The major cultural changes in Western societies since the Reformation have created a serious challenge for the church. Modernity in particular has been inhospitable to Christian orthodoxy and many have been tempted to reject classical versions of the faith. This has led to a division within churches that Walker and Parry name "the third schism" a divide between those who believe and practice the central tenets of Christian tradition and those who do not. The authors have adopted and adapted C. S. Lewis' phrase "deep church" to highlight the necessity of remembering our past in order to recover historic Christian orthodoxy. This book is a call to deep church, to remember our future, to make a half-turn back to premodernity; not in order to repeat or relive the past, but in order to draw on its rich yet often-forgotten resources for the here and now.
Andrew G. Walker is Emeritus Professor of Theology, Religion, and Culture at King's College, London.
Robin Parry (PhD) is Minor Canon for Eco Spirituality at Worcester Cathedral in England and an academic books editor for Wipf and Stock Publishers. He has published books on Genesis, Lamentations, trinitarian worship, deep church, universal salvation, biblical cosmology, and eco-spirituality.