Theology
Grace and Social Ethics Gift as the Foundation of Our Life Together Angela Carpenter Grace and Social Ethics demonstrates why the doctrine of grace has significant implications for social ethics and for Christian en - gagement with culture. The book reframes Christian social ethics by illuminating how grace shapes human identity and community. Angela Carpenter integrates theology and social science to artic - ulate a vision of human persons as constituted by gift rather than merit. This graced anthropology compellingly bridges theology and contemporary research on human dependence and mutuality. Carpenter insightfully applies this graced identity to pressing issues in social ethics such as criminal justice, labor practices, and gun violence. Scholars and students of Christian theology and theological ethics as well as pastors seeking resources for moral formation will find illuminating perspectives in this integrative work, which situates social justice imperatives within God’s gracious purposes. “We human beings are relational creatures who need gifts of love. Without God’s love we would not even exist, but what does our need for grace mean for our life together? Carpenter’s wonderfully erudite yet remarkably accessible book insightfully reveals an overlapping consensus in theological, biological, and psycholog- ical understandings of our dependent nature. She then draws out important implications concerning the ways we deal with fear and anxiety and encourages us to seek out meaning in life.” —JESSE COUENHOVEN, Villanova University FROM THE INTRODUCTION Christian theological commitment to God’s grace is expansive, bearing on every point of doctrine, from creation to Christology to soteriology. Human beings are not self-sufficient but are instead dependent on God for our existence, our sustenance, and our res - cue from sin and death. . . . Dependency, whether on God or others, is not something to be overcome and thrown aside, even though modern Westerners do tend to find it uncomfortable or intolerable. In fact, rejecting or avoiding this truth about ourselves leads to all sorts of destructive behaviors that Christians have traditionally called sin. Crucial to the claims of this book will be the idea that we are this same creature, with the same nature and agency, whether this agency is being expressed in relationship to God or in relation - ship to other human beings.
DECEMBER 2024 • 240 pp. • paper • $27.99 • 9781540961815
Angela Carpenter (PhD, University of Notre Dame) is the Leonard and Marjorie Maas Associate Professor of Reformed Theology at Hope College. Her first book, Responsive Becoming: Moral Forma- tion in Theological, Evolutionary, and Developmental Perspective , received the Martin Institute and Dallas Willard Research Center Book Award.
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