Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Foreword by The Bishop of Shrewsbury, The Rt Revd Mark Rylands
- 1 Introduction: shaping rural theology
- PART 1 PERSPECTIVES FROM THE BIBLE
- PART 2 PERSPECTIVES FROM ORDINARY THEOLOGY
- PART 3 THEOLOGICAL AND SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES
- 8 Encountering New Age spirituality: opportunities and challenges for the rural church
- 9 God in creation: a reflection on Jürgen Moltmann's theology
- 10 Belonging to rural church and society: theological and sociological perspectives
- PART 4 HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES
- PART 5 LISTENING TO VISITORS
- PART 6 LISTENING TO THE COMMUNITY
- PART 7 LISTENING TO CHURCHGOERS
- PART 8 LISTENING TO CHURCH LEADERS
- PART 9 SATISFACTION AND STRESS IN MINISTRY
- Contributors
- Sources
- Subject Index
- Name Index
9 - God in creation: a reflection on Jürgen Moltmann's theology
from PART 3 - THEOLOGICAL AND SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Foreword by The Bishop of Shrewsbury, The Rt Revd Mark Rylands
- 1 Introduction: shaping rural theology
- PART 1 PERSPECTIVES FROM THE BIBLE
- PART 2 PERSPECTIVES FROM ORDINARY THEOLOGY
- PART 3 THEOLOGICAL AND SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES
- 8 Encountering New Age spirituality: opportunities and challenges for the rural church
- 9 God in creation: a reflection on Jürgen Moltmann's theology
- 10 Belonging to rural church and society: theological and sociological perspectives
- PART 4 HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVES
- PART 5 LISTENING TO VISITORS
- PART 6 LISTENING TO THE COMMUNITY
- PART 7 LISTENING TO CHURCHGOERS
- PART 8 LISTENING TO CHURCH LEADERS
- PART 9 SATISFACTION AND STRESS IN MINISTRY
- Contributors
- Sources
- Subject Index
- Name Index
Summary
Abstract – Jürgen Moltmann's fine book God in Creation makes a contribution to one type of rural theology. Although the book is concerned with the totality of the relationship between God and the created order, it is, nevertheless and consequently, a stimulus to reflection on a theology of the environment and a theology of the rural church. The book itself was delivered in 1984–85 in the Gifford lectures (which tend to deal with science and religion) and this article places it both within the biography of Moltmann himself and in relation to his intellectual oeuvre.
Introduction
In a consideration of the concerns of rural theology, there has historically been an emphasis on the care of the created order although, latterly, climate change has become a predominant theme. Both these concerns, despite their enormous importance, are driven by essentially pragmatic factors. It is helpful from time to time, however, to step back from pragmatism to wider and larger perspectives, and it is this that Moltmann's theology enables us to do. But first, it is necessary to make a distinction between four theological enterprises. There is a long tradition of natural theology going back in Christian history at least as far as St Paul and the first chapter of the Epistle to the Romans and, in Jewish history, to the Psalms and the declaration by the heavens of the glory of God (Psalm 19.1). Natural theology was given a succinct shape and central place in the writings of Thomas Aquinas where the cosmological argument provides one of the proofs for the existence of God (McDermott, 1989, pp. 12–13). William Paley (1802) elaborated the argument; he contended that the design, intricacy, harmony and variety of the world all point to a rich and beneficent creator.
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- Information
- Rural Life and Rural ChurchTheological and Empirical Perspectives, pp. 94 - 104Publisher: Acumen PublishingPrint publication year: 2012