Ebook
This book introduces the theory of interreligious resilience as a means to developing deeper and more effective interreligious engagement and resilience. Michael S. Hogue and Dean Phillip Bell advocate for interreligious resilience as the ability to grow through encounters with religious difference. They argue that rather than the capacity to endure change and return to a normal status quo, a deeper, more complex resilience is characterized by an ability to learn through disturbances, disruptions, and uncertainty.
This book integrates theory and practice by situating the practical tasks of interreligious engagement in theological and social contexts. It is systemic and multidimensional, rather than staying focused on isolated interreligious issues or interpersonal interreligious encounters.
This book is essential reading for all religious leaders and other community leaders working with religious people in an interreligious world.
This book provides a new interpretative framework for thinking about and practicing interreligious engagement and leadership, introducing a resilience and vulnerability theory of religion.
Shows why interreligious leadership is more difficult and more important than ever before.
Introduces a resilience and vulnerability theory of religion and religious life.
Provide readers with real-world cases and sacred texts so they can practice working with the interreligious resilience framework.
Acknowledgments
Introduction: Interreligious Resilience, Why It Matters, and How We Got Here
PART I: Building a Model of Interreligious Resilience
1. Interreligious History and Models: Addressing Religious Supremacy and Religious Pluralism
2. Interreligious Contexts: Globalization, Postsecularism, Acceleration, and Polarization
3. Interreligious Leadership: Challenges and Opportunities
4. Interreligious Resilience
PART II: Practical Application
5. The VITA Pathway of Interreligious Resilience
6. Case Studies: From Theory to Practice and From Practice to Theory
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Grounded in the practice of interreligious resilience, this is a clarion call to collaborative action for a more socially just and environmentally regenerative world. It is an essential resource for interreligious leaders seeking catalytic ways to respond to social and economic inequality, ecological crises, religious supremacy, and ethnonationalism. We can undo patterns of religious supremacy and create resilient communities and forms of belonging sustained by creative vulnerability and interreligious engagement!
With a clear, concise, and innovative approach, this book charts a new and exciting vision for religious leadership. It should be widely read and discussed.
Michael S. Hogue is Professor of Theology, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion at Meadville Lombard Theological School, USA.
Dean Phillip Bell is President/CEO and Professor of Jewish History at Spertus Institute for Jewish Learning and Leadership, USA.