Christianity, Politics, and the Predicament of Evil overcomes a defining divide in contemporary Protestant political ethics created by two contrasting conceptions of politics. The first, exemplified in the work of Reinhold Niebuhr, construes politics as a matter of statecraft that utilizes the power of government to secure the greatest possible order and justice for society as a whole. The second, most prominently articulated by Stanley Hauerwas, maintains that politics concerns itself with the cultivation of virtue; consequently, it finds not the “well-ordered state” but the church to be the exemplar of politics. Not only illuminating the divide between politics-as-statecraft and politics-as-soulcraft but also redeveloping the conceptual space between them, this book reconceives politics within a theological framework in which the eschatological City of God, rather than the well-ordered state or the faithful church, functions as the paradigm of political life. At the same time, it simultaneously recognizes that the existence of evil, which corrupts individual wills and social structures, inhibits human beings from building the City of God in this world. Analyzing, criticizing, and drawing resources from Niebuhr and Hauerwas, as well as looking beyond to Augustine, Martin Luther King, Jr., and others, this book specifies the respective roles of soulcraft and statecraft in a political ethic capable of guiding Christians as they witness to God’s eschatological intention to establish the City of God in a world currently mired in the predicament of evil.

A bold new interpretation of Augustine’s virtue of hope and its place in political life When it comes to politics, Augustine of Hippo is renowned as one of history’s great pessimists, with his sights set firmly on the heavenly city rather than the public square. Many have enlisted him to chasten political hopes, highlighting the realities of evil and encouraging citizens instead to cast their hopes on heaven. A Commonwealth of Hope challenges prevailing interpretations of Augustinian pessimism, offering a new vision of his political thought that can also help today’s citizens sustain hope in the face of despair. Amid rising inequality, injustice, and political division, many citizens wonder what to hope for in politics and whether it is possible to forge common hopes in a deeply polarized society. Michael Lamb takes up this challenge, offering the first in-depth analysis of Augustine’s virtue of hope and its profound implications for political life. He draws on a wide range of Augustine’s writings—including neglected sermons, letters, and treatises—and integrates insights from political theory, religious studies, theology, and philosophy. Lamb shows how diverse citizens, both religious and secular, can unite around common hopes for the commonwealth. Recovering this understudied virtue and situating Augustine within his political, rhetorical, and religious contexts, A Commonwealth of Hope reveals how Augustine’s virtue of hope can help us resist the politics of presumption and despair and confront the challenges of our time.

What did the apostle Paul mean when he portrayed the creation as subjected to frustration and enslaved to destruction? What forms of frustration and destruction might he have seen throughout the Roman Empire? And how would he describe creation's condition today? Creation's Slavery and Liberation addresses these questions by tracing the story of creation as it appears in Paul's own Scriptures (the Tanakh), Roman imperial propaganda, Paul's letter to Rome, and U.S. industrial agriculture. This story reveals God to be the Creator who makes right (justifies) and makes alive through Jesus Christ and the Spirit. Because God liberates, justifies, and vivifies the entire creation and since--according to Paul--creation's liberation is linked to humanity's glorification, Paul expects Christians to pursue justice and nourish life. Burroughs encapsulates key justice-oriented and life-supporting practices in seven eco-ethical principles. To make these principles come alive, she describes the ways in which Roman imperial and American industrial regimes have caused injustice and destruction and, instead, she proposes more regenerative approaches to growing, enjoying, and sharing our daily bread.

The Business of War incisively interrogates the development and contemporary implications of the military-industrial complex. It exposes the moral dangers of life in neoliberal economies dependent upon war-making for their growth and brings the Christian tradition's abundance of resources into conversation with this phenomenon. In doing so, the authors invite us to rethink the moral possibilities of Christian life in the present day with an eye toward faithful resistance to "the business of war" and its influence in every aspect of our lives. In combining biblical, historical, theological, and ethical analyses of "the business of war," the authors invite us to better understand it as a new moral problem that demands a new, faithful response. With contributions from: Pamela Brubaker Stan Goff Christina McRorie Logan Mehl-Laituri Kara Slade Won Chul Shin David Swartz Jonathan Tran Myles Werntz Matthew Whelan Tobia Winright

For the past sixty years, the Pentecostal and Charismatic movement has played a major role in Zambia. In this book, Naar Mfundisi-Holloway explains the history of this development and its impact on civic engagement. She opens a discussion on church-state relations and explains how the church presented a channel of hope in the wake of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, despite having a history that eschewed civic engagement. In fact, the pandemic propelled the church to work alongside the state in the fight against the disease. Using interviews and historical analysis, this book provides valuable insight into how Pentecostal and Charismatic churches have effectively engaged matters of civic concern in Zambia dating from colonial times.

The book is about showing different ways of doing ethics, highlighting a kind of methodological pluralism. This book attempts to relate the difference in methodology and perspective to difference in identity, focal point of analysis, or projects of persuasion. Difference matters ultimately because pluralism matters. This book is a tutorial in ethical analysis and reasoning. Seminarians and graduate students will be brought into the finer points of ethical analysis, of mastering the ins and outs of ethical methodology, by immersing themselves in critical social-ethical analyses of prominent scholars in the American academy. Students will be guided toward how to develop their own voice in social issues, hone their capability in social analysis, and critically engage the social sciences, history, philosophy, and literature as they embark on ethical analyses. There is no single way of teaching the methodology of social ethics and no single theory of ethics that satisfies all; therefore ethics and its methodology are better understood by enabling students to view the field through multiple "windows." Simultaneously they will learn to view social reality from different perspectives. The seven chapters of this book explore the different ways American ethicists have interrogated their nation's moral systems or crafted methods for understanding them.