Sin and the Vulnerability of Embodied Life - (T&t Clark Studies in Systematic Theology) by Charlotte Bray (Hardcover)

About the Book

"By drawing on a diverse range of thinkers from both within and outside of the Catholic tradition, this book examines what sin is and how it shapes our lives in a fallen, yet grace-filled, world. It explores how Catholics should speak about sin and grace in a world where structural injustice holds sway causing harm and violence to both people and planet"--

Book Synopsis

This book explores how Catholics should speak about sin and grace in a world where structural injustice holds sway causing violence and harm. Bray brings diverse voices into creative dialogue to explore why unjust social situations can properly be called sin from a Catholic theological perspective, and how this sin can be understood to impact one's agency, freedom, and historical condition vis-à-vis God.

Discussing disparate thinkers such as John Paul II, Judith Butler, Thomas Aquinas, and key Latin American liberation theologians, Bray deepens and constructively develops the Catholic understanding of social sin. She argues that the language of social sin presents us with an idea more theologically profound than just the identification of structural injustice; it depicts the power of collective human sinfulness to shape our lives and environments in ways which harm our relations with God, one another, and the rest of the created world.

Review Quotes

"This book makes a significant contribution to filling a serious gap in recent Catholic scholarship: the need for a mature, creative and wide-ranging theological discussion of social sin, a debate that has remained a source of unreconciled difficulty in Catholic teaching since the intense debates at the end of the last century. Bray's book is a gift to those wishing to move those debates forwards." --Anna Rowlands, Durham University, UK

About the Author

Charlotte Bray is the Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Lincoln Theological Institute, University of Manchester, UK.