Read Anywhere and on Any Device!

Special Offer | $0.00

Join Today And Start a 30-Day Free Trial and Get Exclusive Member Benefits to Access Millions Books for Free!

Create Free Account

Quick and Easy Sign Up!

It takes less then 1 minute to sign up, then you can enjoy Unlimited eBooks.

Sign Up Browse

Read Anywhere and on Any Device!

  • Download on iOS
  • Download on Android
  • Download on iOS

Rube Goldberg Machines: Essays in Mormon Theology

Adam S. Miller
4.9/5 (32371 ratings)
Read Now Download Now ⏭ listen AudioBook
Description:Doing theology is like building a comically circuitous Rube Goldberg machine: you spend your time tinkering together an unnecessarily complicated, impractical, and ingenious apparatus for doing things that are, in themselves, simple. But there is a kind of joy in theology's gratuity, there is a pleasure in its comedic machination, and ultimately-if the balloon pops, the hamster spins, the chain pulls, the bucket empties, the pulley lifts, and (voila ) the book's page is turned-some measurable kind of work is accomplished. But this work is a byproduct. The beauty of the machine, like all beauty, is for its own sake. Theology, maybe especially Mormon theology, requires this kind of modesty. The Church neither needs nor endorses our Rube Goldbergian flights. The comic aspect of the arrows we wing at cloudy skies must be kept firmly in mind. The comedy of it both saves us from theology and commends us to it. Engaged in this work, theology has only one definitive strength: it can make simple things difficult. Good theology forces detours that divert us from our stated goals and prompt us to visit places and include people that would otherwise be left aside. The measure of this strength is charity. Theological detours are worth only as much charity as they are able to show. They are worth only as many waylaid lives and lost objects as they are able to embrace. Rube Goldberg machines, models of inelegance, are willing to loop anything into the circuit-tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, Democrats, whatever. In charity, the grace of a disinterested concern for others and the gratuity of an unnecessary complication coincide. Theology helps us to find religion by helping us to lose it. Theology makes the familiar strange. It ratchets uncomfortable questions into complementary shapes and helps recover the trouble that is charity's substance. This book is itself a Rube Goldberg machine, pieced together from a variety of essays written over the past ten years. They offer explicit reflections on what it means to practice theology as a modern Mormon scholar and they stake out substantial and original positions on the nature of the atonement, the soul, testimony, eternal marriage, humanism, and the historicity of the Book of Mormon.We have made it easy for you to find a PDF Ebooks without any digging. And by having access to our ebooks online or by storing it on your computer, you have convenient answers with Rube Goldberg Machines: Essays in Mormon Theology. To get started finding Rube Goldberg Machines: Essays in Mormon Theology, you are right to find our website which has a comprehensive collection of manuals listed.
Our library is the biggest of these that have literally hundreds of thousands of different products represented.
Pages
148
Format
PDF, EPUB & Kindle Edition
Publisher
Greg Kofford Books
Release
2012
ISBN
1589581938

Rube Goldberg Machines: Essays in Mormon Theology

Adam S. Miller
4.4/5 (1290744 ratings)
Read Now Download now ⏭ listen AudioBook
Description: Doing theology is like building a comically circuitous Rube Goldberg machine: you spend your time tinkering together an unnecessarily complicated, impractical, and ingenious apparatus for doing things that are, in themselves, simple. But there is a kind of joy in theology's gratuity, there is a pleasure in its comedic machination, and ultimately-if the balloon pops, the hamster spins, the chain pulls, the bucket empties, the pulley lifts, and (voila ) the book's page is turned-some measurable kind of work is accomplished. But this work is a byproduct. The beauty of the machine, like all beauty, is for its own sake. Theology, maybe especially Mormon theology, requires this kind of modesty. The Church neither needs nor endorses our Rube Goldbergian flights. The comic aspect of the arrows we wing at cloudy skies must be kept firmly in mind. The comedy of it both saves us from theology and commends us to it. Engaged in this work, theology has only one definitive strength: it can make simple things difficult. Good theology forces detours that divert us from our stated goals and prompt us to visit places and include people that would otherwise be left aside. The measure of this strength is charity. Theological detours are worth only as much charity as they are able to show. They are worth only as many waylaid lives and lost objects as they are able to embrace. Rube Goldberg machines, models of inelegance, are willing to loop anything into the circuit-tax collectors, prostitutes, lepers, Democrats, whatever. In charity, the grace of a disinterested concern for others and the gratuity of an unnecessary complication coincide. Theology helps us to find religion by helping us to lose it. Theology makes the familiar strange. It ratchets uncomfortable questions into complementary shapes and helps recover the trouble that is charity's substance. This book is itself a Rube Goldberg machine, pieced together from a variety of essays written over the past ten years. They offer explicit reflections on what it means to practice theology as a modern Mormon scholar and they stake out substantial and original positions on the nature of the atonement, the soul, testimony, eternal marriage, humanism, and the historicity of the Book of Mormon.We have made it easy for you to find a PDF Ebooks without any digging. And by having access to our ebooks online or by storing it on your computer, you have convenient answers with Rube Goldberg Machines: Essays in Mormon Theology. To get started finding Rube Goldberg Machines: Essays in Mormon Theology, you are right to find our website which has a comprehensive collection of manuals listed.
Our library is the biggest of these that have literally hundreds of thousands of different products represented.
Pages
148
Format
PDF, EPUB & Kindle Edition
Publisher
Greg Kofford Books
Release
2012
ISBN
1589581938

More Books

Original Grace

Original Grace

4.4/5 (1,282,506 ratings)

Letters to a Young Mormon

Letters to a Young Mormon

4.2/5 (4,466 ratings)

Grace Is Not God's Backup Plan: An Urgent Paraphrase of Paul's Letter to the Romans

Grace Is Not God's Backup Plan: An Urgent Paraphrase of Paul's Letter to the Romans

4.1/5 (1,751 ratings)

An Early Resurrection: Life in Christ before You Die

An Early Resurrection: Life in Christ before You Die

4.5/5 (743 ratings)

A Brighter Future for Mormon Theology: Adam S. Miller’s Future Mormon (Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture Book 21)

A Brighter Future for Mormon Theology: Adam S. Miller’s Future Mormon (Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture Book 21)

4/5 (647 ratings)

Seven Gospels: The Many Lives of Christ in the Book of Mormon

Seven Gospels: The Many Lives of Christ in the Book of Mormon

4/5 (647 ratings)

The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace: Boredom and Addiction in an Age of Distraction (New Directions in Religion and Literature)

The Gospel According to David Foster Wallace: Boredom and Addiction in an Age of Distraction (New Directions in Religion and Literature)

4.7/5 (647 ratings)

Nothing New Under the Sun: A Blunt Paraphrase of Ecclesiastes

Nothing New Under the Sun: A Blunt Paraphrase of Ecclesiastes

4.6/5 (647 ratings)

Speculative Grace: Bruno Latour and Object-Oriented Theology

Speculative Grace: Bruno Latour and Object-Oriented Theology

4.9/5 (647 ratings)
loader