Who Do You Say That I Am?: Christians Encounter Other Religions

One of the most perplexing questions facing contemporary Christians is how to maintain the uniqueness of their faith while engaging in conversation with members of the many other religious traditions that populate contemporary American culture. In this splendid book, Shenk (professor of religion at Eastern Mennonite University in Harrisonburg, Va.) explores the problems and the possibilities of religious pluralism for the Christian. In measured prose, Shenk shows that the problems that Christians often have with religious pluralism stem from their being a people commanded to proselytize. Such concern for insisting that Christ is the only true way has created an exclusivism that has characterized much of Christianity, but it has also created, in Shenk's eyes, a watering-down of the Christian message to make it more palatable for contemporary culture. Shenk works methodically through the theological options and questions that surround the issue of religious pluralism; he investigates biblical perspectives on other religions; he explores questions about the identity of Christ; and he examines the different ways in which Christians can be witnesses in a religiously plural culture. In the end, Shenk persuasively advocates a stance of understanding, respect, and tolerance that sacrifices none of the centrality of Jesus to the Christian tradition. (Aug.)