The New Frontier Of Religion And Science

This is the first major response to the challenge of neuroscience to religion. It considers eastern forms of religious experience as well as Christian viewpoints and challenges the idea of a mind identical to, or a by-product of, brain activity. It explores religion as inner experience of the Transcendent, and suggests a modern spirituality.

This is the first major response to the challenge of neuroscience to religion. It considers eastern forms of religious experience as well as Christian viewpoints and challenges the idea of a mind identical to, or a by-product of, brain activity. It explores religion as inner experience of the Transcendent, and suggests a modern spirituality.

This book examines the meaning of religion within the scientific, evidence-based history of our known past since the big bang. While our current major religions are only centuries or millennia old, our volume discusses the origins and development of human religious practice and belief over our species’ existence of 300,000 years. The volume also connects the scientific approach to natural and social history with ancient truths of our religious ancestors using new lines of inquiry, new technologies, new modes of expression, and new concepts. It brings together insights of natural scientists, social scientists, philosophers, writers, and theologians to discuss narratives of the universe. The essays discuss that to apprehend religion scientifically, or to interpret and explain science theologically, the subject must be examined through a variety of disciplinary lenses simultaneously and raise several theoretical, philosophical, and moral problems. With a singular investigation into the meaning of religion in the context of the 13.8 billion-year history of our universe, this book will be indispensable for scholars and students of religious studies, big history, sociology and social anthropology, philosophy, and science and technology studies.

Exploring the religious category of dying to self, this book aims to resolve contemporary issues that relate to detachment. Beginning with an examination of humility in its general notion and as a religious virtue that detachment presupposes, Kellenberger draws on a range of ancient, medieval, modern, and contemporary sources that address the main characteristics of detachment, including the work of Meister Eckhart, St. Teresa, and Simone Weil, as well as writers as varied as Gregory of Nyssa, Rabi'a al-Adawiyya, Søren Kierkegaard, Andrew Newberg, John Hick and Keiji Nishitani. Kellenberger explores the key issues that arise for detachment, including the place of the individual's will in detachment, the relationship of detachment to desire, to attachment to persons, and to self-love and self-respect, and issues of contemporary secular detachment such as inducement via chemicals. This book heeds the relevance of the religious virtue of detachment for those living in the twenty-first century.

Public theologians are already thundering like prophets at climate change and racial injustice. But the gale force winds of natural science blow through society as well. The public theologian should be on storm watch.

Keeping up with the rapidly growing research base, the leading graduate-level psychology of religion text is now in a fully updated fifth edition. It takes a balanced, empirically driven approach to understanding the role of religion in individual functioning and social behavior. Integrating research on numerous different faith traditions, the book addresses the quest for meaning; links between religion and biology; religious thought, belief, and behavior across the lifespan; experiential dimensions of religion and spirituality; the social psychology of religious organizations; and connections to coping, adjustment, and mental disorder. Chapter-opening quotations and topical research boxes enhance the readability of this highly instructive text. New to This Edition *New topics: cognitive science of religion; religion and violence; and groups that advocate terrorist tactics. *The latest empirical findings, including hundreds of new references. *Expanded discussion of atheism and varieties of nonbelief. *More research on religions outside the Judeo-Christian tradition, particularly Islam. *State-of-the-art research methods, including techniques for assessing neurological states.

Purgatory holds a precarious position in the afterlife beliefs of most Christians. Often viewed as a doctrine that is held only by Roman Catholics, purgatory has historically been maligned by its detractors as unbiblical, theologically problematic, and a product (and source) of superstition. Moreover, it would appear that belief in purgatory has declined in the faith-lives of Catholics as well, many of whom now seem keen to forget the fears and anxieties that its existence might have raised for them about the afterlife. In response to such criticisms and concerns, this book argues that purgatory can indeed be a constructive and hope-filled component of any Christian understanding of the afterlife. In examining the history of the doctrine, it seeks answers that explain purgatory’s recent descent into obscurity. However, it also pursues present insights that can shed new light onto how purgatory might find renewed relevancy.

A fascinating collection of essays by leading scholars in the field engage with the idea of religious pluralism mooted by John Hick to offer incisive insights on religious pluralism and related themes and to address practical aspects such as interreligious spirituality and worship in a multi-faith context.