Cover -- Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Introduction: Christianity, Theology and Contemporary Culture -- Practical theology: the background -- Practical theology as methodology -- Practical theology: further reflections -- PART I: THEOLOGY, CHURCH AND CONTEMPORARY CULTURE -- 1 Church, Authority and the Culture of Credibility -- Roman Catholicism in North America: four writers in dialogue -- Teaching authority -- Authenticity and authority -- Authority and discipleship -- 2 Christianity and Consumerism -- Preamble: Going to church in Atlanta -- Religious studies, culture and contemporary Christianity -- Choice, consumerism and Christianity -- Christmas, Christianity and culture -- Christianity in a secular society -- 3 Theology and Cultural Challenge -- Introduction -- The deductive possibility: John Milbank and Radical Orthodoxy -- The reductive possibility: Lieven Boeve and reflexive theology -- The inductive possibility: David Martin and socio-theology -- Reflexive religion and contemporary culture -- Theological engagement -- PART II: ORDINARY THEOLOGY -- 4 Acuity, Clarity and Practical Wisdom -- Introduction -- Practical theology, ecclesiology and formation -- Describing faith: some perspectives -- What is theological knowledge? -- World-views -- Summary -- 5 Mother Church -- Introduction -- Mother church -- Metaphor and metamorphosis -- The nature of theology -- The nature of the church -- The nature of theological education -- Conclusion -- 6 Formation, Transformation and Liberation -- Introduction -- Transformation -- Liberation -- Wisdom -- Education and vocation -- Understanding -- Conclusion -- PART III: THEOLOGICAL CULTURE AND THE CONCRETE CHURCH -- 7 Adventure and Atrophy in a Charismatic Movement -- Introduction -- Interpreting Toronto: a methodological sketch -- Immersed in the river of revival: returning to Toronto.

Adventure and atrophy -- Conclusion -- 8 A Blessed Rage for Order -- The origin and anatomy of reform -- Reform: an ethnographic sketch -- An interpretative horizon -- Money, sex and power -- Reading Reform differently -- Conclusion -- 9 Comic Turns -- Introduction -- Anglicanism as irony and comedy -- Anglicanism: comic and ironic -- Excursion: Continuing Anglican Churches as alternative comedy -- Further reflections -- The cultural nature of Anglican Communion -- Comic endings: what is the future for the Anglican Communion? -- Concluding and unscientific postscript: quadripolar Anglicanism -- Conclusion: Authentic Engagement -- Bibliography -- Index -- A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- Y -- Z.