Showing papers on "Baptism published in 1999"

Childhood in Anglo-Saxon England

Abstract: Anglo-Saxon childhood and the social history of children archaeological sources documentary sources age thresholds and rites of passage conception, birth and babies infancy, baptism and the afterlife health and childcare the family fosterage, God-parents and adoption play and education adolescence. Appendix: Anglo-Saxon lawcodes relating to children.

Beasts and baptism : A new perspective on the Old English Physiologus

Abstract: Previous scholarship on the Old English Physiologus has not only mistakenly tended to consider the work as a fragment, but has also failed to acknowledge that this Anglo-Saxon bestiary contains a theme unique to the Physiologus tradition. The Old English Physiologus, complete despite its mere three animal entries, is an Easter poem, honoring within the scope of its three animal accounts the three days of Christ's death, harrowing of hell, and resurrection. Moreover, central to the poem's theme is the celebration of baptism – the central rite of the Easter weekend – as the means to attaining heaven on the final Easter, Judgment Day. The Old English Physiologus is a didactic and celebratory poem that urges Christians to prepare for Easter and Judgment Day through the renewal of vows during Lent and through baptismal vows or even baptism itself on Holy Saturday.

A poor man's christology

Abstract: The Jerusalem church called itself oι πτωχoι (Gal 2.10), probably from Isa 61.1, and held a prophetic Christology (Acts 3, 7). The Ebionites in Irenaeus and Epiphanius traced their name to Acts 2–5, and held Jesus to have been a prophetic figure, conceived naturally and possessed by the Spirit/‘Christ’ from baptism till before the passion. The same prophetic/possessionist Christology seems to be taught by Jewish Christians opposed by Justin and Ignatius: the ‘docetists’ believed that Christ (not Jesus) seemed to have suffered. It is also opposed by Polycarp, by John (especially in 1 John 4–5), by Paul (dramatically in 1 Cor 12.1–3), and in the pre-Marcan traditions.

Pious Persuasions: Laity and Clergy in Eighteenth-Century New England

Abstract: Congregational ministers in early New England worked hard to advance the cause of orthodox religion among the region's laypeople, but the people's willingness to voice differences with their ministers persisted. By the time of the Revolutionary War, New Englanders had established a strong tradition of independent-mindedness, shaped in part by the previous century's struggles over piety and religious practice. In this study, the author explores both Congregational doctrine and laypeople's practices throughout the 1700s. Erik Seeman looks at the piety of ordinary people, including a Boston housewright; the interplay of magic and religious culture; the changing experience of women; and the persistence of revivalism. His findings offer a different perspective on the Great Awakening of the 1740s, which appears not as a historical turning point but rather as one of four major revivals that fostered communal piety. Seeman further examines how pastors and parishioners negotiated their increasingly contentious religious culture when participating in highly charged events: deathbed scenes, rituals of baptism and the Lord's Supper, and religious revivals.

Gender and the Sacred Self in John Donne

Abstract: This first book-length feminist study of Donne argues that his sacred subject-position is ambivalently and illustratively invested in cultural archetypes of mothers, daughters, and brides. The chapters focus on baptism, marriage, and death as key moments in Donne's and his culture's construction of the gendered soul.

Engendered Encounters: Men of the Church and the “Church of Women” in Maasailand, Tanzania, 1950–1993

