Render Unto God

Description: "What marks, principles, and values from our study of Jesus can guide our reflections about the church and its witness in a world of economic injustice? What kinds of principles ought to be part of an ecclesiology in a world where family violence is epidemic?" So asks author James Poling in his exploration of the role of faith and religious practice as a resource for those who are economically vulnerable to domestic violence. In this groundbreaking work, Poling focuses his research on women and children in working-class and poor communities of three cultures, analyzing the forces that define and sustain economic vulnerability and detailing how such vulnerability affects the daily lives of people within these communities. He looks at how the church can function as a source of healing and empowerment for persons who are trapped by domestic violence and economic vulnerability and develops models for prevention of violence and of practical ministry for pastoral care of the victims and perpetrators. Endorsements: "Jim Poling weaves together his expertise in the effects of violence with careful attention to the way economics impacts the lives of those who look to the church for care and counseling. The result is an extraordinarily useful resource that offers an intercultural frame to demonstrate the need for informed economic analysis to revise current theory and practice of care and counseling. Render Unto God is a theoretically and theologically rich contribution that will help pastors, seminarians, and pastoral counselors discern and resist values and practices that create or reproduce economic vulnerability, and guides the practice of care in ways that contribute to economic justice and nonviolence." --Nancy J. Ramsay, Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary About the Contributor(s): James Newton Poling is Professor of Pastoral Theology, Care and Counseling at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary, Evanston, Illinois. He has also taught at Colgate Rochester Divinity School, New York, and Bethany Theological Seminary, Oak Brook, Illinois. He is an ordained minister of the Presbyterian Church (USA), Fellow of the American Association of Pastoral Counselors, past President of the Society of Pastoral Theology, and author of The Abuse of Power: A Theological Problem.