Download or read book The New Asceticism written by Sarah Coakley and published by Bloomsbury Publishing. This book was released on 2015-11-05 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Each chapter of The New Asceticism concentrates on a contentious issue in contemporary theology - the role of women in the churches, homosexuality and the priesthood, celibacy and the future of Christian asceticism - in an original thesis about the nature of desire which may start to heal many contemporary wounds. Professor Coakley is as familiar with the Bible and the Early Fathers as she is with the writings of Freud and Jung, and she draws heavily on Gregory of Nyssa's theology of desire in what she proposes. She points the way through the false modern alternatives of repression and libertinism, agape and eros, recovering a way in which desire can be freed from associations with promiscuity and disorder, and forging a new ascetical vision founded in the disciplines of prayer and attention.
Download or read book Theology as Ascetic Act written by Nathan G. Jennings and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2010 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Nathan G. Jennings's captivating study explores the ascetical logic of the various practices that Christians call theology. By establishing ascetic practice as coherent within the logic of Christian thought, Jennings argues that Christian theology itself, as an embodied Christian practice, is a type of and participant in Christian asceticism. Jennings establishes that the implications of such an understanding of Christian theology can be brought to bear on modern Christian scholarship in profound and transformative ways. With engagements and references that span a vast terrain from Patristic authors to modern systematic theologians, Theology as Ascetic Act: Disciplining Christian Discourse is a significant contribution to both modern Christian thought and the study of asceticism.
Download or read book The Oxford Handbook of Mystical Theology written by Edward Howells and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2020-02-25 with total page 719 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Oxford Handbook of Mystical Theology provides a guide to the mystical element of Christianity as a theological phenomenon. It differs not only from psychological and anthropological studies of mysticism, but from other theological studies, such as more practical or pastorally-oriented works that examine the patterns of spiritual progress and offer counsel for deeper understanding and spiritual development. It also differs from more explicitly historical studies tracing the theological and philosophical contexts and ideas of various key figures and schools, as well as from literary studies of the linguistic tropes and expressive forms in mystical texts. None of these perspectives is absent, but the method here is more deliberately theological, working from within the fundamental interests of Christian mystical writers to the articulation of those interests in distinctively theological forms, in order, finally, to permit a critical theological engagement with them for today. Divided into four parts, the first section introduces the approach to mystical theology and offers a historical overview. Part two attends to the concrete context of sources and practices of mystical theology. Part three moves to the fundamental conceptualities of mystical thought. The final section ends with the central contributions of mystical teaching to theology and metaphysics. Students and scholars with a variety of interests will find different pathways through the Handbook.
Download or read book Sites of the Ascetic Self written by Niki Kasumi Clements and published by University of Notre Dame Pess. This book was released on 2020-05-31 with total page 329 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sites of the Ascetic Self reconsiders contemporary debates about ethics and subjectivity in an extended engagement with the works of John Cassian (ca. 360–ca. 435), whose stories of extreme asceticism and transformative religious experience by desert elders helped to establish Christian monastic forms of life. Cassian’s late ancient texts, written in the context of social, cultural, political, doctrinal, and environmental change, contribute to an ethics for fractured selves in uncertain times. In response to this environment, Cassian’s practical asceticism provides a uniquely frank picture of human struggle in a world of contingency while also affirming human agency in ways that signaled a challenge to followers of his contemporary, Augustine of Hippo. Niki Kasumi Clements brings these historical and textual analyses of Cassian’s monastic works into conversation with contemporary debates at the intersection of the philosophy of religion and queer and feminist theories. Rather than focusing on interiority and renunciation of self, as scholars such as Michel Foucault read Cassian, Clements analyzes Cassian’s texts by foregrounding practices of the body, the emotions, and the community. By focusing on lived experience in the practical ethics of Cassian, Clements demonstrates the importance of analyzing constructions of ethics in terms of cultivation alongside critical constructions of power. By challenging modern assumptions about Cassian’s asceticism, Sites of the Ascetic Self contributes to questions of ethics, subjectivity, and agency in the study of religion today.
