What's that on the cover of Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future?

What's the image on the cover of my new book Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future: Story, Tradition, and the Recover of Community (Baylor University Press), and what in the world does it mean? I answer those questions in my response to four reviewers of the book in the linked issue of the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research (vol. 11, no 2; November 2016) [click on hyperlink].

Interested in Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future? Order the book from Baylor University Press or via Amazon.

Pacific Journal of Baptist Research issue explores Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future

National Association of Baptist Professors of Religion plenary

book symposium panel session, Waco, Texas, May 24, 2016

The new issue of the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research (vol. 11, no. 2 [November 2016]) is devoted to a book symposium exploring my new book Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future: Story, Tradition, and the Recovery of Community (Baylor University Press, 2016]). The four essays and my response to them are lightly revised versions of presentations made in a plenary panel session at a joint meeting of the National Association of Baptist Professor of Religion and the Baptist History and Heritage Society held on the campus of Baylor University's George W. Truett Theological Seminary in Waco, Texas, May 23-25, 2016. The contents of the issue appear below:

Adam C. English     2

Editorial

David E. Wilhite     3

Baptists, Catholicity, and Visible Unity: A Response to Steven Harmon

Amy L. Chilton Thompson     12

Response to Steven R. Harmon’s Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future: Story, Tradition, and the Recovery of Community

Courtney Pace     16

Baptists, Catholicity, and Missing Voices: A Response to Steven Harmon

Andrew Smith     20

Description, Prescription, and the Ecumenical Possibilities of Baptist Identity: Reading Steven Harmon’s Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future

Steven R. Harmon     24

Locating the Unity of Christ’s Rule: A Response to Respondents to Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future 

Panelists (L-R): David E. Wilhite, Amy L. Chilton Thompson,

Courtney Pace, Andrew Christopher Smith

The issue is edited and introduced by Dr. Adam C. English, Chair of the Department of Christian Studies and Professor of Christian Theology and Philosophy at Campbell University in Buies Creek, North Carolina, who also moderated the NABPR/BHHS panel discussion. Contributors of the review essays are Dr. David E. Wilhite, Associate Professor of Christian Theology at Baylor University's George W. Truett Theological Seminary; Dr. Amy L. Chilton Thompson, Adjunct Professor at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena, California and Azusa Pacific University in Azusa, California; Dr. Courtney Pace, Assistant Professor of Church History at Memphis Theological Seminary in Memphis, Tennessee; and Dr. Andrew Christopher Smith, Assistant Professor of Religion at Carson-Newman University in Jefferson City, Tennessee.

Read the full November 2016 issue of the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research as a downloadable PDF file here.

Interested in reading Baptist Identity and the Ecumenical Future? Order from Baylor University Press or via Amazon.

PJBR symposium on Curtis Freeman's Contesting Catholicity

The November 2015 issue of the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research, for which I serve on the editorial board, is devoted to a book symposium on Curtis Freeman's book Contesting Catholicity: Theology for Other Baptists (Baylor University Press, 2014). Here's a link to the open-access PDF for this issue of the journal; the editorial introduction appears below:

The essays that follow were originally presented in the context of a panel discussion of Curtis W. Freeman’s book Contesting Catholicity: Theology for Other Baptists (Waco, Tex.: Baylor University Press, 2014) in a plenary session of the annual meeting of the National Association of Baptist Professors of Religion in Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, May 18-20, 2015. The first two responses to the book are from specialists in Baptist history: Bill J. Leonard, James and Marilyn Dunn Professor of Baptist Studies and Professor of Church History at Wake Forest University School of Divinity, where he was the founding dean, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, USA, and C. Douglas Weaver, Professor of Religion and Director of Undergraduate Studies in the Department of Religion at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, USA. The second pair of responses is offered by Baptist theologians: Adam C. English, Associate Professor of Theology and Philosophy at Campbell University in Buies Creek, North Carolina, USA, and Fisher Humphreys, Professor of Divinity (retired) at Beeson Divinity School, Samford University, Birmingham, Alabama, USA. Finally, Curtis W. Freeman, Research Professor of Theology and Director of the Baptist House of Studies at Duke University Divinity School in Durham, North Carolina, USA, responds to these engagements of his work.

New publication--"James Wm. McClendon, Jr.'s Narrative Christology in Ecumenical/Ecclesiological Perspective"

The November 2014 issue of the Pacific Journal for Baptist Research (vol. 9, no. 2) includes my article "James Wm. McClendon, Jr.'s Narrative Christology in Ecumenical/Ecclesiological Perspective," The issue in its entirety is available online in PDF (click on hyperlink above); the abstract for the article follows:

ABSTRACT

The reception of Baptist theologian James Wm. McClendon, Jr.’s proposal of a “two-narrative” Christology has focused on its relation to the Chalcedonian “two-natures” Christology. While not ignoring this question, this article addresses the ecumenical and ecclesiological implications of McClendon’s Christology by turning to a pair of different questions. First, what does McClendon’s seemingly non-Chalcedonian Christology look like when viewed through the lenses of the attention bilateral ecumenical dialogue has given to Christology as central to efforts toward confessing “one faith,” in particular in light of the progress in overcoming the fifth-century Christological divisions made in the ecumenical dialogues between the non-Chalcedonian churches of the East and Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant churches during the past four decades? Second, what are the ecumenical implications of McClendon’s suggestion of a link between his two-narrative Christology and ecclesiology?

Pacific Journal of Baptist Research 9, no. 1 published

The most recent issue of the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research, for which I serve as a member of the Editorial Board, has now been published and is available online. Vol. 9, no. 1 (May 2014) is a Festschrift issue in honor of New Zealand Baptist theological educator Laurie Guy, with contributions from John Tucker, David Bebbington, Peter Lineham, Allan Davidson, and Martin Sutherland, along with a bibliography of Guy's published work. Click the embedded reader above to read the issue here; it is also available as a PDF download on the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research web site, where back issues are available in PDF as well.

Introducing the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research

I’m pleased to announce that the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research, a peer-refereed journal for which I serve on the Editorial Board, has made the transition from print subscription journal to fully open-access online journal under the leadership of new Senior Editor Myk Habets, who is Lecturer in Systematic Theology, Head of  the Carey Graduate School, and Director of the R. J. Thompson Centre for Theological Studies at Carey Baptist College in New Zealand. While based in New Zealand, the Pacific Journal of Baptist Research has been broadening its scope beyond Australasia to include Baptist and Anabaptist communities in the Pacific Rim nations and beyond. Toward that end, the journal has added American and European representation to its Editorial Board, moved from print to online, and published work of international interest such a recent article on “The baptist Imagination of James McClendon.” I hope readers of Ecclesial Theology will visit the new web site of the journal and read new issues as they are published.

I also hope that scholars working on article-length projects with connections to Baptist studies will consider responding to the call for manuscript submissions. For those so interested, here's some information on the journal and submissions from the PJBR masthead:

The Pacific Journal of Baptist Research (PJBR) is an open-access online journal which aims to provide an international vehicle for scholarly research and debate in the Baptist tradition, with a special focus on the Pacific region. However, topics are not limited to the Pacific region, and all subject matter potentially of significance for Baptist/Anabaptist communities will be considered. PJBR is especially interested in theological and historical themes, and preference will be given to articles on those themes. PJBR is published twice-yearly in May and November. Articles are fully peer-reviewed, with submissions sent to international scholars in the appropriate fields for critical review before being accepted for publication. The editor will provide a style guide on enquiry. All manuscript submissions should be addressed to the Senior Editor: myk.habets@carey.ac.nz.