Abstract: A significant paradox of the missionary endeavor in many parts of Africa, as elsewhere, is the preponderance of female adherents to Christianity, despite concerted efforts by most mainstream missionary groups to convert men.Theoretical or comparative studies of missionization, conversion, or religious experience and change which have informed this article include Beidelman (1974), Etherington (1977), King (1995), Holden (1983), Bowie (1993), Rafael (1993), Blakeley, Van Beek and Thomson (1994), Swatos (1994), Shaw (1995), Kipp (1995), and Spear and Kimambo (1999). “Again and again in a mission history,” notes Adrian Hastings, “the early significant baptisms were mostly of women” (Hastings 1993:112).In her history of Christianity in Africa, Elizabeth Isichei (1995) corroborates Hastings' findings, as does much of the ethnographic and historical literature on missionization in Africa (e.g. Barrett 1968:148; Landau 1995:197; Hastings 1993:112–114). Although not self-evident, such an outcome is of course more understandable for missionary groups who tried to convert and train African women to be the “good wives and mothers” necessary for the propagation of the Christian family and the “domestic” duties of the Christian home (Gaitskell 1979, Hunt 1990, Labode 1993, Kanogo 1993). Certainly this has been the case among Maasai in Tanzania, even though Catholic missionaries from the Congregation of the Holy Ghost have spent over forty years trying to evangelize Maasai men. In vain they tried to convert men first through schools, then in their homesteads, and finally in individual instruction classes. Maasai women were restricted from attending school, tolerated but not encouraged to attend homestead instruction and services, and dissuaded from holding formal leadership positions in the church. Despite these gender-based evangelization strategies and objectives, however, significantly more Maasai women than men have sought instruction and baptism in the Catholic church. Conversion to Catholicism was never easy for these women, as they had to overcome not only the reluctance of the missionaries but also the objections of their husbands and fathers. Yet they persevered, and now constitute the majority of practicing Catholics. Intent on creating Christian communities premised on male leadership and patriarchal authority, the men of the church have instead facilitated the creation of a “church of women.”

Lutherans and Calvinists in the Age of Confessionalism

Abstract: Contents: Confessional Demarcation: Reformation or deformation? Lutheran and reformed views of Martin Luther in Brandenburg's 'Second Reformation' Ritual and Protestant identity in Late-Reformation Germany The exorcism controversy and baptism in the late Reformation The 'Fractio panis': a reformed communion practice in late Reformation Germany The elevation of the Host in the age of confessionalism: adiaphoron or ritual demarcation? Demarcating boundaries: Lutheran pericopic sermons in the age of confessionalization Lutheran confessionalization, preaching and the Devil Religion and Politics in the Age of Confessionalism: The Palatinate and Brandenburg's 'Second Reformation' Calvinism, the Thirty Year's War, and the beginning of absolutism in Brandenburg: the political thought of John Bergius Confessionalism and absolutism: the case of Brandenberg The schools of Brandenberg and the 'Second Reformation': Centers of Calvinist learning and propaganda Overcoming Confessional Differences: John Bergius: irenicism and the beginning of official religious toleration in Brandenberg-Prussia Reformed irenicism and the Leipzig colloquy of 1631 Brandenburg's reformed RAte and the Leipzig manifesto of 1631 Index.

Baptism, the New Testament and the church : historical and contemporary studies in honour of R.E.O. White

Abstract: The question of the meaning and significance of baptism is explored from a number of different perspectives in this volume. Inspired by the honoree of this volume and his important work on the subject, the contributors approach baptism from biblical, historical, theological and practical perspectives. Some of the essays re-examine the well-known biblical texts, feeling free to probe their implications. Others tease out the implications of the concept of baptism in a variety of contexts, both ancient and modern. Contributors include Joel Green, Geoffrey Bromiley, Larry Kreitzer, John Nolland, Ramsey Michaels and J.D.G. Dunn.

Becoming a Christian: The Ecumenical Implications of Our Common Baptism

Abstract: The essays in this book explore varieties of baptismal practice today, address the continuing problem of 're-baptism', offer fresh perspectives on the relation between baptism and Christian ethics, and call the churches to draw the full implications for Christian unity of their 'mutual recognition of baptism'. Baptism, the birthright common to all Christians, is a cornerstone of the ecumenical movement. Continuing the dialogue among liturgists, theologians, church musicians and pastors begun in So We Believe, So We Pray (WCC, 1995), this book focuses on baptism in relation the unity of the church. Exploring patterns of baptismal practice today, it includes striking examples of inculturation from around the world. It also insists on the link between liturgy and life. With contributions from Gordon Lathrop, Anscar Chupungco, OSB and Janet Crawford, this book is an important resource for everyone concerned with baptism, worship, the life of the church and the ecumenical movement today.

