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"Building a Multi-ethnic Church" will inspire church leaders to be more proactive in providing the type of leadership necessary to enable the Church (and its leadership) to reflect more closely the ethnic diversity of the UK, and to be the Kingdom now.The purpose of this book is to offer those involved in church leadership information, advice and guidance. It can be used by individuals or teams for: supporting individual growth and development; supporting or delivering training; enabling leaders, stakeholders and the wider community to understand the issues; and developing policy, strategy and implementation plans.

Fear, resentment, humiliation, cruelty, love and faith: these are some of the raw emotions exposed in the Gospel stories of Christ's Passion."Passionate Christianity" explores key moments in the Passion as experienced by those caught up in the world-changing events of the last hours of Jesus' life, and relates them to our lives and faith today.Cally Hammond invites you to experience afresh the events of the Passion - the agony in the garden of Gethsemane, the scourging of Jesus, the crowning with thorns, the carrying of the cross and the crucifixion. In doing this, she leads you to discover new depths of meaning in these events, develop a deeper commitment to your faith, and to meet the challenges of life with passionate Christianity.

Boff investigates how the need to care is inbuilt in human nature. Compassion is the true essence of the human condition, masked by our immersion in neoliberal consumerism. This is a serious and reflective book in 15 sections, plus glossary and bibliography. Sections include: the fable-myth about 'Care'; Care - its dimensions, its essence, its resonances, its concrete forms, its pathological states; and, Exemplary figures.

Levels and patterns of consumption and production in the West have reached a level that cannot be maintained. The way we live, and in particular the way we produce and use energy, is no longer environmentally sustainable: it is already threatening the health and well-being of both planet and people. An estimated 150,000 people per year die as a direct result of anthropogenic climate change, and they are disproportionately in the low-income countries. Our activities and the policies that shape them need to change. This book, which is the first serious Christian engagement with the emerging issue of Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP), analyses the scientific, sociological, economic and theological thinking that makes a Christian response to these trends imperative, before moving on to a practical conclusion that explores what Christians, church fellowships and the Church can do and campaign about.

The Bible contains all kinds of prayers, from heart-rending cries of doubt and despair to joyful expressions of thanksgiving and praise. This comprehensive anthology brings together the prayers recorded in the Bible. It also includes prayers based on parts of scripture that lend themselves to private or group devotions. The prayers are taken from all the major Bible translations, including the "NRSV", "NIV", "REB", "NJB", "KJV" and the "Good News Bible". There is a brief introduction outlining the different types of prayer and highlighting how using the Bible can strengthen and enrich your prayer life. "Praying with the Bible" is a rich biblical resource that both individuals and those responsible for leading worship will want to turn to time and again.

Charles Wesley is known for the astonishing breadth of his hymnody, and many of his Advent and Christmas hymns are regularly sung in churches today. Charles Wesley, the younger brother of John Wesley, was born in December 1707 and this year mark's the tercentenary of his birth. These Advent and Christmas meditations are based on a selection of Wesley's best-loved hymns. For each day, there is a scripture reading, an extract from one of Wesley's hymns and short meditation and a brief prayer. The reflective material on the hymns places Wesley in the rich soil of his Anglican heritage. The book includes mediations for the whole of Advent and for each of the twelve days of Christmas. There are also suggestions for using the meditations in the format of daily morning and evening prayer, either individually or in groups.

An innovative Reader in Ritual Studies which focuses on the Christian Liturgy as an example of ritual studies, this book covers the context of ritual, classical views of ritual, defining ritual, the field of ritual, the Method, including Participant observations, and Case studies. Many of the great names such as Mary Douglas, Romano Guardini, Ronald L. Grimes Margaret Mary Kelleher, Nathan D Mitchelland Catherine Bell are made conveniently accessible here, together with a wide range of up to date work in this growing area.

"Thomas, The Other Gospel" tells the story of the gospel from its discovery to its current reception among academics and in more popular circles. It provides a clear, comprehensive, non-technical guide through the scholarly maze of issues surrounding the Coptic text. Nick Perrin argues that the gospel derives not from the era of Jesus or even the apostles (as many have led us to believe), but from the late second century. He also argues that the gospel was originally written in Syriac and not 'in Greek as many other scholars believe. Thus the real value of the Gospel of Thomas lies not in what it does or does not say about the 'real Jesus' but in what it tells us about early Syriac Christianity. Perrin presents a sound and balanced, yet thoroughly persuasive, alternative explanation to revisionist accounts of Christian origins.

At the dawn of Christianity, holy women went into the deserts of northern Egypt to give themselves totally to lives of prayer. Today, we are gradually discovering more about these desert mothers: they were teachers, they were spiritual guides and sometimes they were leaders of monastic communities. The sayings and stories that come from these sages speak to us compellingly about living the Great Commandment. They never forget that love of God, love of neighbour and love of self are patiently knit together by daily practice. Their advice is down-to-earth, blunt, and savvy. The lives of these desert mothers, while often seeming strange and completely at odds with the lives of women today, challenge and subvert many of the cultural norms that hinder spiritual growth. Here, in this gentle introduction, Mary Earle gives thought-provoking insights into the teachings of the desert mothers and provides a series of creative and practical exercises to enrich and deepen your spiritual life.

