This selection of writings from the most important moments in the history of Christianity has become established as a classic reference work, providing insights into 2000 years of Christian theological and political debate.
While retaining the original material selected by Henry Bettenson, Chris Maunder has added a substantial section of more recent writings. These illustrate the Second Vatican Council; the theologies of liberation; Church and State from 'Thatcher's Britain' to Communist Eastern Europe; Black, feminist, and ecological theology; ecumenism; and inter-faith dialogue. The emphasis on moral debate in the contemporary churches is reflected in selections discussing questions about homosexuality, divorce, AIDS, and in-vitro fertilization, amongst other issues.
This further expanded fourth edition brings the anthology up-to-date with a new section looking at issues facing the twenty-first century churches. This includes extracts exploring the churches' responses to questions of social justice, international politics, trade and debt, environmental change, and technological development. New material also covers the global growth of Christianity, the progress of Christian unity, and mission in multi-faith and postmodern societies.
Author(s): Henry Bettenson (editor), Chris Maunder (editor)
Edition: 4
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Year: 2011
Language: English
Pages: 528
City: Oxford
Preface to the Fourth Edition • Chris Maunder
Preface to the First Edition
Supplementary Note
Contents
Part I. The Early Church (to the Council of Chalcedon, 451)
Section I. The Church and the World
Section II. Creeds
Section III The Earliest Testimony to the Gospels
Section IV. The Person and Work of Christ
Section V. The Problem of the Relation of the Divinity and the Humanity in Christ
Section VI. Pelagianism. Human Nature, Sin, and Grace
Section VII. The Church, the Ministry, and the Sacraments
Section VIII. The Authority of the Holy See
Section IX. Doctrine and Development. The Vincentian Canon
Section X. Christian Inscriptions
Part II. From the Council of Chalcedon to the Present
Section I. From Chalcedon to the Breach between East and West
Section II. The Empire and the Papacy
Section III. Monasticism and the Friars
Section IV. The Church and Heresy
Section V. The Conciliar Movement
Section VI. Scholasticism
Section VII. The Church in England until the Reformation
Section VIII. The Reformation on the Continent
Section IX. The Reformation in England
Section X. The Roman Catholic Church from the Counter-Reformation to the Second Vatican Council
Section XI. The British Churches in the Seventeenth Century
Section XII. The British Churches in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries
Section XIII. The Roman Catholic Church at the Second Vatican Council
Section XIV. The Twentieth-Century World Churches: Justice, Peace, and the Environment
Section XV. The Twentieth-Century World Churches and Inter-Faith Dialogue
Section XVI. The Twentieth-Century Churches and Christian Unity
Section XVII. The Twentieth-Century Churches: Sexuality and Procreation
Section XVIII. The Churches and Twenty-First-Century Issues
Appendix. A List of Councils
Bibliography
Acknowledgements
Index