The Idea of Limbo in Alexander of Hales and Bonaventure

Abstract: many aspects of their world, particularly those aspects for which there was only theological evidence, namely, the afterlife. When thirteenth-century writers considered heaven and hell, they had a great body of established opinion with which to work; even purgatory had been examined in depth under such a name for quite some time.1 But certain categories of individuals the Fathers of the Old Testament, or the ancient just; and infants who died without baptism, still gripped by original sin defied ready classification. Unbaptized infants were, on the authority of Augustine, generally confined to hell, but with a different punishment than the rest of the damned.2 In both cases, the difficulty was with original sin, which according to Christian thought could only be eliminated through the person of Christ. The Fathers had lived blameless lives of faith, though they were still weighed down by original sin. Likewise, unbaptized infants had led blameless existences, but had died before their original sin could be absolved. Christian thought had from the earliest times consigned both of these classes of individuals to hell for their original sin, but a "higher" portion of hell, on account of their virtue or innocence.3 These ideas largely held sway for centuries, but were in time regarded as inadequate for the theological sophistication of the thirteenth century. By that time, a word had come into being "limbo" considered as a place on the rim of hell but separated from its worst features. Thanks largely to the efforts of Albertus Magnus4, the single realm of limbo was

Apocalypse, Ethnography, and Empire in John Derricke's Image of Irelande (1581) and Spenser's View of the Present State of Ireland (1596)

Abstract: Thus the Wisdom of God forsawe in the corruption of mans Nature, when in the planting of the Jewes in the land of Canaan commanded to roote out the auncient people of that Lande least their euill maners should corrupt the Jewes. And as touching the Irish (I speak not of the good, who are to be embraced and cherished) what are they better than Canaanites, which contemne God and Religion obseruing neither the rites of Baptism nor Matrimony.

The liturgy in the life of the Church

Abstract: After laying a more general theological foundation by noting how in one sense true liturgy is the Church's life, and that the New Testament proclaims an inextricable link between worship and daily living, the author summarizes the Vatican II Liturgy Constitution's vision of good liturgy (which glorifies God and sanctifies those glorifying Him, and fosters full, conscious, and active participation). He then turns to the question of ecclesial identity, noting how diversity belongs to the nature of things and that this nature should not be violated. Examples are provided to illustrate how Eastern Catholic identity has been violated, and that in some instances Rome itself, especially most recently, has intervened to remind Eastern Catholics of the need to restore zeon, infant communion, the iconostasis, public celebration of Vespers, Matins and the Liturgy of the Pre-sanctified Gifts, hierarchical services, reverence in celebration, baptism by immersion, real prosphorae as opposed to pre-cut breads, and sung, as opposed to read, Liturgies. Throughout he insists on the need for Eastern Catholic bishops to be obedient to Vatican instructions concerning authentic Eastern worship.

Juan de Torquemada's Defense of the Conversos

Abstract: In January of 1449 the city of Toledo rose up against an attempt by Alvaro de Luna, the favorite of the reigning king of Castile,Juan II, to impose a heavy tax on the city. This levy was intended to help Don Alvaro to defend his position against the hostility of certain noble families, including the king's cousins. The insurrection led to the burning of the house of the appointed tax collector, Alonso Cota, a "New Christian," one of those descendants from converts to Judaism who had made a career for himself as a royal official. There followed a wider attack on the conversos, a sign that baptism, even voluntarily received,would not win for Jewish converts or their Christianized descendants full acceptance in some "Old Christian" circles.1 Men who themselves had abandoned Judaism or whose families had received baptism, often during upheavals at the end of the fourteenth century and the beginning of the fifteenth, were deprived of official posts in the city. An ecclesiastical trial of converts accused of "judaizing" also was held, leading to some executions, and much property was confiscated. Led by a disgruntled royal official, Pedro Sarmiento, the Old Christians of Toledo issued the Sentencia-estatuto, which forbade New Christians to hold offices and benefices in the city and its surrounding territories. The same document declared conversos infamous and unable to testify in legal proceedings.2 Polemics, the most important written by the lawyer Marcos Garcia de Mora, called Marquillos, denied that Jews could become true Christians and accused them of a propensity for evil. Old Christians, treated as the only true adherents to the faith, were described as threatened by Jewish machinations.3 (Part of his case against the converts was grounded on local laws, including a statute of Alfonso VII issued during the twelfth century, which forbade converts from Judaism to hold office in the city.) At first Alvaro de Luna made feeble efforts to help the conversos of Toledo, and then he abandoned them. King Juan made efforts to coerce the rebels, but he abandoned them when his son and heir, Don Enrique, took Toledo under his wing. Thereafter, he was more interested in conciliating than punishing his rebellious subjects.5 The New Christians in the city were not without friends. Fernan Diaz de Toledo, the king's relator and a prominent convert, worked to enlist Lope de Barrientos, the Dominican bishop of Cuenca and a leading member of the royal entourage, among the opponents of the rebels. Alonso de Cartagena, bishop of Burgos, also a New Christian, wrote a detailed critique of this "sentence: He also described the Jews as a nation ennobled by God, not lost in infamy.6 Participation in this debate quickly spread outside Castile, as both sides attempted to gain a favorable hearing from Pope Nicholas V (1447-1455). Sarmiento and his allies sent representatives to Rome to plead their case, but they were turned away on the urging of the leading Dominican theologian present in the Curia, Cardinal Juan de Torquemada.7 In September of 1449, probably following the cardinal's advice, Pope Nicholas issued a bull condemning any effort to segregate or penalize converts from Judaism. The pope also excommunicated Sarmiento and his followers, and he deposed the ecclesiastical judge Pedro Lopez de Galvez for his role in the heresy proceedings against the conversos. Nicholas, after his fashion, wavered later in his opposition to the sentence under pressure from lay powers, suspending and then canceling the censures imposed on the inhabitants of Toledo. (The pope later renewed certain measures favoring Juan II, but he ignored the victims of the Toledan uprising.8) Torquemada, however, was not deterred by the pontiff's wavering. In 1450 he published a tract denouncing the proceedings held against the conversos. (This may have been an amplification of one or more memoranda written for the pope when news of the rising in Toledo first came to Rome. …

