Books by Paul Silas Peterson

After the birth of the Protestant ecumenical movement in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and following the first great wave of universal Christian ecumenism in the 1960s and 1970s after the Second Vatican Council, prominent theologians of nearly every ecclesial tradition charted new territory in the last decades of the twentieth century. They crossed boundaries within their own ecclesial traditions and built bridges to other Christian churches--churches that were once excluded from fellowship. In the development of these new programs of ecumenical theology, the theologians redefined their own confessional identities and, in many cases, crossed the liberal-conservative divide within their own traditions. This volume introduces this fascinating dynamic of theological mediation, redefinition, and generosity. It shows how the ecumenical impulses, which were directed outwardly to other traditions, had reflexive effects inwardly. Working in the realms of both historical and systematic theology, the essays in this volume provide a critical analysis of the history of this general theological sentiment and offer an outlook for its future.Contributors Brian D. McLaren, ForewordPaul Silas Peterson, IntroductionPart One: Ecumenical reform theologiesAndrew Meszaros, Yves Congar: The Birth of ""Catholic Ecumenism""Matthew L. Becker, Edmund Schlink: Ecumenical TheologyDorothea Sattler, Otto Hermann Pesch: Ecumenical ScholasticismRonald T. Michener, George Lindbeck: Ecumenical Unity through Ecclesial ParticularityNikolaos Asproulis, John D. Zizioulas: A Pioneer of Ecumenical Dialogue and Christian UnityPart Two: Overcoming liberal-conservative polaritiesBen Fulford, Hans Frei: Beyond Liberal and Conservative Friederike Nussel, Wolfhart Pannenberg: Liberal OrthodoxyJay T. Smith, Stanley J. Grenz: The Evangelical Turn to Postliberal Theological MethodPart Three: Boundary crossings in philosophical, systematic and ethical theologyWilliam E. Myatt, David Tracy: Difference, Unity, and the Analogical ImaginationChristophe Chalamet, Robert Jenson: God's Way and the Ways of the ChurchVictoria Lorrimar, Stanley Hauerwas: Witnessing Communities of CharacterChristine M. Helmer, Marilyn McCord Adams: Philosophy, Theology, and PrayerPart Four: Ecumenical theology todayWolfgang Vonday, Pentecostalism and Christian Orthodoxy: Revision, Revival, and RenewalJohanna Rahner, Shifting Paradigms - Future Ecumenical ChallengesMichael Amaladoss, Theology today in India: Ecumenical or interreligious?Bernd Oberdorfer, Next Steps - and Visions? Lutheran Perspectives on Doctrinal Ecumenism

although Hans Urs von Balthasar's earliest publication is from 1925, and although he was a mature forty years old in 1945, there is a deficiency in the secondary literature regarding his early literature, its historical backgrounds and non-theological sources. In this study Balthasar is presented in relation to the various contexts in which he was both drawing upon and responding to from the 1920s to the 1940s. The major contexts analyzed here are the broad central European Germanophone cultural context, the Germanophone Catholic cultural context, the German studies context, the French Catholic renewal literature and theology of the early 20th-century, the popular journal Stimmen der Zeit, Neo-Scholasticism, early 20th-century French Catholic culture, Swiss fascism, National Socialist literature, the Renouveau Catholique, the George-Kreis and many others. Balthasar's early anti-Semitism and some of the problematic aspects of his early work are also addressed in this study. His understanding of the modern age, his relationships with some key intellectual figures and his later reflections on his early work are also introduced. The book offers a comprehensive study of Balthasar's early intellectual development.

The Reformation was the single most important event of the early modern period of Western civilization. In Reformation in the Western World, Paul Silas Peterson shows how the retrieval of the ancient Christian teachings about God's grace and the authority of Scripture influenced culture, society, and the political order.