Recommended Reading List

Alter Robert, The David Story: A Translation with Commentary of 1 and 2 Samuel. New York and London: W. W. Norton% Company, 1999,
Ball, Milner, Called by Stories: Biblical Sagas and Their Challenge for Law. Raleigh, North Carolina: Duke University Press, 2000.Distinguished legal scholar and Presbyterian minister Milner S. Ball examines great sagas and tales from the Bible for the light they shed on the practice of law and on the meaning of a life lived in the legal profession. Scholars and laypersons alike typically think of the law as a discipline dominated by reason and empirical methods. Ball shows that many of the dilemmas and decisions that legal professionals confront are more usefully approached through an experience of narrative in which we come to know ourselves and our actions through stories.
Barth, Karl. On Religion: The Revelation of God as the Sublimation of Religion. Translated and Introduced by Garrett Green. London and New York: T & T Clark, 2006.
Cohn, G. A. Rescuing Justice and Equality. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2008.
Coles M. D., Robert. “What Profit Under the Sun? Part nine of Privileged Ones, Volume V of Children of Crisis. Boston and Toronto: An Atlantic Monthly Press Book, Little, Brown and Company, 1977. Pp. 505-555.
Cooey, Paula M. Willing the Good: Jesus, Dissent, and Desire. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress Press, 2006.Although Christianity began as a dissident movement and in the Reformation recreated itself through dissent, traditional Christianity has always been uneasy with dissent and pluralism. Whether directed against the church itself or the larger society, dissent has been most often met with ridicule and persecution. Lively and engaging, Cooey's highly relevant book retrieves and valorizes the reforming impulse from Reformation times, follows it back through the early church's internal and external battles, and traces it back to Jesus himself. She shows how a strong affirmation of dissent as a Christian duty can inform a more open and faithful church as well as a publically relevant theology and ethics.
Cooey, Paula M., Family, Freedom, and Faith: Building Community Today. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 1996.
Delbanco, Nicholas. Anywhere Out of the Wordl. New York: Columbia Unvivesity Press, 2005.
Dionne, Jr. E. J. Souled Out: Reclaiming Faith and Politics After the Religious Right. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2008.
Dulles, S. J., Avery Cardinal. Church and Society. New York: Fordham University Press, 2008.
Greeley, Andrew and Michael Hout, The Truth about Conservative Christians: What They Think and What They Believe. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2006.
Gunton, Colin E., Becoming and Being: The Doctrine of God in Charles Hartshorne and Karl Barth. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1978.
Hacker, J. S. and Paul Pierson, Off Center: The Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2007. While most Americans remain politically moderate, American politics has careened to the right over the last two decades. Why? What can be done? This book helps make sense of recent political changes and explains how popular will is deliberately being subverted. The authors propose important reforms to strengthen our democracy and return American politics to the center.
Hallie, Philip. Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed: The Story of Le Chambon and How Goodness Happened There. New York: HaperPerennial, 1994.
Higgins, Gregory, The Tapestry of Christian Theology: Modern Minds on Biblical Narrative, New York and Mahwah, N. J.: Paulist Press, 2003.
Horsley, Richard. Hearing the Whole Story: The Politics of Plot in Mark’s Gospel. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001.
Ishay, Micheline R., The History of Human Rights: From Ancient Times to ghe Globalization Era. Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: The University of California Press, 2004.
Kaufman, Gordon .God, Mystery, Diversity: Christian Theology in a Pluralistic World. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1996.
Kaufman, Gordon D. In Face of Mystery: A Constructive Theology. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1993. Theology, Gordon Kaufman suggests, is an imaginative construction, the creation of a symbolic world for ordering life. As it has been constructed, so it can be reconstructed, and Kaufman does so in a way that clarifies both the historic roots and the present-day applications of Christian symbolism. He works with a "biohistorical" interpretation of human life, one that portrays humanity as a product of biological evolution and historical development. While taking account of cultural and religious pluralism, and while providing criteria for making comparative assessments and judgements, this interpretation of human historical exitence also situates human begins--with their capacities for freedom and creativity--within the ecological wed that sustains all life. Human beings, Kaufman argues, have created religious symbolism as a necessary part of their attempt to orient themselves in the world. He shows how Christianity, as a system of symbols, has figured in this effort, and he carefully examines the separate elements of the Christian perspective-- foremost among them, God. How does the concept of God, as an ultimate point of reference, enhance our understanding of today's world; and how does the symbol "Christ" qualify this concept? The answer Kaufman proposes clarify the changing relevance of the symbolic world of Christianity.
Kaufman, Gordon. In the Beginning . . . Creativity. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2004.
Kugel, James L. How to Read the Bible: A Guide to Scripture Then and Now. New York and London: Free Press, 2007.
Lehmann, Paul L. Ethics in a Christian Context. New York and Evanston: Harper & Row, 1963.
Lehnann, Paul L. The Decalogoue and a Human Future. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company., 1995.
Mc Daniel, Charles.God and Money: The Moral Challenge of Capitalism. London and Boulder: Rowman,& Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2007.
Meeks Wayne A., Christ Is the Question. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2006.
Metz, Johann Baptist. Faith in History and Society: Toward a Practical Fundamental Theology. Translated by David Smith. New York: A Crossroad Book, The Seabury Press, 1980.
Most, Glenn W. Doubting Thomas. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2006.
Niebuhr, Richard E. Experiential Religion. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1973.
Niebuhr, Richard E. “The Strife of Interpretation: The Moral Burden of Imagination. The Art of Reading Deeply.” Parabola: Myth and the Quest for Meaning. New York: The Society for the Study of Myth and Tradition. Volume X, Number 2, May 1985, edited by D. M. Dooling. Pp. 34-47.
Pelikan, Jaroslav. Jesus Through the Centuries: His Place in the History of Culture. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1985.
Ratzinger, Joseph Cardinal. Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology. Translated by Sister Mary Frances McCarthy, S.N.D. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987.
Robinson, Marilynne. The Death of Adam. New York: Picador, 1998.
Simpson, James. Burning to Read: English Fundamentalism and Its Reformation Opponents. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2008.
Stone, Robert, Prophetic Realism: Beyond Militarism and Pacifism in an Age of Terror. New York and London: T & T Clark, 2005.
Tanner, Kathryn. Econonmy of Grace. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2005. Are there any fair and viable alternatives to global capitalism? University of Chicago theologian Kathryn Tanner offers here a serious and creative proposal for evaluating economic theory and behavior through a theological lens.
Tanner, Kathryn. Politics of God; Christian Theologies and Social Justice. Minneapolis: Augsburg Fortress, 1992.
Taussig, Hal. A New Spiritual Home: Progressive Christianity at the Grass Roots. Santa Rosa, California: Ploebridge Press, 2006.
Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Cambridge, Massachusetts and London, England: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007.
Tweed, Thomas A., Crosswing and Dwelling: A Theory of Religion. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 2006.
Wiesel, Elie. Ani Maamin: A Song Lost and Found Again. Translated from the French by Marion Wiesel. New York: Random House, 1973.
Williamson, Clark A. A Guest in the House of Israel: Post-Holocaust Church Theology. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Know Press, 1993.Williamson challenges churches and theologians to become aware of the inherited ideology of anti-Judaism that has distorted their teaching, even on such key matters as Jesus, the Scriptures, the church, and God, and suggests a radical, constructive alternative to the "teaching of contempt".
Wolf, Alan. The Transformation of American Religion: How We Actually Live Our Faith. Chicago and London: The University of Chicago Press, 2003.
Yourcenar, Marguerite. "On Some Lines from the Venerable Bede.” from That Mighty Sculptor, Time. Marguerite Yourcenar. Translated by Walter Kaiser in collaboration with the author. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1992. Pp. 3-9.