Orbis Books (USA)

ECOLOGY & JUSTICE SERIESThe Good News of Jesus Christ is a word about life, and the letter of First John offers an important witness to how that life is lived in love. First John’s discussion of life is rarely read in an environmentally supportive way. Rodolfo Felices Luna explicitly sets out to challenge the human exclusivity of interpreting First John. Though it is not immediately thought of as one of the environmentalist texts of the biblical corpus, the ways that First John talks about life and love offer fresh approaches for both eco-critical readings of scripture and faithful Christian action for environmental well-being. This book explicitly takes up Pope Francis’s calls for an integral ecology and turns it on our reading of and living from scripture.

When Dustin Feddon began accompanying men on death row and in solitary confinement, he saw a broken system that failed man after man within its walls. Even for those in “release” programs, what he saw—and the men he met—compelled him to ask if there could be new kinds of spaces, not confined spaces or “halfway houses,” but communities that welcomed people back into the human family, re-affirming their dignity? The answer he discovered, was a resounding Yes. That yes began a new community—and the story of Joseph House.All author royalties will go to support the work of Joseph House.

From Africa, a ground-breaking reflection on suffering and resilience that speaks to universal questions for theology and the church.How do ordinary Africans sustain hope and faith in a world marked by rising poverty, inequality, extremism, poor governance, and unrest—despite the rapid growth of Christianity across the continent? In this book, Stan Chu Ilo explores the spiritual resilience of African communities through the lens of a deeply-felt cultural expression: “suffering and smiling,” a phrase popularized by Afrobeat legend Fela Kuti. Drawing from the lived experiences of everyday African believers, Ilo examines the deep wells of strength, community, tradition, and religious faith that help them endure—and even thrive—amid hardship.

First published in 1975, God of the Oppressed remains a landmark in the development of Black Theology—the first effort to present a systematic theology drawing fully on the resources of African-American religion and culture. In his reflections on God, Jesus, suffering, and liberation, Cone relates the gospel message to the experience of the Black community. But a wider theme of the book is the role that social and historical context plays in framing the questions we address to God, as well as the mode of the answers provided.