The Shape of Participation: A Theology of Church Practices

The Shape of Participation is a work of constructive theology addressed to theologians seminarians and thoughtful pastors. Owens engages and deepens recent popular discussions of church practices by approaching practices from the church Fathers understanding of the churchs participation in God. Through a wide-ranging engagement with theologians both ancient and contemporary---including Cyril of Alexandria. Maximus the Confessor Dietrich Bonhocffer and Herbert McCabe---Owens argues that the embodied practices of the church are the churchs participation in the life of God. making the church Jesuss own continued peaceable embodiment in and for the world. This book is for theologians pastors and anyone who wants a deeper understanding of how the visible presence of Gods church is extraordinarily good news in a violent world.. Im grateful for this account of the churchs relationship to the life of God for refusing the hopelessness of so much contemporary ecclesiology. All of us who persist in preaching or hearing the Word and receiving Gods good gifts at the table will be strengthened and encouraged by Owenss theocentric understanding of what the church is up to in the world.---Beth Felker Jones wheaton College. A wonderful book---Owens takes the significant interest in `practices that has emerged over the last decade engages it theologically in rich ways with attention to specific eeclesial examples and deepens it through insightful analyses of Dietrich Bonhocffer. Herbert McCabe and Maximus the Confessor. Pastors and scholars alike will benefit from careful study of Owenss significant argument.---L. Gregory Jones Duke University. By refraining the churchs practices as a participation in Christ and indeed as Christs own practicing in and for the world. Owens has brought to the study of Christian practice new theological depth shape and creativity. Moreover by doing this in dialogue with ancient as well as contemporary theological and philosophical sources and in a way that takes seriously the concrete embodied church rather than remaining on the level of idealized and abstract ecclesiology he has provided us a helpful new model for thinking about what it means to be the church.-Bryan Stone Boston University School of Theology