new discoveries

i've been reading through some of the back-catalog on paul fromont's blog, and just came across one from about a month ago on james alison (see also james alison - essays of interest). as paul describes, james alison "is a theology professor, journalist, author, and openly gay Roman Catholic priest." he is also the author of Knowing Jesus, Faith Beyond Resentment: Fragments Catholic and Gay and On Being Liked, among other books.

i suppose the reason this caught my eye is the link between a couple of my recent posts - the fact that alison is gay, as well as his thinking regarding the atonement (you can read my poor and fumbling thoughts on this subject here). this latter link is comes from the book description of his latest book:

On Being Liked is the transforming and joyful sequel to Faith Beyond Resentment: Fragments Catholic and Gay, which established the Catholic priest and writer James Alison as one of the most striking, original, and intellectually irresistible voices in the church. Alison invites us to let go of a commonly held account of salvation that is nonsensical, scandalous and damaging. He takes us step-by-step through a bold adventure of re-imagining the central axis of the Christian story, not as ‘How does God deal with sin?’ but as ‘How do we take up God’s invitation to share in the act of creation?’ All the while, to our growing astonishment and wonder, we discover ourselves as liked – not only loved - in the eyes of God.

this sounds like a book that is definitely worth checking out.

alison recently gave a lecture titled "Who Sacrifices Whom to Whom? Rethinking Atonement" at trinity college, university of melbourne (on september 2nd). i did a google search to see if anything has been written up about it but came up empty. i did, however, find this link to a study of the theory and theology of rene girard in regards to sin and redemption (alison's book is listed in the bibliography). girard is another thinker i hadn't heard about until today, but who i will also be exploring more deeply (starting by reading the above study).