Free Creatures Of An Eternal God

(Peeters 1996)

The traditional doctrine of God's universal causality holds that God directly causes all entities distinct from himself, including all creaturely actions. But can our actions be free in the strong, libertarian sense if they are directly caused by God? W. Matthews Grant argues that free creaturely acts have dual sources, God and the free creaturely agent, and are ultimately up to both in a way that leaves all the standard conditions for libertarian freedom satisfied. Offering a comprehensive alternative to existing approaches for combining theism and libertarian freedom, he proposes new solutions for reconciling libertarian freedom with robust accounts of God's providence, grace, and predestination. He also addresses the problem of moral evil without the commonly employed Free Will Defense. Written for analytic philosophers and theologians, Grant's approach can be characterized as “neo-scholastic” as well as “analytic,” since many of the positions defended are inspired by, consonant with, and develop resources drawn from the scholastic tradition, especially Aquinas.

An ongoing seminar, led by Ronald Thiemann of Harvard Divinity School, took the arts as the point of departure for consideration of the role of religion in public life, particularly the ways in which Lutheran intellectuals and academics might participate. The emergence of religious meaning in the arts (especially music and literature) and the nature of the spirituality that results are considered by the seminar participants: Curt Thompson, Gregg Muilenburg, Bruce Heggen, Carol Gilbertson, Kathryn P. Duffy, Karen Black, Kathryn Ananda-Owens, James Hanson.

Distinguished scholar Matthew Levering examines the doctrine of creation and its contemporary theological implications, critically engaging with classical and modern views in dialogue with Orthodox and Reformed interlocutors, among others. Moving from the Trinity to Christology, Levering takes up a number of themes pertaining to the doctrine of creation and focuses on how creation impacts our understandings of both the immanent and the economic Trinity. He also engages newer trends such as ecological theology.

The claim that God is timeless has been the majority view throughout church history. However, it is not obvious that divine timelessness is compatible with fundamental Christian doctrines such as creation and incarnation. Theologians have long been aware of the conflict between divine timelessness and Christian doctrine, and various solutions to these conflicts have been developed. In contemporary thought, it is widely agreed that new theories on the nature of time can further help solve these conflicts. Do these solutions actually solve the conflict? Can the Christian God be timeless? The End of the Timeless God sets forth a thorough investigation into the Christian understanding of God and the God-world relationship. It argues that the Christian God cannot be timeless.

Drawing on modern physics and ancient metaphysics, Stephen H. Webb constructs a philosophy of Christian materialism based on the unity of matter and spirit in the incarnation.

Pro Ecclesia is a quarterly journal of theology published by the Center for Catholic and Evangelical Theology. It seeks to give contemporary expression to the one apostolic faith and its classic traditions, working for and manifesting the church's unity by research, theological construction, and free exchange of opinion. Members of its advisory council represent communities committed to the authority of Holy Scripture, ecumenical dogmatic teaching and the structural continuity of the church, and are themselves dedicated to maintaining and invigorating these commitments. The journal publishes biblical, liturgical, historical and doctrinal articles that promote or illumine its purposes. Ways to subscribe: Call toll-free: 800-273-2223 Email: [email protected] For back-issues, please contact [email protected] Editorial inquiries: Joseph Mangina, [email protected] Submissions should be sent by email attachment in Microsoft Word, double-spaced, with identifying marks removed for the purposes of blind peer review. Book review inquiries: Chad Pecknold, [email protected] Advertising inquiries: Charles Roth, Jr., [email protected] Subscription inquiries: [email protected] ISSN: 1063-8512

This work is a fresh, unusually lucid approach to Christian theology and interfaith dialogue fromÊIndia.ÊIts basic aim is to examine the Christian consciousness of God's work in history--redemption history within the entire Êhistory of the world.ÊIt uses Christian Faith by Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768-1834) as its main text, so as to view this theme in a reversed order from the way it is presented there. This approach, which centers on God's new creation in Christ, leads to an incisive understanding of Christianity's relation to other modes of faith.ÊThroughout, Dr. Kunnuthara compares the thought of another Indian Christian leader steeped in Hindu thought, Pandippedi Chenchiah (1886-1959), to enable renewed interfaith dialogue across a wide spectrum.