Bøger udgivet af ATF Press

In 1830, at the age of forty, Jean-Claude Colin accepted the call of his colleagues to take charge of the Society of Mary (Marists). He had joined this project as a seminarian in Lyons, France, in 1816, along with Marcellin Champagnat, future founder of the Marist teaching brothers. Since ordination, he had been an assistant priest at Cerdon (photo below), preached revival missions in rural districts and been principal of a high school-seminary. Colin always insisted that he was only a temporary superior until someone more capable could take over. Yet, by the time he resigned in 1854, he had obtained papal approval of the priests' branch, established the Society firmly in France, especially in education, and sent fifteen expeditions of missionary priests and brothers to the remote and scattered islands of the southwest Pacific. There they planted the Catholic Church in New Zealand, Wallis and Futuna, Tonga, Samoa, Fiji and New Caledonia. Between his resignation and his death in 1875, Colin wrote Constitutions for the priests and brothers of the Society of Mary and for the Marist sisters. He also left a rich spiritual teaching. For this achievement, the Society regards him, despite his reluctance, as its Founder.

The question of hermeneutics now dominates all disciplines of human knowledge and its construction. It has moved from a concentration on how to apply the results of research knowledge to considerations of the frameworks by which we conduct research as a meaningful exercise. The study of the Bible is not exempt from these developments. The essays in this collection amply testify to the breadth of frameworks that are now being applied to the Bible and the development of ethical awareness in the construction of knowledge. The reader will find engagements with the Bible informed by developments in science, law, ecology, feminism and linguistics. Key ethical issues about violence, fundamentalism, anti-semitism and patriarchy are directly addressed as inextricably involved in the interpretation of the Bible, on the understanding that both Bible and interpreter must be responsible and accountable in todays world. Critical analysis of the Bible is no different, even when there is a pre-disposition or confessional commitment to treat the bible as sacred scripture. Biblical research is inextricably affected by those epistemologies and ethical sensitivities that inform understanding and the search for meaning in our contemporary world.

China has been a challenge to Christianity since the beginning of modern times, and it remains so today. Here is a great civilisation comprising a quarter of humankind, yet largely untouched by Christian values and beliefs. Any theological evaluation of the state of world Christianity that does not take China into account is impoverished and radically incomplete.

The human body is the primary lens through which we view, encounter and engage the world around us. It is no surprise then to find a wide range of theological reflection upon the human body, from those that affirm the human body as something very good, through to other more negative views where the body is something to be marginalised or escaped from. The body and theology also meet in conversations over body, mind and soul; gender; disability; eschatology; race and culture; sexuality; Christology; and medicine and technology to name but a few. Each of the authors in this volume pick up the theme of embodiment as the lens through which they look at an aspect of theology and body, providing an engaging window onto some of these discussions.

'Did Matthew "e;twist"e; the Scriptures?' 'Where did Satan come from?' 'My Reading? Questions and issues like these are presented in this selection of papers and presentations from a Bible conference at Avondale College on the broad topic of intertextuality. More than 100 scholars and administrators convened and shared their research as well as their personal perspectives on how to read and apply holy Scripture in the 21st century. This anthology contains a representative sample of their studies and reflections.

For a long time what we now know as space was inaccessible to humans, not because it was at a height which was unattainable without the least astronautical technology or principles, but because of the cosmic and dualistic representation of reality. Humans were relegated to the centre, to a sort of ecesspiti of imperfection, alteration, incompleteness and finally death. Around them were crystal spheres which held the planets and starsoimmutable, eternal and perfectoa domain which was completely off-limits to humans, unless they had discarded their carnal envelope, either through a mystical experience or after death. It took a revolution, the Copernican Revolution, to shatter the celestial spheres and make them no longer forbidden territory. Galileo was one of the first revolutionaries: through his astronomical observations, he showed the Earth and the Sky were in fact made of the same fabric, the same material, and therefore belonged to the same world. Then followed Kepler and others. Centuries passed, and human conquered the air, and then space. Their feet touched the surface of the Moon and their wheels the surface of Mars. The Earth and the entire universe somehow became flat again with no folds, no curves, at least in appearance, to hide any dark corners. The horizon once again retreated out of reach taking with it perhaps the last dreams of exploration. The human imagination does not like horizons which are too flat, too clear; humanity needs to meet resistance, brakes, constraints to stop them in their tracks, to cross them and lead them, to new unknown territories. An impossible Horizon, writes Jacques Arnould in this work, but a horizon without which our adventures, our explorations would lose their savor and especially their meaning. We will then understand that even if the goal is never fully achieved, it is the quest that enriches us.i Bertrand Piccard. (Balloonist, aviator and psychiatrist, Bertrand Piccard is the first to complete a non-stop balloon flight around the globe, in a balloon named Breitling Orbiter 3. With Andre Borschberg, he is the initiator, chairman, and pilot of Solar Impulse, the first successful round-the-world solar powered flight)

An engagingly visual guide book to a lost city from a scholar in the forefront of research on Colossae. Alan Cadwallader distils information, insights and interpretation into a rich collection of evidence from Colossae and its environs, giving us access to a fascinating and under-researched city. Together with a significant chapter by Rosemary Canavan, Cadwallader's often ground-breaking work gives us unprecedented access into the life and context of this city. A book for all who enjoy time travel with expert guides!

In July 1872 three Sisters of St Joseph and one lay woman arrived at The Vale, a village near Bathurst, New South Wales. They had come from Adelaide in response to an invitation from the Catholic bishop of Bathurst to establish a foundation of the newly founded Congregation in his diocese--the first Josephite foundation in New South Wales. Sister Teresa McDonald was the leader or Superior of the founding community. Born in Scotland in 1838, she had come to Australia with her parents finally settling in Adelaide. A friend of both Father Julian Tenison Woods and Mother Mary MacKillop, she joined the Sisters of St Joseph in 1867. This book explores her early life and her time as a Sister of St Joseph in Adelaide where she served as the first Provincial of the Congregation in South Australia. It also gives particular attention to Teresa's short years at The Vale, her struggle with ill health and her death in January 1876.