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How should Christians approach important contemporary issues like war, race, creation care, gender, and politics?

Christians in every culture are confronted with social trends and moral questions that can be difficult to navigate. But, the Bible often doesn't speak directly to such issues. Even when it does, it can be confusing to know how best to apply the biblical teaching.

In Cultural Engagement: A Crash Course in Contemporary Issues authors Joshua D. Chatraw and Karen Swallow Prior first offer a broadly accessible framework for cultural engagement and then explore specific hot topics in current Western culture including:

Sexuality
Gender Roles
Human Life and Reproduction Technology
Immigration and Race
Creation and Creature Care
Politics
Work
Arts
War, Weapons, and Capital Punishment

Featuring contributions from over forty top thinkers, proponents of various views on the specific topics present their approaches in their own words, providing readers an opportunity to fairly consider options.

Unique in how it addresses both big-picture questions about cultural engagement and pressing current issues, Cultural Engagement provides a thorough and broad introduction useful for students, professors, pastors, college ministers, and any believer wanting to more effectively exercise their faith in the public square.

List of contents

Introduction: A Call to Cultural Engagement

Part 1 - Charting a Course for Cultural Engagement

1. Defining Culture: How It Cultivates and Communicates
2. Understanding Christian Approaches to Cultural Engagement: Why the Categories Help and Hurt
3. The Centrality of the Gospel in Cultural Engagement
4. The Importance of Virtue and Skill in the Practice of Cultural Engagement

Part 2 - Practicing Cultural Engagement

5. Engaging on Homosexuality

Views - affirming, non-affirming (traditional and third-way)
Contributor Pool - four or five of the following: Matthew Vines, Luke Timothy Johnson, Robert Gagnon, Albert Mohler, Denny Burk, Wesley Hill, Matthew Lee Anderson, Preston Sprinkle, Todd Wilson

6. Engaging on Gender

Views - egalitarian, complementarian
Contributor Pool - four of the following: Rachel Held Evans, Jen Wilkin, Courtney Reissig, Lynn Cohick, Michael Bird, Craig Blomberg, Ben Witherington, Jillian Ross, Andreas Kostenberger, Tom Schreiner

7. Engaging on War and Weapons

Views - pacific, just war, anti-gun, pro-gun
Contributor Pool - four of the following: Stanley Hauerwas, Ben Witherington, Preston Sprinkle, Russell Moore, Joseph Loconte, John Piper, Rob Schenk, Karen Swallow Prior

8. Engaging on Reproductive Technology

Views - no abortion, abortion in difficult cases, pro-choice and pro-IVF, pro-life and pro-IVF
Contributor Pool - four or five of the following: Francis Beckwith, John Stonestreet, Charles Camosy, Ellen Painter Dollar, Matt Appling

9. Engaging on Race

Views - landscape, positive toward Black Lives Matter, negative toward Black Lives Matter
Contributor Pool - four of the following: Trillia Newbell, Anthony Bradley, Voddie Baucham, D. A. Horton, Thabiti Anyabwile, Alan Noble

10. Engaging on Islam

Views - same God, different God
Contributor Pool - Miroslav Volf, Nabeel Qureshi

11. Engaging on Creation and Creature Care

Views - landscape, pro-global warming, skeptical of global warming, animal welfare, meat eating
Contributor Pool - five of the following: Steven Bouma-Prediger, Mark Liederbach, Kathryn Blanchard, Kevin J. O'Brien, Alexei Laushkin, Calvin Beisner, Christene Gutleben, Sarah King, Joel Salatin

12. Engaging on Politics

Views - Kuyperian, Benedict Option, Paleo-Baptist, Religious Left, Religious Right
Contributor Pool - five of the following: James K. A. Smith, Amy Black, Rod Dreher, Scot McKnight, Nathan Fin, Russell Moore, Bruce Ashford, Jim Wallis, Tony Perkins

13. Engaging on Work

Views - Transformational, Two Kingdoms, pro women working, against women working
Contributor Pool - four of the following: Timothy Keller, Greg Forster, Stephen Grail, Michael Horton, Greg Gilbert, Kevin DeYoung, Katelyn Beaty, Owen Strachan

14. Engaging on the Arts

Views - Christian art, culture making, insufficient questions, avoiding sex and nudity, engaging sex and nudity
Contributor Pool - five of the following: Philip Ryken, Nicholas Wolterstorff, Andy Crouch, Alissa Wilkinson, Tim Challies, Craig Detweiler

Conclusion: A Realistic Hope

About the author

Joshua Chatraw (PhD, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary) serves as the director for New City Fellows and the Resident Theologian at Holy Trinity Anglican Church in Raleigh, North Carolina. His books include Apologetics at the Cross, Cultural Engagement, Truth in a Culture of Doubt, and Truth Matters. He is a fellow with the Center for Pastor Theologians and has served in both pastoral and academic posts during his ministry. 

 

Summary

How should Christians approach important contemporary issues like war, race, creation care, gender, and politics?
Christians in every culture are confronted with social trends and moral questions that can be difficult to navigate. But, the Bible often doesn't speak directly to such issues. Even when it does, it can be confusing to know how best to apply the biblical teaching.
In Cultural Engagement: A Crash Course in Contemporary Issues authors Joshua D. Chatraw and Karen Swallow Prior first offer a broadly accessible framework for cultural engagement and then explore specific hot topics in current Western culture including:

• Sexuality
• Gender Roles
• Human Life and Reproduction Technology
• Immigration and Race
• Creation and Creature Care
• Politics
• Work
• Arts
• War, Weapons, and Capital Punishment

Featuring contributions from over forty top thinkers, proponents of various views on the specific topics present their approaches in their own words, providing readers an opportunity to fairly consider options.
Unique in how it addresses both big-picture questions about cultural engagement and pressing current issues, Cultural Engagement provides a thorough and broad introduction useful for students, professors, pastors, college ministers, and any believer wanting to more effectively exercise their faith in the public square.

Additional text

This book is incredibly needed for 'such a time as this.' In this day and age, when rhetoric and worldviews are so divisive, and intelligence with grace and integrity is in short supply, Prior and Chatraw manage to bring together authors who nuance ancient biblical ideas with a wisdom that speaks to the ethical issues of our modern age. Pulling no punches in tackling all the toughest issues, this remarkable one-volume compendium is practically encyclopedic in its perspectives that exemplify goodness, truth, and beauty, while showing that Christians can also thoughtfully disagree on nonessential issues without losing unity in the essentials of the faith.

Report

In a time when US culture is incredibly fragmented, and the way forward seems to revolve around social media power dynamics, Cultural Engagement is a welcome and needed resource. By itself, part 1 offers a concise review of the literature on culture, its importance, and how it is formed. In part 2, Josh and Karen curate the best thinking on timely and critical contemporary issues--race, gender, work, arts, and challenges to life itself. It is this respectful pairing of differing viewpoints that is rare today, in both secular and Christian circles. Excellently done! Katherine Leary Alsdorf, founder and director of Redeemer's Center for Faith and Work

Product details

• Authors: Josh Chatraw, Joshua Chatraw, Joshua D. Chatraw, Karen Swallow Prior
• Publisher: KNV Besorgung
• Languages: English
• Product format: Book
• Released: 31.07.2019
• EAN: 9780310534570
• ISBN: 978-0-310-53457-0
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Religion/theology > Christianity; Non-fiction book > Philosophy, religion > Religion: general, reference works; RELIGION / Christian Theology / Ethics, RELIGION / Biblical Studies / Exegesis & Hermeneutics, RELIGION / Christian Ministry / Pastoral Resources, TOPICAL / Christian Interest