Christian Theology
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Esoteric Christianity, or the Lesser Mysteries
Annie Wood Besant (1847-1933) was a prominent Theosophist, women's rights activist, writer and orator and supporter of Irish and Indian self rule. For a time she undertook part-time study at the Birkbeck Literary and Scientific Institution, where her religious and political activities were to cause alarm. She was earning a small weekly wage by writing a column for the National Reformer, the newspaper of the National Secular Society. For many years Annie was a friend of the Society's leader, Charles Bradlaugh. Both of them became household names in 1877 when they published a book by the American birthcontrol campaigner Charles Knowlton. After joining the Marxists, Annie stood for election to the London School Board. In 1889, she was asked to write a review for the Pall Mall Gazette on The Secret Doctrine, a book by H. P. Blavatsky. After reading it, she sought an interview with its author and in this way she was converted to Theosophy. Her works include: The Political Status of Women (1874), The Law of Population (1877), Autobiographical Sketches (1885), Reincarnation (1892), Seven Principles of Man (1892), Death - And After? (1893), Karma (1895) and Esoteric Christianity; or, The Lesser Mysteries (1901/05).
Faith of Our Fathers, The
Explains the basic tenets of the Catholic Faith and why we hold them. Delves into the historical background of virtually everything people find hard to understand about our Religion, such as priestly celibacy, sacred images, the Church and the Bible, the primacy of Peter, Communion under one kind, invocation of the Saints, etc. First published in 1876, when there was much anti- Catholic sentiment in the U.S., it sold 1.4 million copies in 40 years and has been reprinted many times since.
Hints on Extemporaneous Preaching
Reverend Henry Ware, Jr. (1794-1843), was an influential Unitarian theologian, early member of the faculty of Harvard Divinity School, and first president of the Harvard Musical Association. He was a mentor of Ralph Waldo Emerson when Emerson studied for the ministry in the 1820s. The son of Henry Ware, Sr. (1764-1845), he was born in Hingham, Massachusetts. After completing his studies at Phillips Academy, Andover and receiving his Harvard A. B. in 1812, he became minister of the Unitarian Second Church in Boston beginning in 1817. During this time he wrote Hints on Extemporaneous Preaching (1824) and The Recollections of Jotham Anderson (1828). In 1830 he left the Second Church's pulpit, with Emerson replacing him there, and moved to Harvard Divinity School. In 1831 he published On the Formation of the Christian Character, a manual on morality and his best-known work. After Emerson's Divinity School Address in 1838, Ware became more distant from his former student and friend, publishing The Personality of the Deity (1838) as a rebuttal of Emerson's views.
On Union With God (With Notes, Preface, and New Introduction)
Surely the most deeply-rooted need of the human soul, its purest aspiration, is for the closest possible union with God. As one turns over the pages of this little work, written by Blessed Albert the Great towards the end of his life, when that great soul had ripened and matured, one feels that here indeed is the ideal of one?s hopes. Simply and clearly the great principles are laid down, the way is made plain which leads to the highest spiritual life. It seems as though, while one reads, the mists of earth vanish and the snowy summits appear of the mountains of God. We breathe only the pure atmosphere of prayer, peace, and love, and the one great fact of the universe, the Divine Presence, is felt and realized without effort. [Complete with Notes, Preface, and a New Introduction]
Orthodoxy
Now with a foreword by Matthew Lee AndersonAntiquated. Unimaginative. Repressive. We've all heard these common reactions to orthodox Christian beliefs. Even Christians themselves are guilty of the tendency to discard historic Christianity. Yet as we read through the literature in Christianity?s past, we learn that we are in better company with our beliefs than we might think. Through his enchanting book, Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton reminds us of the paradoxes of our faith and the joy that comes when we explore them.From the foreword by Matthew Lee Anderson, author of The End of Our Exploring:?How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and yet at home in it?? And with that question, G.K. Chesterton recounts the heart of an intellectual journey that took him from the edges of a nihilistic pessimism into the center of the paradoxical joy of Christian orthodoxy. His book is not a defense of the Christian faith, at least not primarily, so much as an attempt to explain how the startling paradoxes and sharp edges of the creed explain everything else. It is a dated work, dealing in the categories and concerns of Chesterton?s contemporaries, and yet it comes nearer timelessness than anything we have today. Though Orthodoxy was written near the start of the 20th century, I have dubbed it the most important book for the 21st. There are few claims I have made in my life that I am more sure of than that one.
Samuel Butler – God the Known and God the Unknown: Fear Is Static That Prevents Me From Hearing Myself
Samuel Butler was born on 4th December 1835 at the village rectory in Langar, Nottinghamshire. His relationship with his parents, especially his father, was largely antagonistic. His education began at home and included frequent beatings, as was all too common at the time. Under his parents' influence, he was set to follow his father into the priesthood. He was schooled at Shrewsbury and then St John's College, Cambridge, where he obtained a first in Classics in 1858. After Cambridge he went to live in a low-income parish in London 1858-59 as preparation for his ordination into the Anglican clergy; there he discovered that baptism made no apparent difference to the morals and behaviour of his new peers. He began to question his faith. Correspondence with his father about the issue failed to set his mind at peace, inciting instead his father's wrath. As a result, the young Butler emigrated in September 1859 to New Zealand. He was determined to change his life. He wrote of his arrival and life as a sheep farmer on Mesopotamia Station in 'A First Year in Canterbury Settlement' (1863). After a few years he sold his farm and made a handsome profit. But the chief achievement of these years were the drafts and source material for much of his masterpiece 'Erewhon'. Butler returned to England in 1864, settling in rooms in Clifford's Inn, near Fleet Street, where he would live for the rest of his life. In 1872, he published his Utopian novel 'Erewhon' which made him a well-known figure. He wrote a number of other books, including a moderately successful sequel, 'Erewhon Revisited' before his masterpiece and semi-autobiographical novel 'The Way of All Flesh' appeared after his death. Butler thought its tone of satirical attack on Victorian morality too contentious to publish during his life time and thereby shied away from further potential problems. Samuel Butler died aged 66 on 18th June 1902 at a nursing home in St John's Wood Road, London. He was cremated at Woking Crematorium, and accounts say his ashes were either dispersed or buried in an unmarked grave.
The Social Principles of Jesus
This book is not a life of Christ, nor an exposition of his religious teachings, nor a doctrinal statement about his person and work. It is an attempt to formulate in simple propositions the fundamental convictions of Jesus about the social and ethical relations and duties of men.Our generation is profoundly troubled by the problems of organized society. The most active interest of serious men and women in the colleges is concentrated on them. We know that we are in deep need of moral light and spiritual inspiration in our gropings. There is an increasing realization, too, that the salvation of society lies in the direction toward which Jesus led. And yet there is no clear understanding of what he stood for. Those who have grown up under Christian teaching can sum up the doctrines of the Church readily, but the principles which we must understand if we are to follow Jesus in the way of life, seem enveloped in a haze. The ordinary man sees clearly only Christ?s law of love and the golden rule. This book seeks to bring to a point what we all vaguely know.It does not undertake to furnish predigested material, or to impose conclusions. It spreads out the most important source passages for personal study, points out the connection between the principles of Jesus and modern social problems, and raises questions for discussion. It was written primarily for voluntary study groups of college seniors, and their intellectual and spiritual needs are not like those of an average church audience. It challenges college men and women to face the social convictions of Jesus and to make their own adjustments.
Union and Communion Or, Thoughts on the Song of Solomon