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This volume takes its title from the first-century Christian catechism called the Didache: "Even as this broken bread was scattered over the hills . . . gathered together and became one, so let Your Church be gathered together from the ends of the earth."
For Christians today, these words remain relevant in an era of massive human movements (voluntary and coerced), hybrid identities, and wide-ranging cultural interactions.
How do modern Christians live as both a "scattered" and "gathered" people?
How do they live out the tension between ecclesial universality (catholicity) and particularity (distinctive ways of being church in a given culture and context)?
Do Christians today constitute a "diaspora," a people dispersed across borders and cultures that nonetheless maintains a sense of commonality and mission?
Scattered and Gathered: Catholics in Diaspora explores these questions through the work of fourteen scholars in different fields and from different corners of the world. Whether through reflections on Zimbabweans in Britain, Levantines in North America, or the remote island people of Chiloe now living in other parts of Chile, they guide readers along the winding road of insights and challenges facing many of today's Christians.
About the author
Michael L. Budde is Professor of Catholic Studies and Political Science at DePaul University in Chicago, where he is also Senior Research Professor in the Center for World Catholicism and Intercultural Theology. His published work focuses on ecclesiology, political economy, and world Christianity; recent works include
The Borders of Baptism and the coedited
Witness of the Body.
