Stanley Hauerwas: Sanctify them in the Truth. Holiness Exemplified.

This is a rather loosely themed collection that deals with a number of interesting questions, centering around the theme holiness. There are essays here on themes that later have become central to Hauerwas, such as the future of the university institution. It is also interesting because Hauerwas revisits som themes from his earliest writings, such as ”character” and ”agency”.There are some solid texts on the church here as well.

There is also one of the more interesting engagements by Hauerwas with the question of homosexuality, using the notion of friendship to question the way the problem usually is presented in (catholic) moral theology. There is also what I believe is the only positive use Hauerwas has ever made of Luther, in an article about the Decalogue. As a balance to that, there is a delightful sermon (one of several) for Reformation Day, titled frankly ”Reformation is Sin”.

This is one of the better collections I think, but I might say that of many of the one’s published in the last fifteen years or so.

Contents:

1. On Doctrine and Ethics
2. The Truth about God: The Decalogue as Condition for Truthful Speach
3. ’Salvation even in Sin’: Learning to Speak Truthfully about Ourselves
4. The Sanctified Body: Why Perfection Does Not Require a ’Self’
5. Going Forward by Looking Back: Agency Reconsidered
6. Gay Friendship: A Thought Experiment in Catholic Moral Theology
7. Characterizing Perfection: Second Thoughts on Character and Sanctification
8. Timeful Friends: Living with the Handicapped
9. In Defense of Cultural Christianity: Reflection on Going to Church
10. The Non-Violent Terrorist: In Defense of Christian Fanticism
11. No Enemy, No Christianity: Preaching between ’Worlds’
12. Christians in the Hands of Flaccid Secularists: Theology and ’Moral Inquiry’ in the Modern University
13. Christian Schooling or Making Students Dysfunctional
14. For Dappled Things
15. Practice Preaching
16. Reformation Is Sin
17. The Cruelty of Peace
18. Living on Dishonest Wealth
19. God’s Grandeur
20. On not Holding On or Witnessing the Ressurection

(note: 15-20 are sermons.)

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