Description
“Sin isn’t relevant anymore.” Alan Mann takes seriously this often-heard assertion and instead goes in search of the real plight at the heart of contemporary Western society. What he finds there is a personal, pervasive, and self-diminishing disease impacting the lives of millions of people: shame. With this insight, Atonement for a Sinless Society seeks a fresh encounter with the biblical narrative, building a more meaningful understanding of the story of Jesus and his disciples for the world in which we live and, in doing so, bringing the Christian understanding of atonement into the twenty-first century.
About the Author
Alan Mann is a writer and author. He has worked in education and for several leading Christian organisations. His works include A Permanent Becoming (2008); and with Steve Chalke MBE, The Lost Message of Jesus (2003) and Different Eyes (2010).
Contents
(More) Musings and Methodology
Part 1: The Stories We Tell
1. A Narrative-Shift towards Innocence
2. Recognizing Shame
3. Shame and Atonement: Some Issues to Consider
Part 2: The Function of Narrative
4. Narrative Now
5. Narrative Possibilities
6. Narrative, and Christian Soteriology
Part 3: The Intent of Jesus in the Gospels
7. Jesus Narrates His Intent: A Story of Coherence
8. Judas and the Disciples: Stories of Incoherence
9. From “Death” to Life: The Hope of Human Coherence
Part 4: Indwelling the Counter Narrative
10. A Rite of Identification
11. A Confrontation with Self
12. An Act of Communion
The End of the Beginning: Some Closing Thoughts
Bibliography
Endorsements and Reviews
A creative and well-researched presentation of faith thinking. Anyone who desires to communicate the gospel to a contemporary audience will find this both a challenging and a rewarding read.
Graham McFarlane, Vice Principal Academic, London School of Theology
In spite of the centrality of the cross to biblical faith, old formulations and cultural formulations today cloud its significance. Alan Mann’s voice is needed and welcome. In these pages, we find a moving narrative of atonement, from a penetrating analysis of the world we inhabit to the resolution of the human experience of chronic shame in the invitation of the Eucharist.
Joel B. Green, Professor of New Testament Interpretation, Fuller Theological Seminary
Instead of ramping up older theories and seeking to impose them on a conscience no longer amenable to them, Mann starts afresh with the concept of shame in our world and shows how a reframed story can lead yet again to the magical moment of history: the cross of Jesus Christ.
Scot McKnight, Professor of New Testament, Northern Baptist Theological Seminary
[Mann’s] basic premises offer fresh ways of thinking about atonement. … This book provides much food for thought, and also resonates as an approach to the atonement for twenty-first century people.
Derek Tovey, in Stimulus, Vol 23, Issue 3
Mann has his finger on the postmodern (ultramodern) pulse, and pushes traditionalists beyond the notion that the Bible has a single, unambiguous theology of the cross and atonement. For those interested in taking a step in a slightly different direction concerning atonement, this book will do that for sure.
Robert W. Canoy, in Review and Expositor, Vol 113
