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Reformed Public Theology
The Reformed tradition in the twenty-first century is increasingly diverse, dynamic, and deeply engaged in a wide variety of global and public issues, from the arts and business to immigration and race to poetry and politics. This book brings together the insights of a diverse group of leading Reformed thinkers--including Nicholas Wolterstorff, Makoto Fujimura, Bruce Ashford, John Witvliet, Ruben Rosario Rodriguez, and James K. A. Smith--to offer a contemporary vision of the depth and diversity of the Reformed faith and its global public impact.
- GenresTheology
336 pages, Paperback
Published August 17, 2021
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April 7, 2022
Summary: A collection of 23 essays by leading Reformed thinkers articulating how Reformed theology bears on various aspects of public life.
One of the things that persuaded me to follow Christ was the discovery of how the Christian faith bore on various aspects of public life beyond the church walls. What stands out as I reflect on important books that have helped me is that many of these have been written by those shaped by Reformed thought. This volume is evidence that there is a robust community carrying on this intellectual heritage
The book is introduced by a marvelous statement by Matthew Kaemingk that articulates the marks of a Reformed public theology:
Listening to the Laity.
Dispersing Power–pushing power out and down.
Temporal Awareness–conscious of “what time it is.”
Historical humility
Aesthetic neighborliness
Culture Making
Public Delight
A Liturgical Life
A Liberated Solidarity
The twenty-three essays that follow are organized into six parts:
Public Culture: Contributors range the world addressing immigration, language, decolonialism, euthanasia, and pluralism. The essay on euthanasia, considering the case of the Netherlands was particularly striking to me in its assertion of the sovereignty of God over medicine, the ministry of prayer, listening, and living with the ambiguity of waiting.
Public Markets: Essays here cover work, economics, and labor rights. Having studied the theology of work, I appreciated Katherine Leary Alsdorf’s essay on a Reformed theology of work in New York, recognizing the rich affirmation of work in Christ’s Lordship over all while challenging the idolatries of vocation.
Public Justice: Writers address ideologies, populism, and activism. Stephanie Summers shares how she was formed through her relationship with Jim Skillen, who helped her root her fiery activism in a framework that saw opponents as potential partners and gave her an understanding of the different institutions or spheres that constitute civil society and saw politics as an avenue to love neighbors. Her narrative is a rich account worth reading by every young (and not so young) activist.
Public Aesthetics: Makoto Fujimura writes on Japanese aesthetics, Jamie Smith on poetry, Robert S. Covolo on fashion, and Eric O. Jacobsen on cities. I was familiar with all but Covolo and have never thought about fashion through the eyes of faith. He looks at fashion as gift, as market commodity, as social force, as aesthetic play, and as social costume and argues for its being worth serious reflection.
Public Academy: As a campus minister, I was particularly eager to see the essays in this section. None disappointed. Bethany Jenkins shows how the Reformed framework enables one to engage every aspect of the pluralist campus. Nick Wolterstorff outlines five themes characteristic of the Reformed understanding of scholarship with a strong encouragement both to engage diverse worldviews as a Christian while engaging in “dialogic pluralism” that both learns from and contributes to the learning of others through active shared engagement. Jeff Liou offers a great service in a thoughtful, nuanced, and Reformed discussion of Critical Race Theory (CRT), explaining it (very necessary, because many fight something they don’t understand), drawing upon Reformed understandings of justice and culture, including neo-Calvinism’s critique of modernity and Western liberalism, and its affirmation of the wealth of every culture. He notes correspondences and differences between Reformed thought and CRT, and highlights the similarity of Boesak’s Reformed critique of South Africa and much of what is found in Critical Race Theory.
Public Worship: The final section focuses on the public of the various aspects of our worship: communion and the welcoming of immigrants, public prayer as a place to give voice to the traumas of the public square, baptism as it bears on racism and sexism, various forms of confession and our civil discourse, and piety, how we imitate Christ in public life. The final essay on piety names the dichotomy between good work and spirituality that has often signaled that work doesn’t matter, only church and argues that ‘the things of earth grow strangely clear (rather than dim)/In the light of his glory and grace.” Our work in the world has eternal significance in and through Christ.
I cannot do all the essays justice in this space. Running through them are the Kuyperian ideas of “every square inch” and “sphere sovereignty.” There is also a Reformed eschatology, emphasized by the Reformed theologian Richard Mouw, to whom this volume is dedicated, of Revelation 21-22, where the kings of the earth bring the wealth of the nations into the holy city. All our efforts in the public sphere gain significance as we look toward that day, and the full revealing of the common grace of God in the world.
