Modern Church

The last decade has seen the emergence of a whole new generation of church designs. Covering buildings across the world, Contemporary Church Architecture aims to appeal not only to architects and clergy involved directly in ecclesiastical architecture but also other practitioners and those with a broader interest in cutting-edge design. This book covers the development of contemporary church design by looking at how the rational and the sacred can be reconciled and can inform one another. It also outlines the main trends and approaches: the conflict between self-expression and expression of the sacred, between sculptural signification and functionalism. Beautifully illustrated with around 350 photographs.

With an innumerable variety of churches to consider, how does one evaluate which is biblically accurate? God presents truth in His Word, yet that Word is interpreted in countless ways and debated endlessly by the masses. Even educated church leaders, often with impressive academic distinctions, cannot agree on doctrine. How can one person with a lifetime of studying Greek disagree doctrinally, on the same subject, with another who has accomplished the same? Yet it is common, and denominations are the result. Since God is not divided on truth, could He not have presented His Word in a less divisive way? Modern Church: Where Tradition Trumps Truth addresses this mass doctrinal division and shows the fundamental reason for its existence. And in seeing the problem exposed, the reader who accepts the premise will begin building a firm doctrinal foundation needed for evaluating the biblical accuracy of any church, denomination, or idea.

Fifty years after the Second Vatican Council, architectural historian Robert Proctor examines the transformations in British Roman Catholic church architecture that took place in the two decades surrounding this crucial event. Inspired by new thinking in theology and changing practices of worship, and by a growing acceptance of modern art and architecture, architects designed radical new forms of church building in a campaign of new buildings for new urban contexts. A focussed study of mid-twentieth century church architecture, Building the Modern Church considers how architects and clergy constructed the image and reality of the Church as an institution through its buildings. The author examines changing conceptions of tradition and modernity, and the development of a modern church architecture that drew from the ideas of the liturgical movement. The role of Catholic clergy as patrons of modern architecture and art and the changing attitudes of the Church and its architects to modernity are examined, explaining how different strands of post-war architecture were adopted in the field of ecclesiastical buildings. The church building’s social role in defining communities through rituals and symbols is also considered, together with the relationships between churches and modernist urban planning in new towns and suburbs. Case studies analysed in detail include significant buildings and architects that have remained little known until now. Based on meticulous historical research in primary sources, theoretically informed, fully referenced, and thoroughly illustrated, this book will be of interest to anyone concerned with the church architecture, art and theology of this period.

This is the SCM Core Text: "Modern Church History" provides an introduction to global Christianity from 1700 to the mid 20th C. The book aims to help students understand the processes, movements and individuals who have contributed to making the contemporary Christian landscape the shape it is in the 21st century. Theologically it takes a wide and inclusive approach to provide a balanced survey of Christianity in all its forms - Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox. Geographically it focuses on the Christian church in the UK, continental Europe and North America, and examines in each location the social movements, campaigns and campaigners, scientific and political challenges that have shaped the Christian Church throughout the period.Beginning with the reaction to Lutherism, it charts the rise of Pietism in Europe throughout the late 17th and early 18th centuries, the influence of John Wesley and the Methodists, in the UK and the 'Great Awakening' in North America. The early chapters summarize the developments within the Christian Church in the UK, with detailed coverage of the English, Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish situations, throughout the 19th Century. This is followed by a summary of the various schools of thought to have developed through the 20th C, including the church's reaction to the 2 world wars in Europe, fundamentalism in the USA. The book also provides specific coverage of the religious situation in North America throughout the modern period covering the development of separate black churches, the 'New Evangelicalism'. It is suitable for level two as well as introductory courses in modern church history or courses concerned with religion, culture and society in the 18th - 20th centuries

First published in 1930, A History of the Modern Church is a scholarly and readable account of the church from the beginning of the Reformation to modern times. It traces the rise of many attitudes towards life, many conceptions of the faith, and many ecclesiastical systems. This book will be of interest to students of religion and history.

Modern Church History: whole libraries could be filled with published books on this subject. Yet this present volume has a distinctive feature: it is written from an African perspective. It may indeed be the first book written on this subject explicitly from this perspective. And for the author, it has been a life-transforming experience. He has found challenges at every turn: there has been for him a shaking of the foundations in relation to cultural norms, historical presuppositions, and spiritual stereotypes. It has been provocatively affirmed that the future of Christianity is African. The first aim of this book is, appropriately enough, to enable African readers better to understand the significance, for them, of the last half-millennium of global Church History. However, it is hoped that non-African readers will find, from this different perspective, new and creative understandings of the subject a subject which is becoming increasingly pertinent in todays global village.

Given the diversity and complexity of developments in the twentieth century, a history of the Christian Church in the modern period is in some ways the most challenging volume of all to write. But Jeremy Morris succeeds in presenting a coherent account of the Church. He emphasises the changing relationship of Western churches to the many forms of Christianity in other parts of the world, while also departing from the Eurocentric worldview of previous histories. His volume offers three major perspectives. The first is political, in which the history of the modern Church is assessed through a prism of international conflicts and international relations. The second perspective is regional, in which coverage is given not only to Europe and the Americas, but to Christianity in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, the Pacific Rim and Australasia. The author's third major perspective is institutional, in which he discusses particular Christian traditions and their relationships with each other, with other faiths and with wider cultures. An epilogue evaluates the future and prospects for Christianity in the new millennium.