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Just Peacemaking: Ten Practices for Abolishing War (1998) — Einführung; Mitwirkender — 82 Exemplare

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At Peace and Unafraid explores principles and practices to guide Christians in
living out Jesus's way of nonviolent love in societies that often do not share
their convictions.
 
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collectionmcc | Mar 6, 2018 |
This book is subtitled “A Realist Pacifist Perspective.” If “realist” means careful, critical, and lucid consideration of a problem from multiple perspectives, then the book delivers what it promises. It is a wealth of information (including bibliography) on both theological and social scientific explorations of peacemaking that should prove especially useful to individuals and groups interested in a thorough introduction to peace studies.

Friesen himself defines a “realist” pacifism as one that “takes seriously the nature of human sinfulness as it expresses itself in the egoistic self-interest and exploitation of political and economic systems” and “is political, that seeks to apply its ethic to resolution of practical, economic, and political issues within human institutions” (p.19). This definition leads him to develop a perspective that is informed by both social scientific and theological insight.

Without wavering from his conviction that nonviolence is central to Christian life, he recognizes the importance of a careful consideration of what both violence and nonviolence mean, both structurally and individually, if Christian life is to include the public discourse central to being human. Friesen does not paint a utopian picture; he is not interested in withdrawal. He is interested in exploring the significance of Christian pacifism for the “real” world of human interaction, communication, and conflict.

Friesen insists that Christian pacifism understand “peace” as shalom. This means that a negative definition is not sufficient. As Martin Luther King, Jr. insisted, peace is more than the absence of war; it is the presence of justice.

Theologically, the discussion revolves around consideration of creation and sin on the one hand and redemption and hope on the other. A “realistic” perspective is cognizant of God's act of creation and redemption as well as the human dimension of sin. It is precisely God's act that provides the basis for eschatological hope and, as in the covenant community of Hebrew Scripture, for shalom. A one-sided emphasis on sin, without attention to the hope grounded in God's active intervention in history, produces only despair. That, Friesen would insist, is not realistic.

Theological and social scientific perspectives are blended in discussion of justice and nonviolence. Justice is “the goal of social institutions.” As goal, it is connected with hope. Because it is concerned with institutions, it is structural and political. For the Judeo-Christian tradition, it is intrinsically connected with the communal experience of shalom. Nonviolence is “the normative principle of social change.” For Friesen, the normative principle of nonviolence is central to Christian faith; because it is a principle of social change, it is political and is a proper subject for social scientific analysis. Friesen insists that “ends” and “means” are inseparable. An unjust means cannot be expected to achieve a just goal. Because “violence” is essentially violation of persons, while “justice” involves their affirmation, violent means cannot be expected to further the cause of justice.

In his Foreward to the book, Stanley Hauerwas expresses his hope that “Friesen has written the book that will finally begin the discussion that we have long needed between the so-called `peace churches' and the mainstream of Christianity.” Perhaps it is a bit much to expect Friesen to begin a discussion that, in one form or another, has been going on for some time. (The series of which this book is a part, the “Christian Peace Shelf,” has been an important part of the recent history of that discussion.) But this book is evidence that a discussion that has too often been superficial and has too easily degenerated into caricature can in fact move to the level of real dialogue, which always includes the potential for mutual transformation. It is an important contribution both to a theology of nonviolence and to a politics of nonviolent action.
… (mehr)
 
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stevenschroeder | Aug 5, 2006 |

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