This useful guide offers a critical appraisal of a theological movement within the church catholic. The authors, a church historian and a systematic theologian, describe Lutheranism as centered in the fundamental principle of the Reformation, "justification by faith apart from works of law."
The book focuses on the emergence of this chief article of faith as a proposal of dogma to the church ecumenical, its theological formulation, and its significance for the shaping of piety and doctrine. Each issue is treated in terms of both confessional history and systematic theology. Seminarians, pastors, teachers, and interested laypersons of all traditions will gain ecumenical insights as well as pertinent information from this work.Get an even better deal on these resources when you order the Fortress Lutheran Library Expansion Bundle.
“let us abolish all party names and call ourselves Christians, after him whose teaching we hold. (LW 45, 70–71)” (Page vii)
Robert W. Jensen is a leading theologian in American Lutheranism. He taught systematic theology for a generation at Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago and together with Rober W. Jenson founded the Center for Catholic and Evangelical Theology and co-edited the journal Pro Ecclesia.
Eric W. Gritsch (1931–2012) was senior scholar for research at the Center of Theological Inquiry in Princeton, New Jersey, and professor emeritus of religion at Saint Olaf College, Northfield, Minnesota. He also spent two decades teaching at Lutheran Theological Seminary in Gettysburg. With Carl Braaten, Jenson founded the Center for Catholic and Evangelical Theology and co-edited the journal Pro Ecclesia.