Engaging the Doctrine of the Church

Engaging the Doctrine of the Church is the seventh volume in Matthew Levering's acclaimed "Engaging the Doctrine" series. While Levering has examined the marks of the Church as "one" and "holy" elsewhere, this volume on the Church's nature and mission focuses on several biblical images--Bride, Family, Body, People, and Mother-- alongside an ecumenically engaged and Tradition-rich inquiry into the marks "catholic" and "apostolic."

Levering begins with the Church as Bride, emphasizing the unfathomably intimate union between God and his people in Christ, joined to the ongoing need for repentance and purification. The image of the Church as God's Family leads him to a rich engagement with African theology regarding how to balance the pressing need for social and political development with the fact that the Church's primary end is the eschatological kingdom rather than an improved earthly politics.

For Levering, the Cross stands at the center of ecclesiology, as he emphasizes especially in discussing Christ's Body. Given the cruciform character of Christian discipleship, Levering calls attention to the ever-present threat of Constantinianism, which turns the Church into an instrument of power rather than of radical love. He examines the Church as Mother in light of the need for Christian receptivity, and he explores how the People of God can today be distorted through an "inverse hierarchology" that concentrates on power. The beauty of the Church is found in the radiation of the glory of the Spirit's love in Christ Jesus.