Preaching Justice

By Christine Marie Smith

Book Overview

Preaching Justice brings together eight very diverse voices from eight distinct cultural/ethnic communities, challenging them to articulate the specific justice concerns, issues, and passions that give rise to a preaching ministry within the their own community and beyond. Theological analyses are offered by theses persons representing their particular communities: Kathy Black - persons with disabilities Martin Brokenieg - Native Americans Teresa Fry Brown - African Americans Eleazar Fernandez - Filipino Americans Justo Gonzalez - Hispanics Eunjoo Mary Kim - Korean Americans Stacy Offner - Jews Christine Marie Smith - lesbians and gays This volume offers a rare vision of what transforms preaching might sound and look like, and urges that all preaching - whatever community it comes from, whatever community it hopes to reach - be grounded in the sacred acts of listening and knowing.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 160608142X
• ISBN13: 9781606081426
• Release Date: November 2008
• Publisher: Wipf & Stock Publishers
• Length: 174 Pages
• Weight: 0.62 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 6.0" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

Transforming through Preaching

For those who feel the call to preach God's word to others, it is important to not allow ourselves to be pigeonholed into delivering the same message each week because we "know" our congregation. One of the tasks of the preacher is to force the listeners to stretch a bit. Just as a successful workout is enhanced by stretching, so is a deepening spiritual experience. Christine Marie Smith has brought together eight diverse voices that each provide their own distinct perspective and allow the reader to learn some ways to "stretch." She provided the theologians with six guided questions, and allowed them to share thoughts from their perspective of persons with disabilities, Native Americans, African American women, Filipinos, Hispanics, Korean Americans, Jewish, and lesbians. There may be some preachers who say, "I don't have any of the cultural/ethnic folks in my congregation or in my community" and it is those who may most need to read this book. In her introduction, Smith offers that "Euro-American voices still dominate every aspect of the field of homiletcs...[and] when one cultural perspective completely dominates an entire pastoral and theological field, radical change is needed." Professor and United Methodist minister Kathy Black helps to stretch the readers' minds regarding persons with disabilities. As the minister of a Deaf congregation, Black recognizes that historically it was "difficult for people to encounter the face of God in persons who were perceived to be less than whole." She affirms that it incurable disabilities are not a part of God's will and it is the responsibility of the preacher to help people to "encounter the face of God in someone maneuvering a wheelchair...or giving a lecture in sign language." As an African American woman minister, Teresa Fry Brown recognizes that African American women have encountered "racism, sexism, classism, materialism, deonominationalism, ageism, and other forms of oppression and rejection." In trying to discover their own faith voices they have had to "chart their own paths to live out their faith in God." Brown submits that through God's "Affirmative Action Program," all voices are welcomed into God's realm. Christine Marie Smith has done a beautiful job providing the voices that all should hear, the voices that affirm God's never-ending love and grace for all of God's children. Let the reader carry that knowledge to the congregation and let the congregation carry it out into the world. In doing so, justice for all will indeed prevail.

Preaching Justice

PREACHING JUSTICE: EHTHNIC AND CULTURAL PERSPECTIVES Edited by Christine Marie Smith We are all culturally myopic. We see through the lens of the culture we were born into, we love through the lens of our sexual orientation, we travel through the prejudice in the world covered in the skin of our particular race. It's just a fact of life that we react from these basics. It's also a fact that anyone who is planning on ministry as his or her path in the world can't be satisfied to see only through that personal lens. That is not what Christ is asking of us. And this is one reason to be grateful for Christine Smith's book, Preaching Justice. This work is a collection of eight essays, which focus on entirely different points of view. Whether reading Kathy Black's essay, A Perspective of the Disabled, or Justo Gonzalez's A Hispanic Perspective, or Smith's essay, A Lesbian Perspective you are stretched beyond your natural perspective to understand God, theology and preaching from someone else's reality. The theme running through the work is the reality of justice as preached from these different points of view. Stacy Offner, in her essay A Jewish Perspective, reminds us that the Hebrew word tzedek is translated as "justice" but also as "righteousness", "virtue" and "equity" and that that word really distills the whole Torah's prescription for the social order of society. So reading these essays helps us remember that though there has never been total social order, never been full justice in the world, justice remains our goal. The Word of God is justice and our preaching is delivering the Word of God. These theologians and preachers have wonderful words to share in helping us do just that.