Discussions have been taking place between Roman Catholics and Anglicans, in the past 40 years. Since 2000 Bishops from both churches have established a new body "to promote our relationship by seeking to translate our manifest agreement in faith into common life and mission." This is quite different from the theological discussions among experts, known as ARCIC. This statement is intended to foster discussion and reflection; it is also a call to action, based upon 'an honest appraisal of what has been achieved in our dialogue.'

"Christ of the Everyday" seeks to help us discover the true meaning of the way of Jesus. Two convictions permeate the text. The first is that to be converted is, in the end, not so much a matter of seeing different things as of seeing the same things differently; and that 'having the eyes of faith', in this sense, is a major component of being a person of faith. The second conviction is that most religious insight is something that happens, if it happens at all, in the midst of the ordinary experiences of life - including our experiences of solitude, suffering, friendship and joy. It is in and from such locations that Christians develop their perspective on Jesus.

The problem of evil and suffering is a black hole for many of us. It is difficult - even impossible - to pray to a God of love in the presence of so much pain. And the Church is not always helpful. Perhaps, Andrew Clitherow suggests in this prophetic book, it is time to lose the version of Christianity that Western consumerism has produced, and to find a new way. Using insights from evolutionary theory, socio-biology and theology, he offers an accessible Christian spirituality which, centred in creative love, becomes a way of life. 'The history of the world is the history of the progress of love at the expense of evil.' In this exhilarating account of love's progress, "Creative Love in Tough Times" calls us to rediscover the Christian faith and to own it for ourselves.

'Here is an oasis in the desert of the Anglican debate . . .This book is rightly aimed at those who are unresolved on questions about homosexuality. Its contention that these questions are important but should not be church-dividing will ring true with many.' Professor David Ford, Regius Professor of Divinity, University of Cambridge. '... an extremely useful and sympathetic guide for the ordinary lay or clerical reader who wants to learn more about the issue which seems to be pulling the Anglican Communion apart ...' David Jones, former Deputy Director of Oxfam and a member of General Synod. ""An Acceptable Sacrifice?" The answer is simple: No. It is not acceptable for us to discriminate against our brothers and sisters on the basis of sexual orientation just as it was not acceptable for discrimination to exist on the basis of skin colour under Apartheid." Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu

The Student Christian Movement was one of the most influential movements in the 20th century. This book tells the story of 'the SCM tradition' as it began and developed, as it suffered division, struggle and perhaps went astray, and as it has sought to rediscover its roots, as it faces the future in hope.

For every Sunday in the three-year Sunday Lectionary cycle, this book offers little reflections and stimuli to prayer for either one, two or three of the readings set. These can be used by people preparing sermons or intercessions, by individuals preparing for communion or added to the notice sheet each week.

This book offers a diverse and imaginative collection of original liturgies for the 'high days' of the church year. It grows out of the author's experience and conviction that these familiar events can be brought alive by focusing on specific themes within the central message of each festival. The chapter headings are: Christ the King, Advent, Christmas, Lent, Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter Day, Pentecost, and Eucharists for Special Occasions; with each providing a goodly selection of material which has all arisen from experience and can be used or adapted with confidence

Each of the gospels has its unique insights into the meaning of passion; each paints its own distinctive portrait of the man on the cross. We are used to meditating on the last seven words from the cross, drawn from all four gospels, but the gospels also record several sayings of Jesus on the way to the cross: words spoken to the crowd, to Peter, to the high priest, to Pilate, to his mother and his best friend. In John, these words seem imbued with a kind of universal significance beyond the immediate story itself. The meditations help us reflect on an evangelist whose story speaks of the coming into the world of the Word made flesh, for whom words and signs are linked throughout his gospel.

As part of the research around the Faith and Life commission of the Church of England (which is a long term follow up to Faith in the City) people have been getting together to look at worship in an urban context. There are many people responsible for leading worship in urban contexts and few resources for this. In urban situations big questions arise and there is a growing awareness of the essential value of religious and spiritual capital. Contributors cover a wide range of church backgrounds and involvements in the urban church.

"Awake to God" attempts to bring together the different themes of self emptying and participation, which postmodern theologians have brought back into the conversation about God. It relates these themes to the Christian tradition and combines them with the insights of some of the great thinkers of the past - Meister Eckhart, Julian of Norwich, Thomas Traherne, Etty Hillesum and Paul Celan - in order to suggest a style of being and seeing for the contemporary Christian...An answer to the question 'How can I be a Christian?'

John Eaton compares reading the Psalms to walking in the mountains: 'Time and time again you see a new crest to climb, but the summit remains beyond.' In "Psalms for Life", he explores the poetry as a never failing source of challenge, comfort and encouragement. Beginning with Psalm 1 and continuing through to Psalm 150, he provides a short reflection on each psalm, explaining the poet's essential message, and ending with a brief meditative prayer. Readers are helped to identify with the wide range of emotions expressed in the Psalms and to pray for God's loving guidance in dealing with them from day to day. As a distinguished biblical scholar who has studied the Psalms all of his life, John Eaton writes with warmth, clarity and authority. As a Christian, he sees the Psalms as prophetic of Christ, revealing vital and often little-known facts of his life and character. As a sensitive and skilful teacher, he draws out the full significance of these ancient songs as a source of wisdom and insight for all who live the Christian life today.