Books published by Augsburg Fortress Publishers

Ellis and Murphy show how contemporary sciences actually support a religiously based ethic of nonviolence, not by appealing to the Enlightment's mechanismic Creator God or revelation's Father God but by discerning the transcendent ground in the laws of nature, the emergence of intelligent freedom, and the echoes of "knoetic" self-giving in cosmology and biology.

In this important work, Child's thesis is that a canonical approach to the scriptures of the Old Testament opens up new possibilities for exploring the theological dimensions of the biblical text.

As the Christian movement nears the end of its second millennium, it faces a crisis that could not have been anticipated at the close of the first thousand yearsor, indeed, by most of our own great-grandparents. Since the most conspicuous dimensions of the waning of Christendom have to do with material decline (the decline in church membership and active attendance of Sunday services, the decline in financial and physical prosperity, the decline of influence in high places), such analyses as there are usually belabor the obvious: something drastic is happening to the churches! "Throughout most of its long history, Christianity has not required of its adherents that they should think the faith. The historical accident of its political and cultural establishment 15 centuries ago ensured that a thinking faith would be purely optional for members of the church. "But thought-less faith, which has always been a contradiction in terms, is today a stage on the road to the extinction, not only of Christianity itself, but of whatever the architects of our civilization meant by 'Humanity.' Only a thinking faith can survive. Only a thinking faith can help the world survive! "- from the Preface

Here is a skillful tracing of two tracks in the evolution of musical genres that have evolved from black religion. Songs of protest developed from the spiritual through social-gospel hymnody to culminate in songs of the civil-rights movement and the blues. Born in rebellion, they envision the Kingdom of God.Songs of praise, by contrast, express adoration. Beginning with the "ring-shout," Spencer follows the history of intoned declamation through the tongue song, Holiness-Pentecostal music, and the chanted sermon of the black preacher. Spencer's approach, termed theomusicology, unlocks the wealth of African-American sacred music with a theological key. The result is a fascinating account of a people's struggle with God in history.

The conversations selected for this volume of Luther's Works have been carefully chosen from among more than seven thousand entries of the Weimar Edition with two aims in veiw: historical perspective and contemporary relevance. The annotations are precise and are related directly to the material at hand.

This volume includes selections from the Christmas Postil, specifically sermons on the Gospel lessons for Christmas Eve, the Early Christmas Service, St. Stephen's Day, the Sunday after Christmas, New Year's Day, and the Festival of the Epiphany.

This volume contains a selection of forty- three sermons arranged in chronological order. Beginning with what may be Luther's earliest extant sermon and ending with the last he delivered before his death, this collection of sermons can give the reader a glimpse into the Reformer's development as a preacher. The forty-three sermons in this volume represent but a fragment of Luther's total output. Even the two thousand sermons or more contained in the Weimar Edition of Luther's writings do not include all of Luther's sermons.

Luther wrote the 119 letters in this volume between 1507 and 1522, during the momentous years that saw him change from an obedient and determined priest of his Order to a vigorous critic of the sale of indulgences and finally to the leader of a reformed church. In these letters Luther discusses his posting of the Ninety-five Theses, the disputations at Heidelberg, Augsburg, and Leipzig, and the bull excommunicating him.