There is rich fare to be found in these pages, often as introductions to more extensive works. For anyone looking for alternatives to the political ideologies often baptized as “Christian,” for anyone wanting to engage in public life in whatever way fits their calling, there are good resources that take us beyond being good, little Christians, that help us think about the purposes of God, the nature of human beings and society and institutions, that help us think in biblical categories about justice, and about the meaning of our worship as we look beyond the church doors. The essays bring in voices from every continent and social situation, belying stereotypes of Reformed thought being only white and western. This is the substantive content needed in adult education in our churches, in workplace ministries, among community organizers, among faculty and campus leaders, and Christians working inside the beltway, and not just in the halls of our seminaries.
____________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
One of the things that persuaded me to follow Christ was the discovery of how the Christian faith bore on various aspects of public life beyond the church walls. What stands out as I reflect on important books that have helped me is that many of these have been written by those shaped by Reformed thought. This volume is evidence that there is a robust community carrying on this intellectual heritage
The book is introduced by a marvelous statement by Matthew Kaemingk that articulates the marks of a Reformed public theology:
Listening to the Laity.
Dispersing Power–pushing power out and down.
Temporal Awareness–conscious of “what time it is.”
Historical humility
Aesthetic neighborliness
Culture Making
Public Delight
A Liturgical Life
A Liberated Solidarity
The twenty-three essays that follow are organized into six parts:
Public Culture: Contributors range the world addressing immigration, language, decolonialism, euthanasia, and pluralism. The essay on euthanasia, considering the case of the Netherlands was particularly striking to me in its assertion of the sovereignty of God over medicine, the ministry of prayer, listening, and living with the ambiguity of waiting.
Public Markets: Essays here cover work, economics, and labor rights. Having studied the theology of work, I appreciated Katherine Leary Alsdorf’s essay on a Reformed theology of work in New York, recognizing the rich affirmation of work in Christ’s Lordship over all while challenging the idolatries of vocation.
Public Justice: Writers address ideologies, populism, and activism. Stephanie Summers shares how she was formed through her relationship with Jim Skillen, who helped her root her fiery activism in a framework that saw opponents as potential partners and gave her an understanding of the different institutions or spheres that constitute civil society and saw politics as an avenue to love neighbors. Her narrative is a rich account worth reading by every young (and not so young) activist.
Public Aesthetics: Makoto Fujimura writes on Japanese aesthetics, Jamie Smith on poetry, Robert S. Covolo on fashion, and Eric O. Jacobsen on cities. I was familiar with all but Covolo and have never thought about fashion through the eyes of faith. He looks at fashion as gift, as market commodity, as social force, as aesthetic play, and as social costume and argues for its being worth serious reflection.
Public Academy: As a campus minister, I was particularly eager to see the essays in this section. None disappointed. Bethany Jenkins shows how the Reformed framework enables one to engage every aspect of the pluralist campus. Nick Wolterstorff outlines five themes characteristic of the Reformed understanding of scholarship with a strong encouragement both to engage diverse worldviews as a Christian while engaging in “dialogic pluralism” that both learns from and contributes to the learning of others through active shared engagement. Jeff Liou offers a great service in a thoughtful, nuanced, and Reformed discussion of Critical Race Theory (CRT), explaining it (very necessary, because many fight something they don’t understand), drawing upon Reformed understandings of justice and culture, including neo-Calvinism’s critique of modernity and Western liberalism, and its affirmation of the wealth of every culture. He notes correspondences and differences between Reformed thought and CRT, and highlights the similarity of Boesak’s Reformed critique of South Africa and much of what is found in Critical Race Theory.
Public Worship: The final section focuses on the public of the various aspects of our worship: communion and the welcoming of immigrants, public prayer as a place to give voice to the traumas of the public square, baptism as it bears on racism and sexism, various forms of confession and our civil discourse, and piety, how we imitate Christ in public life. The final essay on piety names the dichotomy between good work and spirituality that has often signaled that work doesn’t matter, only church and argues that ‘the things of earth grow strangely clear (rather than dim)/In the light of his glory and grace.” Our work in the world has eternal significance in and through Christ.
I cannot do all the essays justice in this space. Running through them are the Kuyperian ideas of “every square inch” and “sphere sovereignty.” There is also a Reformed eschatology, emphasized by the Reformed theologian Richard Mouw, to whom this volume is dedicated, of Revelation 21-22, where the kings of the earth bring the wealth of the nations into the holy city. All our efforts in the public sphere gain significance as we look toward that day, and the full revealing of the common grace of God in the world.