Funerals and Baptisms, Ordinary and Otherwise: Ritual Criticism and Corinthian Rites:

Abstract: The emerging field of ritual studies gives Second Testament scholars innovative ways of approaching the rites of the Jesus movement and thus enables them better to re-create the community life reflected in the language of the Second Testament. In the case of Corinth, placing the rites of the Jesus movement there in the context of Mediterranean ritual activity alerts interpreters to an expulsion rite conducted as a funeral at 1 Corinthians 5:2 2 and directs them to rites with features analogous to baptism on behalf of the dead (1 Cor 15 :29). This study sets the Corinthian extension of baptism to the dead alongside funerals conducted for the living and imaginary or honorary funerals, with the aim of characterizing the creative modification rites could undergo in the Greco-Roman world. As a result, a ritual critical approach provides a way of integrating baptism on behalf of the dead into the baptismal practices of the Corinthians, and it suggests how rites marking entry into and exit from their community w...

Not Vice Versa. Reading the Powers Biblically: Stringfellow, Hermeneutics, and the Principalities

Abstract: Proximate to the discernment of signs is the discernment of spirits. This gift enables the people of God to distinguish and recognize, identify and expose, report and rebuke the power of death incarnate in nations and institutions or other creatures, or possessing persons, while they also affirm the Word of God incarnate in all of life, exemplified preeminently in Jesus Christ, The discernment of spirits refers to the talent to recognize the Word of God in this world in principalities and persons despite the distortion of fallenness or transcending the moral reality of death permeating everything. This is the gift which exposes and rebukes idolatry. This is the gift which confounds and undoes blasphemy Similar to the discernment of signs, the discernment of spirits is inherently political while in practice it has specifically to do with pastoral care, with healing, with the nurture of human life and with the fulfillment of all life.1 On Wednesday evening before Pentecost 1938 William Stringfellow sat, an anxious eleven-year-old waiting through the lections and hymns. He once confided that on account of his musical ineptitude he regularly refrained from singing but thereby focused all the more on the language and theology of the hymnal, first learning there the esoteric names of the principalities and powers and of their vocation to praise God. His own recounting of that day includes disillusionment that there was no secret to be revealed concerning the mysterious working of the Holy Spirit (actually not a bad day's work for a confirmation liturgy)2. In any event, at the time appointed he stepped forward. As the original humans, Adam and Eve, presided from above in stained glass, Stringfellow soberly answered the bishop's queries. Yes, he renewed the baptismal promises first undertaken on his behalf and in his stead, among other things renouncing the devil and all his works. Some forty years later, as a rainstorm broke, he led a group of friends at his home on Block Island in a liturgical exorcism to banish from the place of his household the presence of death after his dearest friend and companion, the poet Anthony Towne, had died3. For that liturgy he employed a rite, published by the Bishop of Exeter4, which Stringfellow had acquired and first utilized to exorcise publicly President Richard Nixon on the eve of his second inauguration. Let no one consider these liturgical events either spooky or weird. Stringfellow enjoyed regarding them with deadly seriousness as inherently political while in practice having specifically to do with pastoral care and healing. For present purposes it is noteworthy that his copy of that exorcism booklet is altered by his own hand consistently substituting "death" or "the power of death" (which he accounted a "living moral reality") where the prayers name "the devil" or "the enemy." These are synonyms I believe he would transpose back into his own confirmation and baptismal vows. Baptism always has about it an element of exorcism and for William Stringfellow