Working with Words: On Learning to Speak Christian

by Stanley Hauerwas

Publisher:

Cascade Books

, 2011

Overview

This collection of essays, lectures, and sermons by Stanley Hauerwas focuses on the central challenge, risk, and difficulty of the necessity of working with words about God. If the word “God” is to be properly used by Christians, it must be disciplined by Christian practice. Like any word, we must learn how to say it correctly.

Key Features

• Collects Hauerwas’ thoughts on talking about God
• Focuses on the challenge and necessity of using theological language correctly
• Contains essays, lectures and sermons written by Hauerwas

Contents and Contributors

• “Look at It and Live: A Sermon”
• “Seeing Darkness, Hearing Silence: Augustine’s Account of Evil”
• “Disciplined Seeing: Forms of Christianity and Forms of Life” with Brian Goldstone
• “God and Goodness: A Theological Exploration”
• “Naming God: A Sermon”
• “Speaking Christian: A Commencement Address”
• “Why ‘The Way Words Run’ Matters: Reflections on Becoming a ‘Major Biblical Scholar’”
• “Why Did Jesus Have to Die? An Attempt to Cross the Barrier of Age”
• “More, or, A Taxonomy of Greed”
• “Love: A Sermon”
• “Love’s Work—Discerning the Body: A Sermon”
• “Body Matters: A Sermon”
• “Finite Care in a World of Infinite Need: A Sermon”
• “Sent: The Church Is Mission”
• “‘Long Live the Weeds and the Wilderness Yet’: Reflections on A Secular Age” with Romand Coles
• “H. Richard Niebuhr”
• “The Virtues of Alasdair MacIntyre”
• “The Virtues of the Summa Theologiae” with Sheryl Overmyer
• “‘A Recall to Christian Life’: What Is Social about the Catholic Social Teachings” with Jana Bennett
• “Methodist Theological Ethics” with D. Stephen Long
• “Friendship and Freedom: Reflections on Bonhoeffer’s ‘The Friend’”

The essays and sermons in Working with Words reveal that the vibrancy of Stanley Hauerwas arises from his single-minded, manic determination to learn from Jesus and the Scriptures to see and speak as a Christian—and to teach other Christians to do the same.

—Peter J. Leithart, president, Trinity House Institute for Biblical, Liturgical, & Cultural Studies

Product Details

• Title: Working with Words: On Learning to Speak Christian
• Author: Stanley Hauerwas
• Publisher: Cascade Books
• Print Publication Date: 2011
• Logos Release Date: 2016
• Pages: 340
• Language: English
• Resources: 1
• Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
• Subject: Philosophical theology
• ISBNs: 9781608999682, 1608999688
• Resource ID: LLS:WORKINGWITHWORDS
• Resource Type: Monograph
• Metadata Last Updated: 2025-03-12T00:41:50Z

About Stanley Hauerwas

Stanley Hauerwas is the Gilbert T. Rowe Professor of Theological Ethics at Duke University. Prior to that, he was a professor at the University of Notre Dame. In 2001, he was named “America’s Best Theologian” by TIME Magazine. Hauerwas is the author of numerous books, including Unsettling Arguments, Hannah’s Child: A Theologian’s Memoir, Christian Existence Today, and Living Gently in a Violent World.

Sample Pages from Working with Words: On Learning to Speak Christian