There is rich fare to be found in these pages, often as introductions to more extensive works. For anyone looking for alternatives to the political ideologies often baptized as “Christian,” for anyone wanting to engage in public life in whatever way fits their calling, there are good resources that take us beyond being good, little Christians, that help us think about the purposes of God, the nature of human beings and society and institutions, that help us think in biblical categories about justice, and about the meaning of our worship as we look beyond the church doors. The essays bring in voices from every continent and social situation, belying stereotypes of Reformed thought being only white and western. This is the substantive content needed in adult education in our churches, in workplace ministries, among community organizers, among faculty and campus leaders, and Christians working inside the beltway, and not just in the halls of our seminaries.
____________________________
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.
July 12, 2024
I read a chapter each evening, and this book has expanded my sense of how the distinctives of the Reformed faith impacts a variety of topics
Well worth the time!
Well worth the time!
May 17, 2023
I bought this having read some of Kaemingk's work and recognizing an edited edition by him would be worth the read. It was a mixed bag on the chapters. Some were really intriguing (Jacobsen on Urban Design, Sutanto on Pluralism in Indonesia) and others, were in my opinion, tedious (Ashford and Greeson's was a slog). Not every chapter will necessarily scratch the itch you may have when considering public theology, but it was a worthwhile read.
Read
August 13, 2022As I embarked on this book, I initially felt like this was the book I'd been waiting for all my life!
If that sounds like over-the-top expectations, I can only acquiesce. Written as an ode of sorts to reformed (Calvinist!) theologian, Richard Mouw, I'm going to quote the longest quote in the world because it illustrates what this book was about:
Dissatified with the public imaginations of the Christian right and the Christian left, the young Mouw ultimately found a home in Reformed public theology. Therein Mouw has spent a career developing and embodying what we might call a "third way" for American Christians to engage in public life. This third way comes to the fore in Mouw's somewhat playful use of paradoxical phrases like "holy worldliness," "political evangelism," convicted civility," "principled pluralism," "baptismal politics," and "common grace." In each of these phrases, Mouw invites his readers to question their more narrow or ideologically bound paradigms for thinking about the connections between faith and public life. What if “evangelism” is both spiritual and material? What if baptism is both personal and political? What if Christians are called to be a public force of conviction and civility, principles and pluralism? What if God’s grace is uniquely manifest in the cross of Jesus Christ and yet we also see God’s goodness mysteriously manifesting itself in our Muslim neighbors? Writing for an American audience gripped by myopic ideologies bereft of humility, creativity, or imagination, Mouw’s playful questioning and vulnerable curiosity consistently model a public-theological imagination that invites a creative dialogue rather than a didactic monologue. The conversation is not closed down: it is opened up.
I guess, to say it simply, this book takes to task the things that make me squirm in the very kind of Christian theology to which I sincerely subscribe. What does it mean to really care for those who are suffering? Is social justice worth my time? Is there value in those with opposing beliefs? Why the didactic monologue of Calvinists especially? Why the throwing-up-of-hands-and-dismissal-of-everyone-not-subscribing-to-orthodoxy?
This book is, indeed, humble, hopeful, and responsible!
It was also a little hardcore for me. Sometimes, I got lost . . .
It’s a book of essays on topics ranging from immigration to fashion, from campus life to baptism. I especially liked the chapters on academia. I did find the social activism refreshing, like REALLY refreshing—like, OH, HERE YOU GUYS AND GIRLS ARE. OH, YOU’RE NOT ALL OLD AND WHITE. OH, HI.
But I confess: it wasn’t a fun read. Textbook-y, at times.
If that sounds like over-the-top expectations, I can only acquiesce. Written as an ode of sorts to reformed (Calvinist!) theologian, Richard Mouw, I'm going to quote the longest quote in the world because it illustrates what this book was about:
Dissatified with the public imaginations of the Christian right and the Christian left, the young Mouw ultimately found a home in Reformed public theology. Therein Mouw has spent a career developing and embodying what we might call a "third way" for American Christians to engage in public life. This third way comes to the fore in Mouw's somewhat playful use of paradoxical phrases like "holy worldliness," "political evangelism," convicted civility," "principled pluralism," "baptismal politics," and "common grace." In each of these phrases, Mouw invites his readers to question their more narrow or ideologically bound paradigms for thinking about the connections between faith and public life. What if “evangelism” is both spiritual and material? What if baptism is both personal and political? What if Christians are called to be a public force of conviction and civility, principles and pluralism? What if God’s grace is uniquely manifest in the cross of Jesus Christ and yet we also see God’s goodness mysteriously manifesting itself in our Muslim neighbors? Writing for an American audience gripped by myopic ideologies bereft of humility, creativity, or imagination, Mouw’s playful questioning and vulnerable curiosity consistently model a public-theological imagination that invites a creative dialogue rather than a didactic monologue. The conversation is not closed down: it is opened up.
