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September 20, 2010 by Jason Hood

5 Influential Texts from the Mainline Tradition

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The members of SAET are, generally speaking, evangelicals. I’d like to start a post series on valuable texts from outside the evangelical tradition.

Can you come up with a “top five” list of books from mainline writers? This can be difficult inasmuch as it requires using labels, which some writers (Jimmy Dunn comes to mind) resist with all their might.

Two of the texts that come to mind are not the normal sort of theological or religious text one might envision in this category: Langdon Gilkey’s Shantung Compound and To End All Wars by Ernest Gordon. These books have a good deal in common. Both are quite readable; both tell a story than involves a fair bit of theology; both are about life in a Japanese prison camp (POW in Gordon’s case, which was much more trying; Gilkey was in a civilian case with much less death). In both instances the theology and worldview of these authors changed drastically while in prison. Both exemplify ecclesial theology, wrestling with doctrine while life has you in its teeth.

Gilkey’s book, and many other fine contenders for a list like this, can be found in Christianity Today’s list of the top 100 books “having a significant effect on Christians” in the 20th century.

Which books would you select and why?

Categories: Ecclesial Theology | Mainline Protestantism
Recent Comments
- matthew said...
  
  I think Robert Jenson’s Systematic Theology would have to be on the list. He’s a significant voice in contemporary systematics, is attempting to do ecclesial theology, and makes a serious attempt to place at the centre of his system a trinitarian account of the doctrine of God, shaped by the biblical accounts of the history of Israel and of Jesus. I don’t think he’s necessarily very successful in this. But he’s a stimulating conversation partner.
  
  I also like Fergus Kerr’s Theology After Wittgenstein. Though he’s a conservative Catholic, so whether he counts as mainline.
  
  Third, not strictly theological the poems of R. S. Thomas. THomas was a Welsh Anglican priest. A displaced intellectual among working class people. Not much of the love of God in there, but fascinating to wrestle with him in his sense of vocation and of alienation from those he serves.
  
  09/22/10 3:00 PM | Comment Link
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About the SAET Blog

Welcome to the SAET blog. Herein you will find the theological/pastoral ramblings of the Rev. Matthew Mason, the good Doctor Jason Hood, and Pastor Gerald Hiestand. All three write under the premise that theology and the pastorate belong together, and that (at least some) pastors must once again function as writing theologians for the wider church, for the ecclesial renewal of theology and the theological renewal of the church.

Contributors

Gerald Hiestand
Gerald has served as the SAET board president since 2006. He has been in pastoral ministry since 1999, and serves currently as the Senior Associate Pastor of Calvary Memorial Church in Oak Park, IL.

Jason Hood
Jason is a graduate of Rhodes College, Reformed Theological Seminary, Highland Theological College and the Univ. of Aberdeen. Jason works as Scholar-in-Residence and director of Christ College Residency Program at Christ UMC. He's trying to figure out the twitter thing, @jasonbhood, and sometimes writes for ChristianityToday.com.

Matthew Mason
Matthew earned an MTh at Oak Hill College, London. He is an Assistant Pastor at Church of the Resurrection, Washington D. C. (Anglican Mission in the Americas), and edits Ecclesia Reformanda, a journal of Reformed theology.

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