Ten Theology Books to Watch For – September 2024

Living the Liturgy: Enlarging the Baptist Vision 

Elizabeth Newman

(Baylor UP)

Baptists have at times been tempted to dismiss liturgy as formulaic. Simply going through the motions or saying set phrases, they have rightly argued, does not necessarily lead to faithfulness. A disconnect between liturgical assemblies and lives of faithfulness, however, does not mean that all liturgy is merely rote. It means, rather, that false idolatrous liturgies have captured our imaginations. In fact, the very idea that liturgy pertains to a sphere separate from the rest of life is itself already a distorted liturgical conviction that is even now disfiguring the body of Christ.

Living the Liturgy argues that there is no sphere of life–political, economic, or otherwise–that is not already liturgical. So understood, liturgies inevitably form our understandings of nature, freedom, time, and much else. The key question is, “Which liturgy is in fact shaping our lives?” Elizabeth Newman argues that Baptists can expand their liturgical and theological vision by locating themselves more fully within the whole church: one, holy, catholic, and apostolic.

Far from entailing a loss of Baptist identity, genuine ecumenism enhances Christian self-understanding, whatever one’s tradition. Ecumenism is an exchange of gifts. A faithful gift exchange–whether giving or receiving–builds communion, illuminating rather than obfuscating Baptist and other Christian identities, enabling us to live and witness more fully for the life of the world. Living the Liturgy displays in particular ways and through specific examples how an ecumenically informed understanding of liturgy can cultivate an enriched Baptist self-understanding and witness in a late modern context.

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A Brief Life of Thomas Aquinas: The Theologian in His Context

Jean-Pierre Torrell

(CUA Press)

Jean-Pierre Torrell, OP, who has already written the most highly-regarded contemporary two-volume introduction to the life and works of Saint Thomas, has composed a shorter book that captures the essence of the career of the Angelic Doctor for a more general audience. Torrell follows a biographical outline of the saint, although he also includes brief accounts of what the author takes to be the most important features of Aquinas’s teachings.

Part biography, part travelogue, part theology, Jean-Pierre Torrell, OP’s A Brief Life of Thomas Aquinas is a multi-faceted look at the life and the writings of Saint Thomas Aquinas. Torrell’s hope is that his biography of the doctor communis intertwined with his theological examination of Aquinas’s writings will enable the reader to understand the person behind the writer and the writer behind the person. Aquinas’s life, Torrell claims, can shed light on his work with respect not only to their number, or to the varied topics he writes about, but to their content as well. It would be inaccurate to view Aquinas hiding behind a mountain of books in the cells he occupied in the various houses he inhabited around the Dominican world. He taught, he preached, he debated, he faced a number of conflicts of ideas that were not of his own making, but out of which would come some of his best-known writings. Torrell’s unique approach makes accessible one of the greatest minds of our tradition and the richness of the legacy he left the Church.

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