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117 pages

English

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An expert on world religions provides a compelling look into the shape and movement of Christianity's past, present, and future. Charles Farhadian accounts for the cultural, social, and theological issues that have shaped Christianity worldwide as he describes the distinctives of the world's largest religion. Addressing the global nature of Christianity without focusing exclusively on that topic, this supplementary text could serve in a variety of courses across the curriculum and is written to be useable in either Christian or secular settings.

Sujets

Philosophie et théologie

Comparative religion

Christianity

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Publié par	Baker Publishing Group
Date de parution	01 décembre 2020
Nombre de lectures	0
EAN13	9781493423651
Langue	English

Informations légales : prix de location à la page 0,0480€. Cette information est donnée uniquement à titre indicatif conformément à la législation en vigueur.

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Cover
Title Page
Dedication
Lovingly dedicated to Jeanette Farhadian
Copyright Page
© 2020 by Charles E. Farhadian
Published by Baker Academic
a division of Baker Publishing Group
PO Box 6287, Grand Rapids, MI 49516-6287
www.bakeracademic.com
Ebook edition created 2020
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4934-2365-1
Unless otherwise indicated, Scripture quotations are from THE HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®, NIV® Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.
Scripture quotations labeled NASB are from the New American Standard Bible® (NASB), copyright © 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. www.Lockman.org
Scripture quotations labeled NRSV are from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, copyright © 1989 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Contents
Cover i
Title Page ii
Dedication iii
Copyright Page iv
Preface v
Introduction ix
1. Who Are Christians? 1
2. Where Are Christians? 27
3. Why Is the Bible So Important to Christians? 61
4. What Is the Christian Church? 85
5. How Do Christians Worship? 109
6. Where Is Christianity Going? 133
7. How Does Christianity Relate to Other Religions? 149
Index 167
Back Cover 173
Preface
B ooks are often born from conversations. This one was. On a walk with Jim Kinney, executive vice president at Baker Publishing Group, I shared my interest in writing something on “world Christianity” in order to add my own ideas to the important conversation about this relatively new field of study. On further thought, turning “Christianity” into “world Christianity” seemed artificial. Isn’t Christianity already global without the redundancy of attaching “world” or “global” to it? Calling it “world Christianity” or “global Christianity” would be unnecessary since its transnational connections are part and parcel of the faith, something already written indelibly into its DNA. Christianity was at its inception “global,” beginning with Jewish communities and then burgeoning into gentile regions and beyond. This means that rather than being a stagnant set of doctrines, Christianity is a movement, whose final destination is hinterland, suburbia, and urban centers. It is the nature of Christianity to be worldwide, to extend itself beyond its current boundaries. That expansion has made Christianity a global religion.
The purpose of this book is straightforward: to provide an accessible introduction to Christianity, without getting sidetracked by following too many bunny trails of debate that have wracked the faith since its inception. Some of those conflicts will be noted, since they are crucial to the way that Christianity has been shaped, but this is not a conflict-driven book. Rather, the book lays out a clear and generous view of Christianity, noting the influences that have shaped the religion through the centuries. By “generous” I mean that I pitch Christianity as a broad movement that consists of Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant expressions. It is important to recognize that while these three streams of Christianity account for the vast majority of Christians, they are not representative of all forms of the faith.
Christian readers will find themselves at home in these pages. They will recognize the key concepts of Christianity and locate themselves within its broad themes. And those new to the faith or without any knowledge of it will find a friendly approach that honors readers’ intelligence without being overly academic. What makes Christianity tick? What is so compelling about it? Why ought we to be interested in Christianity? I will answer these questions and more in this book.
Over the past years, there has been interminable talk about Christianity, as both help and hindrance. Christianity, at once blamed for social conflict and embraced as revitalizing individuals and cultures, is such a massive religion that almost anything one says about it could be true, at least in some place or time. One thing is absolutely correct: Christianity, like other religions, is not simply a set of doctrines or practices. Rather, Christianity is deeply connected to everything in life, from how one understands the cosmos, to how one navigates one’s inner life, to whom one marries and how one treats others.
