10AR15-31

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Apologia Report 15:31 (1,036)

August 18, 2010

Subject: Moral transformation: Evidence for God

In this issue:

AFRICAN PENTECOSTALISM - difficulties in classification

ATHEISM - proofs for God based on moral transformation

EVANGELICALISM - Journal of the American Academy of Religion promotes ex-member testimony

MYSTICISM - Choice review includes bibliographic sources

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PLEASE NOTE: Our office will be closed for the next couple of weeks. Consequently, the next issue of AR is scheduled for the week of September 5th.

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AFRICAN PENTECOSTALISM

"Classifying African Christianities: Past, Present, and Future: Part One" by Paul Kollman -- the lead editorial (pp1-2, no byline) explains that this issue of the Journal of Religion in Africa (40:1 - 2010) addresses "the diaspora that further expands the range of arguments and interventions into the field of Pentecostal / charismatic church and African independent church studies." Here (pp3-32), "Kollman focuses on past studies of African Christianity and identifies their shortcomings. ...

"[C]lassifying African Christian churches on the continent [has been] problematic, Kollman asserts, because African Christians who did not fit into existing typologies were overlooked. In recent years the rapid growth of Pentecostalism and charismatic Christianity has raised new conceptual problems that point out the limitations of previous classifications."

In Kollman's abstract to Part Two <www.tinyurl.com/26ugrlx>, he further explains that "Current approaches to classifying African Christianities include generalizing approaches like Ogbu Kalu's assertion of ongoing revival and particular studies associated with the anthropology of Christianity. Here I argue for a generational approach to African Christian communities, noting what has been achieved and what remains to be done."

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ATHEISM

The Evidence for God: Religious Knowledge Reexamined, by Paul K. Moser [1] -- Moser (Professor and Chairperson of the Dept. of Philosophy at Loyola University, Chicago) "develops a bold evidentialist argument based on human intention that a willful, noncoerced, moral transformation 'becomes personifying evidence' for God. His groundwork includes God as a being worthy of worship that calls humans to manifest divine moral life through self-sacrifice and obedience. In the first three chapters, he dispatches with nontheistic naturalism for failing to provide coherent explanatory strategies; with arguments that fail to articulate a definitely real God worthy of worship; and with arguments that do not include a morally transformative character as 'God.' Chapter 4 discusses the idea that rational argument pertains to religious belief with a kerygmatic nature - not an argument to convince any rational person, but an argument leading to an individual's divine moral transformation. Chapter 5 addresses the multiplicity of religions with the oddly named 'Inclusive Christian Exclusivism' - that 'we know all are saved through Christ: we don't know that only those who know Christ are saved.' Moser dispatches evil as a defeater of belief in God based on the incomprehensibility of God's purposes in all actions. He focuses on recent analytic philosophy of religion while bringing a deep, nuanced respect and use of Christian and Hebrew scripture into the argument. Summing Up: Highly recommended." Choice, Jul '10, n.p.

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EVANGELICALISM

Evangelical Disenchantment: Nine Portraits of Faith and Doubt, by David Hempton [2] -- One of the longest and loudest complaints from sociologists who defend the cults has come against the use of ex-member testimony. So it is with great irony that we find this review in one of the flagship publications for sociologists of religion. And what a way for it to begin. Hempton's premise: "Perhaps there is no better way of understanding the essence of any religious tradition than by looking at the lives of those who once loved and later repudiated it."

Reviewer Catherine Brekus explains that "By examining the lives of nine evangelicals who renounced the tradition, Hempton hopes to come to a deeper understanding of both its strengths and weaknesses. His book tells us the moving stories of nine creative artists who were drawn to evangelicalism's warmth and moral earnestness only to become disillusioned with its intellectual aridity, its support for gender and racial inequalities, its apocalypticism, and its belief in a punishing, judgmental God. [Hempton's] cast of characters represents some of the best-known artists and intellectuals of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries: George Eliot, the brilliant novelist; Frances W Newman, a missionary to Baghdad (and brother of the famous Catholic convert John Henry Newman); Theodore Dwight Weld, the fiery abolitionist; Sarah Grimke, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, and Frances Willard, three inspirational leaders of the feminist movement; Vincent van Gogh, the tortured painter; Edmund Gosse, the novelist; and James Baldwin, the African American writer."

Brekus concludes that "scholars who want a deeper understanding of evangelical struggles over humanitarianism, secularization, reform, missions, race, and feminism will find [Hempton's] book invaluable" adding that it is "beautifully written, often moving, and filled with the same 'moral earnestness' that he finds in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century evangelicalism." Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 78:1 - 2010, pp296-298.

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MYSTICISM

Christian Mysticism: An Introduction to Contemporary Theoretical Approaches, Louise Nelstrop, Kevin Magill, and Bradley B. Onishi, eds. [3] -- "Academic students of Christian mysticism are well served by Nelstrop (Regent's Park College, Oxford, UK) and her collaborators. Their two-pronged analytical framework first identifies four typical interpretive perspectives (perennialist, contextualist, feminist, and performative language) and then focuses on key themes (Platonism, interior selfhood, apophatic language, hierarchies, erotic imagery) to introduce readers to writings of important Christian mystics. This rather challenging book in the British manner would be a worthy complement to Stephen Fanning's Mystics of the Christian Tradition [4], a widely adopted and well-researched introductory history, and to the discerning anthology The Essential Writings of Christian Mysticism [5], edited and with an introduction by Bernard McGinn. Nelstrop and colleagues are highly effective in showing how the study of Christian mysticism has been influenced in recent decades by poststructuralist Continental philosophy and by feminist scholarship. They give rather short shrift to perennialist interpreters (e.g., Huston Smith and his fellow traditionalists) but offer a rewarding introduction to the field. Students reading this book could benefit as well from the recent work of Ann Taves in her Religious Experience Reconsidered [6] and from the online resources edited by Bruce Janz at Roots of Western Mysticism Resources [www.tinyurl.com/6mjyys]." Choice, Jul '10, n.p.

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SOURCES: Monographs

1 - The Evidence for God: Religious Knowledge Reexamined, by Paul K. Moser (Cambridge Univ Prs, 2009, paperback, 289 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/265z7z2>

2 - Evangelical Disenchantment: Nine Portraits of Faith and Doubt, by David Hempton (Yale Univ Prs, 2008, hardcover, 256 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/2eeok5b>

3 - Christian Mysticism: An Introduction to Contemporary Theoretical Approaches, Louise Nelstrop, Kevin Magill, and Bradley B. Onishi, eds. (Ashgate, 2009, paperback, 288 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/26vdmpn>

4 - Mystics of the Christian Tradition, Stephen Fanning (Routledge,2001, paperback, 304 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/233stts>

5 - The Essential Writings of Christian Mysticism, Bernard McGinn, ed. (Modern Library, 2006, paperback, 592 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/2csluuv>

6 - Religious Experience Reconsidered: A Building-Block Approach to the Study of Religion and Other Special Things, Ann Taves (Princeton Univ Prs, 2009, hardcover, 240 pages) <www.tinyurl.com/267qe3w>

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