Tag: harvey cox

From Secular City to the Future of Faith

As I continue to read Harvey Cox’s new book The Future of Faith, I wonder about how it compares with his early book The Secular City. The Secular City embraced secularism as an inveitable part of urban development and recognized the privitization of religion. The Future of Faith, however, seems to be opening up to the idea that Christianity may have a grassroots resurgence (it is in Africa and Asia) that restores some of its public potency.

This blog post was a helpful start in examining Cox’s theological journey between the two books.

The Future of Faith

I am enjoying Harvey Cox’s newest book, The Future of Faith, and have agreed to participate in a blog book tour. Cox has made insightful observations about religion for decades. Stephen Prothero has pointed to Cox as “the leading trend spotter in American religion.”

Although Cox makes no claim to evangelical faith, his insights are helpful in clarifying just what Christianity was, is, and will be. You may recognize his name from my recent reference to his distinction between belief and faith. I look forward to reviewing the book officially in a future post. For now, here’s some more info on the book.

Harvey Cox new book tour will stop here, but as you can see below it will be making their rounds over the next month until they wrap things up in Montreal at the American Academy of Religion‘s annual meeting, where he will participate on a panel regarding a ‘Big Idea’ for the future of the Church. These ‘Big Ideas’ will be video tapped and shared, so be on the look out for live footage from the last night of the tour.

Joseph Weethee , Jonathan Bartlett, The Church Geek, Jacob’s Cafe, Reverend Mommy, Steve Knight, Todd Littleton, Christina Accornero, John David Ryan, LeAnn Gunter Johns, Chase Andre, Matt Moorman, Gideon Addington, Ryan Dueck, Rachel Marszalek, Amy Moffitt, Josh Wallace, Jonathan Dodson, Stephen Barkley, Monty Galloway, Colin McEnroe, Tad DeLay, David Mullens, Kimberly Roth, Tripp Hudgins, Tripp Fuller, Greg Horton, Andrew Tatum, Drew Tatusko, Sam Andress, Susan Barnes, Jared Enyart, Jake Bouma, Eliacin Rosario-Cruz, Blake Huggins, Lance Green, Scott Lenger, Dan Rose, Thomas Turner, Les Chatwin, Joseph Carson, Brian Brandsmeier, J. D. Allen, Greg Bolt, Tim Snyder, Matthew L. Kelley, Carl McLendon, Carter McNeese, David R. Gillespie, Arthur Stewart, Tim Thompson, Joe Bumbulis, Bob Cornwall

This Tour is Sponsored by Transforming Theology DOT org!

Urban Insight from Harvey Cox

Harvard Professor and author, Harvey Cox possesses some of the most penetrating cultural and urban insight I have found. His most recent book, When Jesus Came to Harvard: Making Moral Decisions Today, contains some great insight on finding common moral ground among religions. However, it lacks a gospel-centered approach. Harvey’s Secular City, published in 1965, became an international bestseller and was selected by the University of Marburg as one of the most influential books of Protestant theology in the twentieth century. This book challenged me to think deeply about urban life, social norms, and the complexity of urban renewal.

In the Secular City, Cox works out the insight that Christianity uniquely facilitates the emergence of cities. He notes that the “universality and radical openness of Christianity” detribalizes people; it enables them to bond on something universal as opposed to local. Athens, he argures, never became a true city, in part, because it was so tribalized; the gods were all localized, unopen to outsiders. He writes: “Only after the beginning of the Christian era was the ideal of an inclusive metropolis conveivable, and even then it took nearly two millennia to relize it.” To a significant degree, Christianity is inclusive; it rules no one out on ethnic or cultural grounds. In fact, if you believe that Christians will ultimately be represented from “every tribe, tongue, and nation,” then Christianity reaches the height of inclusive without the theological vacuum of universalism. Not only does it include people; it reconciles them through Christ. Christians should not be useless citizens or angry neighbors. The gospel, then, should compell us to engage the peoples and the cultures of the city and the world in a way that renews, not ignores or exploits, urban life. I go back to it again and again and have not come close to exhausting Cox’s  insight for church planting and urban ministry.

Today I picked up his The Seduction of the Spirit: The Use and Misuse of People’s Religion, published in 1985 and look forward to gleaning from his understanding of religion, it’s blessing and curse. So, I thought I would recommend Cox. Note: He is not bedtime reading. His mental rigor and inter-disciplinary thought is both inspiring and challenging, but its worth the struggle.