Views of the body, the natural world, politics, economics, ethics, one’s mind, ambitions, suffering, anxiety, and hope are profoundly shaped and given meaning and purpose by Christianity. While coverage of all these topics is impossible in such a few pages, this book strikes a balance between breadth and depth, without succumbing to either superficiality or the hedged-in, intractable tensions within Christianity.
On several occasions, while traveling internationally, I have been asked variations of the same question. It goes something like this: “What religion are you, Catholic, Methodist, or Lutheran?” What an incongruous question, since these three “religions” are actually the same religion—they are all forms of Christianity. The word “ecumenism” was a more popular term in the past, but it still conveys an important insight about Christianity. “Ecumenism” means the “whole household of God.” To be ecumenical means to affirm the church’s unity above denominational lines. Unfortunately, this does not always work out well on the ground, but many Christians do recognize that Christianity is essentially one, made up of many expressions. That is to say, anyone who accepts the basic affirmations of Christianity is Christian, whether they are Roman Catholic, Methodist, Lutheran, or one of the hundreds, probably even thousands, of denominations of Christianity. This book presents the parameters of Christianity that define the faith for all Christians.
My hope is that anyone—Christian or otherwise—can read this book and gain an appreciation for the largest religion in the world. Part of the uniqueness of this work is my purposeful departure from focusing exclusively on the Global North. My hope is that the interest of Christians reading this book will be piqued and refreshed by its global viewpoint. Practitioners of other religious traditions will find here a concise study of Christianity, not just its Western perspectives.
My understanding of Christianity comes from years of study, personal experience, and interactions with Christians. I teach world religions at Westmont College, a Christian liberal arts college located in Santa Barbara, California, where I compare religions such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism, Shinto, Taoism, and Confucianism. I also teach Christian missiology, the study of the sending of the Christian church into the world to share the good news of Jesus Christ, where I emphasize the cultural and social shifts that occur when communities become Christian. Interpreting those changes within Christianity requires the ability to see the tradition from within and without—that is, to understand Christianity through the eyes of the believer as well as from the vantage point of an outsider to the faith. So I write both as an insider to Christianity and as one who can see the tradition from outside itself, at least in terms of comparing it with other religions.
For more than three decades I have visited Christians outside of the Global North. Experiences of learning from Christians from Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Pacific continue to be a source of great inspiration to me personally and, at times, serve as a corrective to what I often see as a far too abstract way of seeing the faith. Any worthwhile interpretation of Christianity must strike a balance between the abstract (e.g., theological) and concrete (e.g., ethnographic). I seek to uphold that balance.
First, I want to thank Jim Kinney of Baker Academic for helping me to lucidly communicate the ideas in this book. I want to thank my students at Westmont College for their enthusiasm for learning and exploring ideas within Christianity and other religions. A debt of gratitude goes to Gina A. Zurlo and Todd M. Johnson, codirectors of the Center for the Study of Global Christianity at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary. Thank you to the countless Christians I have met in Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Pacific, since they have taught me more than books alone can convey about the faith. I also thank my wife, Katherine, and sons, Gabriel and Gideon, for their patience and love as I worked on this book. Finally, I want to thank my mom, Jeanette Farhadian, now ninety-four years old, whose bold witness continues to remind me of the seriousness of the state of our current and future lives—the state of our souls. Little else matters other than knowing God the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This book is lovingly dedicated to her. All mistakes are mine.
Introduction
H ow would you characterize Christianity? What do others say? Everyone has an opinion about Christianity. It is the largest religion in the world and has the broadest global reach. What began with a motley group of around a dozen quite unextraordinary people has burgeoned into nearly every conceivable social, economic, and cultural grouping in the world. Dating back more than two millennia, Christianity’s expansion into cultures has left indelible marks worldwide, leaving in its wake great transformations.
The religion of celibate monks, CEOs of multinational corporations, homeless persons, and those of every other social, cul