it specifically celebrates and affirms freedom from the power of death and all its works-indeed from the principalities and powers of this world. Apart from Anglican hymnology, the young Stringfellow's first real dose of powers theology came at the World Conference of Christian Youth in Oslo, Norway, which he attended as a college sophomore in 1947. Under the theme of the "Lordship of Christ" there was plenty of room for the triumphalism which characterized the expansive postwar American ecumenism in which Stringfellow was a participant. However, the speakers at that conference bore their good news out from the shadow of death. They spoke out of Christian resistance movements under Nazi occupation. They were chastened and sober. Among them were Martin Niemoller of Germany, Bishop Belgrav of Norway, and Madeleine Barot of France.5 Mme. Barot, for example, was particularly lucid in identifying the "chaos of order" in which humanity had fallen slave to its own systems, to its own production and discovery, and to its own propaganda for which she saw the Babel story as emblematic. …

Lo status iuridicus nella chiesa dei Christifideles Laici secondo il Codice dei canoni delle chiese orientali

Abstract: The Code of the Canons of the Eastern Churches, promulgated in 1990, extensively deals with the rights and duties of Christian laity in the Church. In addition to the rights and duties that are shared by all faithful, secular Christians enjoy the rights and duties listed in the canons of Title XI (devoted mainly to laity). On the strength of Baptism, lay people participate in their individual's condition, to live a saintly life and fulfil the mission entrusted by God to the Church in the world. Secularity is lay people's distinctive character : living in the world, they neither take holy orders nor have religious status. The specific juridical status of laity in the Church arises, therefore, from both their being baptized and their secular character : they live in the world the charisms they have been endowed with through the seal of the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Pocohontas's baptism: Reformed theology and the paradox of desire

Abstract: Seeking to elucidate certain elements of Reformed theology, the writer explores the conversion narrative concerning the baptism, in the early 17th century, of the Native American woman Pocahontas. She explains that in a letter detailing his anxieties about his relationship with Pocahontas, the English settler John Rolfe denies the desire of carnal affection while celebrating his longing to convert Pocahontas. She highlights this link between the desire for the flesh and the desire for the spirit, and she traces the ways in which these longings operate in Rolfe's letter and in the baptismal theology informing the conversion of Pocahontas. She suggests that an analysis of the desires of the convertor and of the connection between the feared yearning for the flesh and the sacred desire for the divine reveal important aspects of Reformed thought.

Literacy and religion : the word, the holy word and the world

Abstract: This chapter provides a poststructuralist analysis of the interrelation of literacy and religion. It argues that religious practice is both a mode and product of power/knowledge relations constructed and sustained by symbols (language), artefacts (texts), narratives (theologies), rituals (baptism) and daily routines (family worship). These constitute regimes of rationality through which metaphysical truths generate and justify differential positions on issues of physical and moral concern despite use of the same holy text.

The prenatal self becoming conscious baptism of Christ, lotus-vision of Buddha : Conscious birth : The experience of a lifetime

Abstract: Graber wrote that Jesus Christ and Gautama Buddha integrated the prenatal self. A comparison of the texts shows that this self is a structure with several layers: The good womb of the middle of gestation; the primal self of the end of the embryonal period; implantation; DNS replication of the female germcell which is the first act of creation. The two men created a lost object of love: Christ his father whom he did not know, Buddha his mother who died after her child's birth.

