New publication--"Free Church Theology, the Pilgrim Church, and the Ecumenical Future"

The new issue of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies (vol. 49, no. 3, Summer 2014) includes my journal article "Free Church Theology, the Pilgrim Church, and the Ecumenical Future" (pp. 420-42). The précis published at the beginning of the article follows below:

Within the framework of receptive ecumenism, this essay addresses the question: is there anything distinctive about theology in the Free Church tradition that constitutes some portion of the ecclesial gifts that the rest of the church might contemplate receiving from the Free Churches? The author’s own Baptist tradition serves as a particular example that represents the larger Free Church tradition in this connection. A survey of the international bilateral dialogues with Baptist World Alliance participation reveals a Free Church theology that is both radically biblical and radically catholic and yet relentlessly pilgrim in its resistance to overly realized eschatologies of the church and its doctrinal formulations. After establishing connections between Free Church and ecumenically shared expressions of a pilgrim church theology, the essay concludes by proposing seven ecclesiological theses rooted in the narrative Christology of Baptist theologian James Wm. McClendon, Jr., regarding what it might mean ecumenically for the church to embody the story of Jesus as a pilgrim people.

Journal of Ecumenical Studies on "The Ecumenical Legacy of the Second Vatican Council, 50 Years Later"

Yesterday I received the latest issue of the Journal of Ecumenical Studies (vol. 48, no. 2; Spring 2013). This issue features a special section on "The Ecumenical Legacy of the Second Vatican Council, 50 Years Later" that publishes the plenary addresses delivered at the annual conference of the North American Academy of Ecumenists in Halifax, Nova Scotia, September 21-23, 2012. I'm looking forward to a prolonged feast of reading and reflecting on these articles, and I hope other readers of Ecclesial Theology who can get access to this issue (check the current periodicals holdings of the nearest seminary or university library; subscription information here) will join me.

Here is a listing of the contents of this section:

• "Introduction" by Sr. Dr. Lorelei F. Fuchs, Research Assistant, National Council of the Churches of Christ, USA, and President of the North American Academy of Ecumenists
• "The Ecumenical Legacy of the Second Vatican Council: Reflections of an Accidental Ecumenist" by Rev. Dr. Karen B. Westerfield Tucker, Professor of Worship, School of Theology of Boston University
• "The Legacy of the Second Vatican Council: An Orthodox Perspective" by Dr. Despina D. Prassas, Assistant Professor of Theology, Providence College
• "The Ecumenical Legacy of the Second Vatican Council: A Disciples Perspective" by Rev. Dr. Robert K Welsh, President of the Council on Christian Unity of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)
• "The Second Vatican Council: The Legacy Viewed through Methodist Eyes" by Rev. Dr. Geoffrey Wainwright, Cushman Chair of Christian Theology (retired), Duke University Divinity School
• "Memories of Vatican II" by Rev. Dr. William A. Norgren, priest, Episcopal Church USA and former director of the National Council of Churches' Faith and Order Commission during Vatican II
• "Do We Need a Vatican III or an Eighth Ecumenical Council?" By Rev. Dr. William G. Rusch, former Director of the Commissionon Faith and Order of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA