This book offers a comprehensive introduction to process theology by one of its foremost practitioners.

The Church of God in Christ (COGIC), an African American Pentecostal denomination founded in 1896, has become the largest Pentecostal denomination in the United States today. In this first major study of the church, Anthea Butler examines the religious and social lives of the women in the COGIC Women's Department from its founding in 1911 through the mid-1960s. She finds that the sanctification, or spiritual purity, that these women sought earned them social power both in the church and in the black community. Offering rich, lively accounts of the activities of the Women's Department founders and other members, Butler shows that the COGIC women of the early decades were able to challenge gender roles and to transcend the limited responsibilities that otherwise would have been assigned to them both by churchmen and by white-dominated society. The Great Depression, World War II, and the civil rights movement brought increased social and political involvement, and the Women's Department worked to make the "sanctified world" of the church interact with the broader American society. More than just a community of church mothers, says Butler, COGIC women utilized their spiritual authority, power, and agency to further their contestation and negotiation of gender roles in the church and beyond.

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From one of the world’s most influential spiritual thinkers, a long-awaited book exploring what it means that Jesus was called “Christ,” and how this forgotten truth can restore hope and meaning to our lives. “Anyone who strives to put their faith into action will find encouragement and inspiration in the pages of this book.”—Melinda Gates In his decades as a globally recognized teacher, Richard Rohr has helped millions realize what is at stake in matters of faith and spirituality. Yet Rohr has never written on the most perennially talked about topic in Christianity: Jesus. Most know who Jesus was, but who was Christ? Is the word simply Jesus’s last name? Too often, Rohr writes, our understandings have been limited by culture, religious debate, and the human tendency to put ourselves at the center. Drawing on scripture, history, and spiritual practice, Rohr articulates a transformative view of Jesus Christ as a portrait of God’s constant, unfolding work in the world. “God loves things by becoming them,” he writes, and Jesus’s life was meant to declare that humanity has never been separate from God—except by its own negative choice. When we recover this fundamental truth, faith becomes less about proving Jesus was God, and more about learning to recognize the Creator’s presence all around us, and in everyone we meet. Thought-provoking, practical, and full of deep hope and vision, The Universal Christ is a landmark book from one of our most beloved spiritual writers, and an invitation to contemplate how God liberates and loves all that is.

Over 3 million copies sold! Essential reading for Catholics of all walks of life. Here it is - the first new Catechism of the Catholic Church in more than 400 years, a complete summary of what Catholics around the world commonly believe. The Catechism draws on the Bible, the Mass, the Sacraments, Church tradition and teaching, and the lives of saints. It comes with a complete index, footnotes and cross-references for a fuller understanding of every subject. The word catechism means "instruction" - this book will serve as the standard for all future catechisms. Using the tradition of explaining what the Church believes (the Creed), what she celebrates (the Sacraments), what she lives (the Commandments), and what she prays (the Lord's Prayer), the Catechism of the Catholic Church offers challenges for believers and answers for all those interested in learning about the mystery of the Catholic faith. The Catechism of the Catholic Church is a positive, coherent and contemporary map for our spiritual journey toward transformation.

Investigating Vatican II is a collection of Fr. Jared Wicks’ recent articles on Vatican II, and presents the Second Vatican Council as an event to which theologians contributed in major ways and from which Catholic theology can gain enormous insights. Taken as a whole, the articles take the reader into the theological dynamics of Vatican II at key moments in the Council’s historical unfolding. Wicks promotes a contemporary re-reception of Vatican II’s theologically profound documents, especially as they featured God’s incarnate and saving Word, laid down principles of Catholic ecumenical engagement, and articulated the church’s turn to the modern world with a new “face” of respect and dedication to service. From the original motivations of Pope John XXIII in convoking the Council, Investigating Vatican II goes on to highlight the profound insights offered by theologians who served behind the scenes as Council experts. In its chapters, the book moves through the Council’s working periods, drawing on the published and non-published records, with attention to the Council’s dramas, crises, and breakthroughs. It brings to light the bases of Pope Francis’s call for synodality in a listening church, while highlighting Vatican II’s mandate to all of prayerful biblical reading, for fostering a vibrant “joy in the Gospel.”

For too long certain scholars have been content to portray Irenaeus of Lyons as a well-meaning churchman but incompetent theologian. By offering a careful reading of Irenaeus' polemical and constructive arguments, God and Christ in Irenaeus contradicts these claims by showing that he was highly educated, trained in the rhetorical arts, aware of general philosophical positions, and able to use both rhetorical and philosophical theories and methods in his argumentation. Moreover, the theological account laid down by his pen was original and sophisticated, supremely so for one of the second century. In contrast to readings that minimize the metaphysical dimension of Irenaeus' theology, Anthony Briggman establishes as pillars of Irenaeus' polemical argumentation and constructive theology his conception of the divine being as infinite and simple, the reciprocal immanence of the Word-Son and God the Father, divine generation, the union of the divine Word-Son and human nature in the person of Christ, and the revelatory activity of the infinite and incomprehensible Word-Son, amongst other features of his theology. Briggman offers a fundamentally new understanding of Irenaeus and his thought.

We live in an age of skepticism. Our society places such faith in empirical reason, historical progress, and heartfelt emotion that it’s easy to wonder: Why should anyone believe in Christianity? What role can faith and religion play in our modern lives? In this thoughtful and inspiring new book, pastor and New York Times bestselling author Timothy Keller invites skeptics to consider that Christianity is more relevant now than ever. As human beings, we cannot live without meaning, satisfaction, freedom, identity, justice, and hope. Christianity provides us with unsurpassed resources to meet these needs. Written for both the ardent believer and the skeptic, Making Sense of God shines a light on the profound value and importance of Christianity in our lives.