This text is a collection of essay by some of the most notable and widely received theologians in current cultural/Postmodern discourse. The essays cover a wide spectum of thematics, from sex to the city, music to body, Christian orthodoxy to radical phenomenological takes on materiality. Most importantly is the robust manifesto that peals large over the postmodern, nihilistic terrain: it is a call, in the first place, toward a radical alternative of a people that can no longer be defined by the vulgar liberal/conservative categories. These people--the mystical body politic of Christ--can be prescribed as a movement toward and into a Trinitarian de-centered body that resists captialist strategies of control and opens out acts of anarchic charity--the life giving participation in God. Radical Orthodoxy is the global movement in which all Christian are called. They are called because through Radical Orthodoxy, the idols of both the liberal and conservative are fully revealed: the idols of ideological control shot-through a pious or "inclusive" (and always bad) reading of Holy writ.

3/4 of this workbook is a treasure. Homosexuality, divorce and abortion are covered beautifully. A 4th of this read was a bit dry.

I like this special ministry handbook by Billy Graham and his coworkers very much because it is an insightful and practical guide about Christian workers' various concerns. It gets in touch with emotional topics that really can help ministers of God to be more awre of the emotional needs of both Christians and non-believers.

As emotion is powerful in move people and motivation is one thing that every Christian workers should know and practice the use of them in creative and constructive ways. Positive understanding and use of emotions are beneficial in avoiding conflicts in life and also making happy livings.

I pray that this book can be a great blessing to everyone who serves the Lord with passion, love, and all. Amen.

This book is uplifting for those of us who have failed in areas of our lives which are important and for which we feel disappointment. Dr. Graham confronts all areas of life, including life itself, and presents the powerful proof that God loves us in spite of our failings. He also focuses in on the IMPORTANCE OF YOUR LIFE so that you may understand better why YOUR LIFE IS IMPORTANT even if you sometimes think it isn't. If you have failed in an important area of your life or if you have children or friends who need substantive words of encouragement, or if you simply need encouragement, you will find this book a valuable resource.

"It's like a glass of fresh iced tea on a hot, dry, dusty day in Texas."

Thanks again Dr. Graham for submitting your life and works to our Maker.

Ward unfortunately quickly moves from asking questions relevant to a great deal of Christian peoples like "What does it mean to be a Christian living in contempary urban settings" to entertaining flights of fancy revolving around questions of semiotics filled with post-modern jingoisms and pseudo-jargon without really making an compelling case for the connection between the two. The result is rather frustrating and makes much of writes unenlightening for practical theological concerns for Christian living. Ward obviously is more exhilirated about the idea of writing a theology of signification than of writing a theology of cities, for he spends much of his time addressing the former rather than the latter resulting in a seemingly endless discussion of irrelevant topics related merely to his own person theoretical interests such his much overplayed treatment of sexuality.

This, however, is not to berate the analyses that are present within work. It is clear that the relevancy of a theology of signs for the city arise for Ward from viewing the urban landscape as a type of text [an annoying tendency of bookish post-moderns who have read so many books that they start to think that the whole of existence is a text]. What is written about his theology of signs-or the ability to give a Christian reading of the [cultural] signs of the times-has a stimulating applicability to the notion of urbanity and Christian community and even newer concepts of modernized space such as those posed by our living much of our lives through the medium of cyberspace. His scholarship has wide-breadth and proves much more conversant in secular critical philosopher than many of more parochially minded theologian companions. Ward really does have a message to set forth upon the table for debate with many lucid observations worthy of consideration. In the end, his is a strong indictment of the cold, secularized universe that the decaying enlightenment tradition and its nihilistic detractors are shoving down our throats.

This work is eclectic drawing upon various sources ranging from obscure theology and philosophy to mass media [I was annoyed that he repeatedly misspelled the Wachowskis' name when discussing the Matrix-revealing he's not really so ultra-hip as he would like us to believe] and at times is very abstruse. It is hard to imagine it being of any value to anyone outside the academic or well-educated population. Nonetheless, it does provide a hearty alternative to the acquiescent and stale Christians portrayals of the city as one can find in the now defunct writings of Cox on secularity.

The premise that this book begins from is the implosion of secularism--not the complete end of secular institutions but rather the apprehension of its foundations being terminally undermined. This is a hefty statement that I personally believe can be significantly substantiated as credible being that the traditional secularization thesis has been entirely debunked; however, I am unsure how less sympathetic readers will react to this premise.

If we are to talk about the 'revival' of religion, albeit while recognizing it really never went away, are we to speak of the re-appearance of pre-modern forms of religion? Running along the theme adopted in the introduction of the evolution of ROMEO & JULIET pre-modern to modern to post-modern (Luhrman's) productions, Ward argues convincingly in my opinion that this is not the revival of pre-modern phantasms of religion but rather the emergence of a trangsgressive, excessive and hyper religion. This he notices can be seen in the the kitsch Holy Land Theme Parks, inane fundamentalisms, the commodification of religion through the media, etc.

'True religion', he argues, must not be understood as something fixed but as something created---as it was when true religion first became a matter of unique attention after the Reformation---through social process and cultural permutations. 'True religion' is disseminated across social and historical process in the discursive exchange of signs throughout cultural networks. Such is the general pace of the book which could frustrate some in how it skirts a direct, lucid confrontation with the issue of there being a 'true religion' as the question would be understood by the vast majority of the non-academic public.