"Baptism of the Holy Ghost & Fire!" The Mission Legacy of Minnie F. Abrams

Abstract: Minnie F Abrams served as a missionary in India from 1887 to her untimely death in 1912. A leader in the 1905-1906spiritual awakening in that country, she trained andpromotedwomen evangelists. She also wrote thepopular The Baptism ofthe Holy Ghost & Fire to promote the needfor a post-conversionaryexperience ofpurification and empowermentfor effective evangelism. Abrams was the most prominent of the veteran missionaries who movedfrom the women So missionary movementthrough the ranks ofthe holiness movementto Pentecostalism. Her long association with schools and charitable institutions and her intense desire to evan­ gelize unreachedpeoples modeleda Pentecostaladaptation of"Woman So Workfor Woman."

PREACHING IN THE SPIRIT The content and focus of Pentecostal preaching in Australia 1910-1939

Abstract: From the beginning, preaching was the major dynamic in Pentecostal evangelism The standard method of winning people to God’s kingdom was to preach the gospel — on the streets, in the home, in hired halls, in tents — indeed wherever they could draw a crowd Nothing else could compare with the proclamation of Christ in the power of the Spirit The Spirit was given so that men and women could preach and it was by the hearing of the Word of God that people were saved Most Pentecostal churches held at least two services on Sundays, with mid-week Bible studies, youth meetings, prayer meetings, tarry meetings and Sunday Schools as well Even in the prayer meetings, there would be some preaching and teaching 1 Preachers were expected to be inspirational The common word for this was ‘anointed’, which meant that the Spirit came upon them and gave them convicting and convincing power which would result in healing and deliverance for the needy and oppressed So when Pentecostals preached it was usually with fervour and enthusiasm It is not easy today to know specifically what was being proclaimed in the halls, tents and home groups by the many evangelists and preachers who scattered the country With one exception, there are no extant sermon notes and, obviously, no electronic recordings However, the printed page offers some idea, as hundreds of published sermons and teaching articles do survive These indicate that there were several common themes in the preaching and teaching of the early Pentecostals As is to be expected, there was a significant emphasis on the baptism and gifts of the Holy Spirit The most popular theme, however, was the second coming of Christ with Christian living also dominant

400 Years: Anglican/Episcopal Mission among American Indians

Abstract: 400 Years: Anglican/ Episcopal Mission Among American Indians. By Owanah Anderson. Cincinnati, OH: Forward Movement Publications, 1997. xii + 401 pp. $12.95 (paper). 400 Years is the definitive history of the Episcopal Church's engagement with American Indians. Its title alone points to the fact that Anglican/ Episcopal mission to and with the indigenous people of the Americas stretches back four centuries to the early incursion into Indian lands by British settlers. Beginning with the baptism of the "first aboriginal convert into the Church of England" (p. 1), chief Manteo from Roanoke Island in 1587, and ending with a survey of Indian mission in the last half of the twentieth century, Anderson presents an in-depth and balanced account of the Indian story in the Episcopal Church. Much of the material presented in 400 Years appeared first in Anderson's earlier book Jamestown Commitment: The Episcopal Church and the American Indian (Forward Movement, 1988). In the preface the author explains the need for an updated, more in-depth study that fills in the gaps of the initial study and celebrates recent advances in American Indian ministry. The new edition does both while adding over two hundred pages of new material. Similar to Jamestown Commitment, 400 Years is organized geographically with chapters ranging from the Great Iroquois Confederacy of the northeastern United States to North Dakota, Navajoland, and Alaska. Added to this addition is a new chapter on "Indians in Cities," also geographically organized and with a helpful 1990 census of urban Indian populations. The effect of this organization is that individuals interested in Indian work in a particular part of the country can easily access the information without having to read through the whole story of Episcopal mission among American Indians. Tempted as one might be to examine only those chapters of one's particular geographic interest, the book as a whole deserves a close read by religious historians, missiologists, scholars of First Nation peoples, and church leaders, whether they have a particular interest in American Indian ministry or not. The book is very rich in stories of tireless workers on behalf of and with America's indigenous peoples. These are not romantic presentations of "do-gooders" but rather fair evaluations and honest critiques of mission efforts. Attention is paid to both white missionaries as well as Indian Christian leaders, past and present, including Joseph Brant, Enmegahbowh, the Delorias, and current bishops Steven Charleston, Steven Plummer and William Wantland. …