I guess, to say it simply, this book takes to task the things that make me squirm in the very kind of Christian theology to which I sincerely subscribe. What does it mean to really care for those who are suffering? Is social justice worth my time? Is there value in those with opposing beliefs? Why the didactic monologue of Calvinists especially? Why the throwing-up-of-hands-and-dismissal-of-everyone-not-subscribing-to-orthodoxy?
This book is, indeed, humble, hopeful, and responsible!
It was also a little hardcore for me. Sometimes, I got lost . . .
It’s a book of essays on topics ranging from immigration to fashion, from campus life to baptism. I especially liked the chapters on academia. I did find the social activism refreshing, like REALLY refreshing—like, OH, HERE YOU GUYS AND GIRLS ARE. OH, YOU’RE NOT ALL OLD AND WHITE. OH, HI.
But I confess: it wasn’t a fun read. Textbook-y, at times.
September 28, 2024
Cannot emphasize enough how impactful this book has been for me and my faith. I grew up in a semi-reformed tradition but never knew any of the rich Christian history of the tradition that my older siblings had been privy to in their education. I decided to read this book after hearing about it on the In All Things podcast with Stephanie Summers; I was intrigued to learn how this tradition could develop my activism and public witness.
From the essays on Brazil’s economy and Kintsugi with Makota Fujimura to learning about Common Grace, and a better conceptualization of the misunderstood term of total depravity, this book is an invaluable resource for Christians of all denominations looking to lead a life of integrity. It really helped me understand how my faith relates to the world and the world to it; this beautiful dialectic of becoming what God has made us to be as we await Jesus’ return <3
It’s also a great conversation starter if you have it out at work as I did!
From the essays on Brazil’s economy and Kintsugi with Makota Fujimura to learning about Common Grace, and a better conceptualization of the misunderstood term of total depravity, this book is an invaluable resource for Christians of all denominations looking to lead a life of integrity. It really helped me understand how my faith relates to the world and the world to it; this beautiful dialectic of becoming what God has made us to be as we await Jesus’ return <3
It’s also a great conversation starter if you have it out at work as I did!
October 22, 2021
Reading this book is like a buffet. It includes a wide variety of topics and aims to "think seriously" about each of them from a Reformed perspective using actual honest to goodness Reformed theology. You will hear quotes from Calvin and Kuyper and Bavink and a bunch of other people in relation to topics that you might not otherwise consider.
It provides a good "introduction" to some of these ideas which is good for anyone who wants an overview of how Reformed thinking might change the way we engage with the world but isn't prepared to delve into strictly theological works. The essays are short (each around ten pages) and assume no previous knowledge of theology. I would recommend perhaps holding on to this book and referencing specific essays over time.
It provides a good "introduction" to some of these ideas which is good for anyone who wants an overview of how Reformed thinking might change the way we engage with the world but isn't prepared to delve into strictly theological works. The essays are short (each around ten pages) and assume no previous knowledge of theology. I would recommend perhaps holding on to this book and referencing specific essays over time.
October 21, 2021
(I read this over the course of three days; they just happened to be separated by a month. No big deal.) A fascinating collection of essays. I think I appreciated most the sheer variety of topics addressed and authors included, and I'm glad that the writers were committed to refining a Reformed vision for public theology and life. I think the book as a whole could have been edited with an eye for more of an overarching narrative, but individually the essays excel, and taken together they're well worth the read.
August 27, 2022
A thoughtful collection of essays exploring a Reformed view of society. Most essays are probably either centrist or left-leaning, but all are explicitly trying to set their position within the Reformed tradition.
April 2, 2021
Superb!
October 5, 2021
An absolute “must read” for modern theological thought and discussion.
July 23, 2022
Deep, theological, and amazingly applicable to all of life.
December 22, 2022
This book was very thought provoking and gave a taster of how as Christians we are to engage in the public square.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews