Download or read book The Church of the Undressed written by Theo Theodora and published by Independently Published. This book was released on 2019-09-16 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What would you do if God directed you to preach a gospel of nudism?Meet proper, meek Kellie Miller. She's married to John Calvin Miller, a young and impoverished new minister. Life is lean at the Miller household until Kellie learns that she has inherited Running Tail Meadows, a resort worth almost $2,000,000! The catch is that it is dedicated to clothing-free living and there's nothing John and Kellie can do about it. How humiliating! Butt naked men! Butt naked women! In the same place-at the same time! Displaying breasts, buttocks, everything! Penises! Vaginas! Nude straights! Nude gays! Shameless! Brazen! Exhibitionism and voyeurism! A sea of succulent flesh: tanned, oiled and tantalizing! And John Calvin a man of the cloth!While anxiously trying to dispose of this albatross, the naive young newlyweds discover that life can be complicated. Friction arises between husband and wife, and neither one is entirely innocent. Then, without warning, Kellie changes-in many ways. Things couldn't get much more confusing. But, of course, they do.Has Kellie gone nuts? Is John the man he thinks he is? What's right? What's wrong? Does everyone get what they deserve? And does love really conquer all?Join John and Kellie, Harry, Roxanne, Cassandra, Barb and Bob as they pick their way through the minefield that seems to lie between them and their would-be Garden of Eden.Warning: This book deals graphically with the topics of nudism and religion. Please do not read it if you are likely to be offended by either, both, or the intersection of the two.
Download or read book The Naked Gospel written by Andrew Farley and published by Zondervan. This book was released on 2009 with total page 242 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Naked Gospel is a chapter-by-chapter assault on the churchy jargon and double talk of our day. It puts forth a message that is simple but life-changing. With a fresh take on Scripture and unapologetic style, The Naked Gospel will challenge you to re-examine everything you thought you already knew.
Download or read book Christian Modesty and the Public Undressing of America written by Jeff Pollard and published by Vision Forum. This book was released on 2003-10 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A much needed tonic for every Christian parent.
Download or read book The Naked Public Square written by Richard John Neuhaus and published by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. This book was released on 1986 with total page 300 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Underlying the many crises in American life, writes Richard John Neuhaus, is a crisis of faith. It is not enough that more people should believe or that those who believe should believe more strongly. Rather, the faith of persons and communities must be more compellingly related to the public arena. "The naked public square"--which results from the exclusion of popular values from the public forum--will almost certainly result in the death of democracy. The great challenge, says Neuhaus, is the reconstruction of a public philosophy that can undergird American life and America's ambiguous place in the world. To be truly democratic and to endure, such a public philosophy must be grounded in values that are based on Judeo-Christian religion. The remedy begins with recognizing that democratic theory and practice, which have in the past often been indifferent or hostile to religion, must now be legitimated in terms compatible with biblical faith. Neuhaus explores the strengths and weaknesses of various sectors of American religion in pursuing this task of critical legitimation. Arguing that America is now engaged in an historic moment of testing, he draws upon Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish thinkers who have in other moments of testing seen that the stakes are very high--for America, for the promise of democratic freedom elsewhere, and possibly for God's purpose in the world. An honest analysis of the situation, says Neuhaus, shatters false polarizations between left and right, liberal and conservative. In a democratic culture, the believer's respect for nonbelievers is not a compromise but a requirement of the believer's faith. Similarly, the democratic rights of those outside the communities of religious faith can be assured only by the inclusion of religiously-grounded values in the common life. The Naked Public Square does not offer yet another partisan program for political of social change. Rather, it offers a deeply disturbing, but finally hopeful, examination of Abraham Lincoln's century-old question--whether this nation or any nation so conceived and so dedicated can long endure.
Download or read book The Naked Christ written by Dan Le and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2012-08-22 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The cross of Christ is undeniably central to the Christian faith. But, how can the cruelty and brutality of a two-thousand-year-old Roman cross touch base with a hedonistic world that has been so desensitized towards violence? Within the postmodern setting of a body-obsessed culture, Christianity urgently requires an innovative and stimulating way of understanding the cross and its atoning significance. At the heart of this book is the Naked Christ--an emblem through which the author draws on the rich resources of the Christian tradition in its portrayal of the cross. He explores how the metaphors of nakedness and clothing can encapsulate aspects of atonement and enable them to be understood within a variety of contemporary contexts. The Naked Christ is a useful resource for anyone seeking fresh ways to express what the cross of Christ means to contemporary culture.
Download or read book The Naked Anabaptist written by Stuart Murray and published by MennoMedia, Inc.. This book was released on 2015-10-20 with total page 204 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Click here to read the introduction to The Naked Anabaptist. In churches and kitchens and neighborhood centers across the world, communities of Jesus-followers are crafting a vision of radical service, simple living, and commitment to peace. Many are finding a home in a Christian tradition almost five centuries old: Anabaptism. Who are the Anabaptists? What do they believe? Where did they come from? What makes them different from other Christians? And can you become an Anabaptist without leaving your own church? Follow Stuart Murray as he peels back the layers to reveal the core convictions of Anabaptist Christianity, a way of following Jesus that challenges, disturbs, and inspires. Glimpse an alternative to nationalistic, materialistic, individualistic Christian faith. If you are seeking a community of authentic discipleship, heartfelt worship, sacrificial service, and radical peacemaking, consider this your invitation. This new edition features: Voices and stories from North America and the global church. Updated and expanded definition and discussion of Christendom. Updated resource section. Free downloadable study guide available here.
Download or read book The Naked Jesus written by John Casimir O'keefe and published by CreateSpace. This book was released on 2014-02-07 with total page 264 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Why this book is so important to me and why I would love for everyone to read it: When we find the Naked Jesus, we uncover the freedom to put our faith into action; we desire to do something and not just believe something; we stop talking a good game and get dirty playing the game; we are freed from the institutional church structure that desires to define us and stand invited to the table where the Naked Jesus help us discover who we are; we are freed from the garbage it brings to the party; and we no longer swim in the slime of the shallow end of the pool.
Download or read book The Jewish Apocalyptic Heritage in Early Christianity written by James C. VanderKam and published by Fortress Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains five chapters which investigate the early Christian appropriations of Jewish apocalyptic material. An introductory chapter surveys ancient perceptions of the apocalyses as well as their function, authority, and survival in the early Church. The second chapter focuses on a specific tradition by exploring the status of the Enoch-literature, the use of the fallen-angel motif, and the identification of Enoch as an eschatological witness. Christian transmission of Jewish texts, a topic whose significance is more and more being recognized, is the subject of chapter three which analyzes what happend to 4,5 and 6 Ezra as they were copied and edited in Christian circles. Chapter four studies the early Christian appropriation and reinterpretation of Jewish apocalyptic chronologies, especially Daniel's vision of 70 weeks. The fifth and last chapter is devoted to the use and influence of Jewish apocalyptic traditions among Christian sectarian groups in Asia Minor and particularly in Egypt. Taken together these chapters written by four authors, offer illuminating examples of how Jewish apocalyptic texts and traditions fared in early Christianity. Editors James C. VanderKam is lecturing at the University of Notre Dame; William Adler is lecturer at North Carolina State University. Series: Compendia Rerum Iudaicarum ad Novum Testamentum Section 1 - The Jewish people in the first century Historial geography, political history, social, cultural and religious life and institutions Edited by S. Safrai and M. Stern in cooperation with D. Flusser and W.C. van Unnik Section 2 - The Literature of the Jewish People in the Period of the Second Temple and the Talmud Section 3 - Jewish Traditions in Early Christian Literature.
Download or read book The Sexuality of Christ in Renaissance Art and in Modern Oblivion written by Leo Steinberg and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2014-12-10 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Originally published in 1983, Leo Steinberg's classic work has changed the viewing habits of a generation. After centuries of repression and censorship, the sexual component in thousands of revered icons of Christ is restored to visibility. Steinberg's evidence resides in the imagery of the overtly sexed Christ, in Infancy and again after death. Steinberg argues that the artists regarded the deliberate exposure of Christ's genitalia as an affirmation of kinship with the human condition. Christ's lifelong virginity, understood as potency under check, and the first offer of blood in the circumcision, both required acknowledgment of the genital organ. More than exercises in realism, these unabashed images underscore the crucial theological import of the Incarnation. This revised and greatly expanded edition not only adduces new visual evidence, but deepens the theological argument and engages the controversy aroused by the book's first publication.
Download or read book The Renaissance Nude written by Thomas Kren and published by Getty Publications. This book was released on 2018-11-20 with total page 436 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A gloriously illustrated examination of the origins and development of the nude as an artistic subject in Renaissance Europe Reflecting an era when Europe looked to both the classical past and a global future, this volume explores the emergence and acceptance of the nude as an artistic subject. It engages with the numerous and complex connotations of the human body in more than 250 artworks by the greatest masters of the Renaissance. Paintings, sculptures, prints, drawings, illuminated manuscripts, and book illustrations reveal private, sometimes shocking, preoccupations as well as surprising public beliefs—the Age of Humanism from an entirely new perspective. This book presents works by Albrecht Dürer, Lucas Cranach, and Martin Schongauer in the north and Donatello, Raphael, and Giorgione in the south; it also introduces names that deserve to be known better. A publication this rich in scholarship could only be produced by a variety of expert scholars; the sixteen contributors are preeminent in their fields and wide-ranging in their knowledge and curiosity. The structure of the volume—essays alternating with shorter texts on individual artworks—permits studies both broad and granular. From the religious to the magical and the poetic to the erotic, encompassing male and female, infancy, youth, and old age, The Renaissance Nude examines in a profound way what it is to be human.
Download or read book The Undressing Poems written by Li-Young Lee and published by W. W. Norton & Company. This book was released on 2018-02-20 with total page 97 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “Immediate, sensual, unrelentingly intense.” —NPR A breathtaking volume about the violence of desire and the peace of love from celebrated poet Li-Young Lee, The Undressing is a tonic for spiritual anemia; it attempts to uncover things hidden since the dawn of the world. Short of achieving that end, these mysterious, unassuming poems investigate the human violence and dispossession increasingly prevalent around the world, and the horrors the poet grew up with as a child of refugees. Lee draws from disparate sources including the Old Testament, the Dao De Jing, and the music of the Wu-Tang Clan. While the ostensive subjects of these layered, impassioned poems are wide-ranging, their driving engine is a burning need to understand our collective human mission.
Download or read book Untigering written by Iris Chen and published by . This book was released on 2021-03-05 with total page 248 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Peaceful parenting is hard enough for the average parent. Imagine trying to do it when you have the instincts of a tiger mother. In Untigering, Iris Chen shares her journey of leaving behind authoritarian tiger parenting to embrace a respectful, relational way of raising children. As a Chinese American mom, she draws from her experiences of living in both North America and Asia and offers insights and practices to:?Heal from your childhood wounds?Change your beliefs about yourself and your children?Parent through connection instead of control?Redefine your understanding of success?Navigate and challenge cultural norms Iris calls for a radical shift from parenting that is rooted in power to one that is grounded in partnership, but she does so with humor, humility, and empathy. This book is her invitation to you to begin your own journey of transformation as a parent.
Download or read book So You Don t Want to Go to Church Anymore written by Wayne Jacobsen and published by Windblown Media. This book was released on 2008-09-02 with total page 157 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jake Colsen, an overworked and disillusioned pastor, happens into a stranger who bears an uncanny resemblance (in manner) to the apostle John. A number of encounters with John as well as a family crisis lead Jake to a new understanding of what his life should be like: one filled with faith bolstered by a steady, close relationship with the God of the universe. Facing his own disappointment with Christianity, Jake must forsake the habits that have made his faith rote and rediscover the love that captured his heart when he first believed. Compelling and intensely personal, So You Don't Want to Go to Church Anything relates a man's rebirth from performance-based Christianity to a loving friendship with Christ that affects all he does, thinks, and says. As John tells Jake, "There is nothing the Father desires for you more than that you fall squarely in the lap of his love and never move from that place for the rest of your life."