Download or read book English Spirituality written by Martin Thornton and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2012-05-01 with total page 350 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "The republication of this definitive text is long overdue and a must for all those who are concerned for the maintenance of a sound, optimistic spirituality." Alan Jones "Skillfully uses Bible and history to good advantage in this long look at English Spirituality's roots." Christian Century "I know of no other book that rivals Thornton's work as a clear and well written compilation of so much valuable material." Review Of Books & Religion "Will provide both Protestant and Catholic readers with an exceptionally readable and thorough treatment of a shared tradition." Spiritual Live
Download or read book The Spiritual Life written by Reverend Adolphe Tanquerey and published by Catholic Way Publishing. This book was released on 1948 with total page 990 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE SPIRITUAL LIFE: A TREATISE ON ASCETICAL AND MYSTICAL THEOLOGY REVEREND ADOLPHE TANQUEREY — A Catholic Classic! — Two Parts of Four Books in One — Includes 1,773 Active Linked Footnotes — Includes Active Linked Headings, Index and Table of Contents — Includes Religious Illustrations Publisher: Available in Paperbacks: FIRST PART: ISBN-13: 978-1-78379-507-9 SECOND PART: ISBN-13: 978-1-78379-508-6 It is the writer’s conviction that Dogma is the foundation of Ascetical Theology and that an exposition of what God has done and still does for us is the most efficacious motive of true devotion. Hence, care has been taken to recall briefly the truths of faith on which the spiritual life rests. This treatise then is first of all doctrinal in character and aims at bringing out the fact that Christian perfection is the logical outcome of dogma, especially of the central dogma of the Incarnation. The work however is also practical, for a vivid realization of the truths of faith is the strongest incentive to earnest and steady efforts towards the correction of faults and the practice of virtues. Consequently in the first part of this treatise the practical conclusions that naturally flow from revealed truths and the general means of perfection are developed. The second part contains a more detailed exposition of the special means of advancing along the Three Ways towards the heights of perfection. Contents: FIRST PART: Principles SECOND PART: The Three Ways BOOK I: The Purification of the Soul or the Purgative Way BOOK II: The Illuminative Way BOOK III: The Unitive Way PUBLISHER: CATHOLIC WAY PUBLISHING
Download or read book A Manual of Ascetical Theology written by Arthur Devine and published by . This book was released on 1902 with total page 650 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Repentance in Late Antiquity written by Alexis Torrance and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2013 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study provides a fresh perspective on the concept of repentance in early Christianity. Alexis Torrance focuses on writings by several ascetic theologians of the fifth to seventh centuries, and also examines texts from Scripture, early Christian treatises and homilies, apocalyptic material, and canonical literature.
Download or read book Asceticism written by Vincent L. Wimbush and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2002-05-23 with total page 678 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From meditation and fasting to celibacy and anchoritism, the ascetic impulse has been an enduring and complex phenomenon throughout history. Offering a sweeping view of this elusive and controversial aspect of religious life and culture, Asceticism looks at the ascetic impulse from a unique vantage point. Cross-cultural, cross-religious, and multidisciplinary in nature, these essays provide a broad historical and comparative perspective on asceticism--a subject rarely studied outside the context of individual religious traditions. The work represents the input of more than forty preeminent scholars in a wide range of fields and disciplines, and analyzes asceticism from antiquity to the present in European, Near Eastern, African, Asian, and North American settings. Asceticism is organized around four major themes that cut across religious traditions: origins and meanings of asceticism, which explores the motivations and impulses behind ascetic behaviors; hermeneutics of asceticism, which looks at texts and rhetorics and their presuppositions; aesthetics of asceticism, which documents responses evoked by ascetic impulses and practices, as well as the arts of ascetic practices themselves; and politics of asceticism, which analyzes the power dynamics of asceticism, especially as regards gender, cultural, and ethnic differences. Critical responses to the major papers ensure the focus upon the themes and unify the discussion. Two general addresses on broad philosophical and historical-interpretive issues suggest the importance of the subject of asceticism for wide-ranging but serious cultural-critical discussions. An Appendix, Ascetica Miscellanea, includes six short papers on provocative topics not related to the four major themes, and a panel discussion on the practices and meanings of asceticism in contemporary religious life and culture. A selected bibliography and an index are also included. The only comprehensive reference work on asceticism with a multicultural, multireligious, and multidisciplinary perspective, Asceticism offers a model not only for an understanding of a most important dimension of religious life, but also for future interdisciplinary study in general.
Download or read book The Body and Desire written by Raphael A. Cadenhead and published by University of California Press. This book was released on 2018-11-27 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although the reception of the Eastern Father Gregory of Nyssa has varied over the centuries, the past few decades have witnessed a profound awakening of interest in his thought. The Body and Desire sets out to retrieve the full range of Gregory’s thinking on the challenges of the ascetic life by examining within the context of his theological commitments his evolving attitudes on what we now call gender, sex, and sexuality. Exploring Gregory’s understanding of the importance of bodily and spiritual maturation for the practices of contemplation and virtue, Raphael A. Cadenhead recovers the vital relevance of this vision of transformation for contemporary ethical discourse.
Download or read book Athanasius of Alexandria written by David M. Gwynn and published by Oxford University Press (UK). This book was released on 2012-02-16 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A bishop and theologian, an ascetic and a pastoral father, Athanasius of Alexandria (c.295-373) is one of the greatest and most controversial figures of early Christian history. This book draws together these diverse yet inseparable roles that defined Athanasius' life and the influence that he exerted on subsequent Christian tradition.
Download or read book Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great written by Thomas L. Humphries Jr. and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2013-10-24 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ascetic Pneumatology from John Cassian to Gregory the Great presents three interconnected arguments. The first argument concerns scholarly readings of antiquity: there are developments in 5th and 6th century Latin pneumatology which we have overlooked. Theologians like John Cassian and Gregory the Great were engaged in a significant discussion of how the Holy Spirit works within Christian ascetics to reform their inner lives. Other theologians, like Leo the Great, participate to a lesser extent in a similar project. They applied pneumatology to theological anthropology. Thomas L. Humphries, Jr. labels that development "ascetic pneumatology," and beings to track some of the late antique schools of thought about the Holy Spirit. The second argument concerns the reception of Augustine in the two centuries immediately after his death: different people read Augustine differently. Augustine's theology was known and understood to varying degrees in various regions. Humphries demonstrates significant engagements with Augustine's theology as it was relevant to Pelagianism (evidenced in Prosper of Aquitaine), as it was relevant to Gallic Arians (evidenced with the Lérinian theologians), and as it was relevant to African Arians and certain questions posed of Nestorianism (evidenced with Fulgentius of Ruspe). Instead of attempting to rank various theologians as better and worse "Augustinians," Humphries argues that there were different kinds of "Augustinianisms" even in the years immediately after Augustine. The third argument concerns Gregory the Great and his sources. Once we see that ascetic pneumatology was a strain of thought in this era and see that there are different kinds of Augustinianisms, we can see that Gregory depends on both Augustine and Cassian. In the closing chapters, Humphries argues that Gregory uses Cassian's ascetic pneumatology, and this allows Gregory's synthesis of Cassian and Augustine to stand in greater relief than it has before. The study begins with Cassian, ends with Gregory, and is attentive to Augustine throughout.
Download or read book Asceticism and the New Testament written by Leif E. Vaage and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2002-09-11 with total page 457 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First published in 1999. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Download or read book Asceticism and Exegesis in Early Christianity written by Hans-Ulrich Weidemann and published by Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. This book was released on 2013-03-13 with total page 466 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the beginning many of the early Christian communities led an ascetic lifestyle, although a good number of New Testament texts do not seem suitable for justifying radical ascetic and encratite practice. The question thus arises how the different forms of asceticism could be justified on the basis of those scriptures.The articles of the volume focus on the interpretation and application of New Testament texts in various ascetic milieus and in the works of several early Christian authors and on the reception history of New Testament texts either supporting or resisting an ascetic relecture.
Download or read book Theology on the Menu written by David Grumett and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2010-02-26 with total page 477 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Food - what we eat, how much we eat, how it is produced and prepared, and its cultural and ecological significance- is an increasingly significant topic not only for scholars but for all of us. Theology on the Menu is the first systematic and historical assessment of Christian attitudes to food and its role in shaping Christian identity. David Grumett and Rachel Muers unfold a fascinating history of feasting and fasting, food regulations and resistance to regulation, the symbolism attached to particular foods, the relationship between diet and doctrine, and how food has shaped inter-religious encounters. Everyone interested in Christian approaches to food and diet or seeking to understand how theology can engage fruitfully with everyday life will find this book a stimulus and an inspiration.
Download or read book Christian Asceticism written by J. A. Ziesler and published by . This book was released on 1974 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Manual of Ascetical Theology written by Rev Arthur Devine and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2013-07 with total page 638 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The spiritual or supernatural life is the true life of man. His soul or spirit is the principal and ruling part of his being, as it is the more noble part. By the spirit man knows God; by it he is capable of being united to God and, as it were, transformed into Him; whilst, on the other hand, the animal and sensitive part is only the instrument which the soul uses in order to know and rule the material world which is so much inferior to itself. The ascetical life shows that man is not of this world, but of heaven; that he is not for this world, but for Him Who is the Author of man and of the world. The supernatural man as an eagle leaves the earth and soars towards heaven; he desires nothing of this world, he seeks nothing of it, because he feels that he is better than it, and is destined for better things. Before a man reaches the perfection of the spiritual or supernatural life, it behoves him to labour much, to fight hard, because the sensitive part is entirely inclined to creatures, and it does not freely and easily follow the spirit ascending to God, but does so only by force and pressure. For as every material body naturally tends towards the earth, and is raised up from it only by a superior force, so man's senses attracted to creatures, are only by force of God's grace withdrawn from them and elevated unto God. All men are called to perfection according to the moral law, and no one can be saved who is not-at least, at the moment of death in a state of grace. This is the first grade of perfection to which all men are bound, but this does not imply that all men are bound to perfection according to asceticism. The first perfection is of precept, the second of counsel. ASCETICAL theology may be defined A science which from truths divinely revealed explains the doctrine by which souls are directed in the acquisition and perfection of the supernatural life, according to the ordinary providence of God. It is a branch of moral theology, and must of necessity have the ordinary science of theology as its foundation. Although with mystical theology it forms a subdivision of moral theology, it is distinct from both of these sciences. While moral theology prescribes the rules of action, ascetical theology teaches the means by which sanctity of life may be acquired, increased, and perfected. On the other hand, mystical theology seems to indicate a higher and sublimer degree of asceticism. This science does not teach the ordinary and wellbeaten paths of perfection, but shows a more excellent way and deals with a more hidden intercourse between man and God, always aspiring as it does to the higher and the better things, according to the words Whether the impulse of the spirit was to go, thither they went, and they turned not when they went. The distinction of ascetical from moral and mystical is clearly defined and explained by John Bapt. Scaramelli, S.J., in his work entitled 'Directorium Mysticum, ' from which in substance the following explanatory remarks are taken. According to this author, after the soul, assisted by Divine grace, has overcome the sensitive part of our being, and withdrawn it from unlawful indulgence in the use and fruition of creatures, and after it has been established in justice according to the rules of moral theology, then, strengthened and attracted by God, it begins to ascend higher in the scale of perfection, and causes the inferior part of our nature to ascend with it, and thus to become more spiritual. This, he says, is Christian asceticism.
