Theology, Church and Ministry: A Handbook for Theological Education

The Theology of Theological Education

What is it that makes something theological education? The obvious answer for many is that it is the content. That is, it is education that is specifically about theology, about God (or, for some, about the experience of God). It is also possible to suggest that the purpose is definitive of what makes something theological education. After all, is it enough to say that knowledge is sufficient t...

The Theological Corruption of the Evangelical Church

I put it to readers that the evangelical church around the world and in Australia has lost its way and is suffering a crisis of identity. Many who call themselves evangelicals have little idea what they believe or why—or even what we are meant to be doing. As Tom Slater put it: “what is the Christian cause? Is it the survival of the church? Is it the ‘success’ of the church? Is it the maintenan...

The Ministry of Healing in the Church

The Church as Bride and Mother: Two Neglected Theological Metaphors

INTRODUCTION In a recent book on ecclesiolog y, Exploring Ecclesiolog y: An Evangelical and Ecumenical Introduction, Brad Harper and Paul Louis Metzger lament the fact that “people are into ‘Jesus’ and ‘spirituality’ today, but not ‘religion’ and ‘Church.’”1 Their proposed solution to this problem is, in part, an emphasis on two metaphors for the Church: the Church as mother and the Church as b...

Challenging Truths: Reflections on the Theological Dimension of Comparative Theology

Given that comparative theology is aimed at learning from the insights of other religious traditions, the comparative theologian‘s confessional perspective must be engaged and subject to possible transformation through the discovery of truth in those traditions. Despite Francis Clooney‘s and James Fredericks‘ attempts to distance comparative theology from the theology of religions, its truth-se...