Download or read book God without Religion written by Andrew Farley and published by Baker Books. This book was released on 2011-06-01 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Andrew Farley's experience as a Christian was first characterized by self-effort as he tried to please God at any cost. His ruthless religion resulted in spiritual burnout and disillusionment with church. Only then did he discover what relaxing in Jesus means and how enjoying God's intimate presence can transform everyday life. Using a unique story-driven format, God without Religion dismantles common religious misconceptions, revealing the true meaning of being filled with the Spirit the facts about judgment, rewards, and God's discipline the simple truth behind predestination and the divisions it causes the problem with the popular challenge to "live radical" Pulling no punches, Farley shows how the truth about these controversial issues can liberate and unify believers as we discover how to rest in the unconditional love of God.
Download or read book The Naked Christian written by Craig Borlase and published by Relevant Media Group. This book was released on 2005 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book is for anyone who grew up in the Church, but did their growing up far away from it. Author Craig Borlase offers answers for those looking for vulnerable Christianity, the kind that makes us unafraid of being naked before each other and God. If you feel you fit just outside of what the Church has to offer, this book offers answers based in Scripture and will lead you into a more authentic relationship with Christ and others. ?The Naked Christian is a book that makes me glad I'm a Christian, and that hasn't happened in a very long time.? Mike Yaconelli ?Craig Borlase shakes off the dust, longing for a purer and more real walk with God. The Naked Christian helps us rethink some of our ?church-culture? mindsets, with refreshingly blunt honesty.? Matt Redman
Download or read book The Naked Marriage written by Dave Willis and published by XO Publishing. This book was released on 2019-02-12 with total page 197 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "Now the man and his wife were both naked, but they felt no shame." (Genesis 2:25) Imagine a marriage with complete intimacy, vulnerability, transparency and trust. Imagine a marriage rooted in faith, friendship and mutual fulfillment. Imagine a marriage with amazing sex, but where great sex is only the icing on the cake. This might all sound too good to be true, but it's actually what God designed marriage to be, and He doesn't want you settling for anything less. Having a "Naked Marriage' is about much more than just nakedness in the bedroom (although that's part of the fun). It means being naked emotionally and spiritually as well as physically. It also means undressing all the misconceptions our culture has used to cover God's original, beautiful design for marriage and rediscovering all marriage can be. You and your spouse can have a thriving, Naked Marriage with a lifetime of love and laughter together. This book will show you how. About the Authors: Dave and Ashley Willis have become some of America's most trusted teachers on marriage. Their books, blogs, videos and speaking events reach millions of couples worldwide. They are part of the team at XO Marriage and MarriageToday, which is the largest marriage-focused ministry in the USA. Dave and Ashley have four young sons and live near Dallas, TX.
Download or read book Naked Spirituality written by Brian D. McLaren and published by HarperOne. This book was released on 2012-09-25 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Christianity is in crisis. Many sincere Christians feel their traditional Christian practices are in danger of becoming irrelevant, empty rituals. In his previous book A New Kind of Christianity, Brian D. McLaren offered new biblical models for how we understand the central ideas of a faith that provides hope for restoring and reinvigorating the power of the gospels to transform us and our communities. In Naked Spirituality, McLaren takes his prophetic work a step further by confronting how the lack of a simple, doable, durable spirituality undermines the very transformation God is calling us to undergo. As a result, our religious structures become tools to maintain the status quo and not catalysts for personal and social change. McLaren presents a four-stage framework for understanding the spiritual life, and he unfolds spiritual practices appropriate to each stage. Each practice is rooted in a simple word: here, thanks, O, sorry, help, please, when, no, why, behold, yes, and silence. Naked Spirituality offers accessible, practical wisdom for living a truly spiritual life. Staying true to Jesus's core message while engaging faithfully with our postmodern world, McLaren presents a proven spiritual program for engaging in and sustaining a meaningful relationship with God.
