Rosemary Radford Ruether

Traci C. West

Gale A. Yee

Deborah Sokolove

Letha Dawson Scanzoni

Victoria Rue

Jeanete Stokes

Janet Walton

Insights from ministers and theologians,activists and leaders, artists and liturgists whoare shaping the future of Christian feminism.New in Paperback!Feminism has brought many changes to Christianreligious practice. From inclusive language andimagery about the Divine to an increase in the numberof women ministers, Christian worship willnever be the same. Yet even now, there is a lack ofsubstantive structural change in many churches anda certain complacency within denominations.The contributors to this book are the thoughtleaders of the future who are shaping, and beingshaped by, the emerging directions of feminist Christianity.They speak from across the denominationalspectrum and from the many diverse groups thatmake up the Christian community. Taken together,their voices offer a starting point for building newmodels of religious life and worship. Contributors include: Mara Pilar Aquino Rachel A. R. Bundang Wanda Deifelt Marie M. Fortune Mary E.Hunt W. Anne Joh Eunjoo Mary Kim KwokPui-lan Cynthia Lapp Shelly Matthews Virginia Ramey Mollenkott Eleanor Moody-Shepherd Surekha Nelavala Diann L. Neu Kate M. Ott Nancy Pineda-Madrid MarjorieProcter-Smith Meg A. Riley Victoria Rue Rosemary Radford Ruether Letha DawsonScanzoni Elisabeth Schssler Fiorenza DeborahSokolove Jeanette Stokes Janet Walton TraciC. West Gale A. Yee Barbara Brown Zikmund

Many Voices, Many Views

New Feminist Christianity

What is the difference between good worship and good entertainment? Too often, people disparage some aspect of worship by calling it “just entertainment” or “just a performance.” Others say that they do not need to go to church because they have profound spiritual or even religious experiences at concerts, plays, movies, or dances. How is worship different from these performing arts? How is art different from entertainment? This book looks at the history of the performing arts both in worship and as worship, with particular attention to the attitudes that shape our ideas about both worship and entertainment. Working definitions of words like “art,” “excellence,” “liturgy,” and “play” help to illuminate what different people mean when they use them in conversations about Christian worship. Putting theological, scriptural, and practical writings on worship and the performing arts in conversation with interviews with dancers, musicians, actors, preachers, and liturgical scholars, this volume is intended to help pastors, performers, and everyone who plans, leads, or cares about worship talk with one another in mutually respectful and helpful ways.

Exploring the Borderland of Worship, Entertainment, and the Arts

Performing the Gospel

As an artist, Deborah Sokolove has often been surprised and dismayed by the unexamined attitudes and assumptions that the church holds about how artists think and how art functions in human life. By investigating these attitudes and tying them to concrete examples, Sokolove hopes to demystify art--to bring art down to earth, where theologians, pastors, and ordinary Christians can wrestle with its meanings, participate in its processes, and understand its uses. In showing the commonalities and distinctions among the various ways that artists themselves approach their work, Sanctifying Art can help the church talk about the arts in ways that artists will recognize. As a member of both the church and the art world, Sokolove is well-positioned to bridge the gap between the habits of thought that inform the discourse of the art world and those quite different ideas about art that are taken for granted by many Christians. When art is understood as intellectual, technical, and physical as well as ethereal, mysterious, and sacred, we will see it as an integral part of our life together in Christ, fully human and fully divine.

Inviting Conversation Between Artists, Theologians, and the Church

Sanctifying Art

Deborah Sokolove

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