Repentance and Forgiveness (Pro Ecclesia)

Reconciliation is at the heart of the Christian faith. It is what God accomplishes by the incarnation of his Son, by Jesus' cross, resurrection, and exaltation: that all people be drawn to God in Christ, and, in being so drawn, drawn into fellowship with one another. The good news of reconciliation is, therefore, also a call to repent and to receive forgiveness, and then, concomitantly, to forgive. The present volume endeavors to reexamine these most fundamental Christian claims. These essays, which were first presented at the 2017 annual Pro Ecclesia conference, return to the biblical sources to help us understand reconciliation afresh. The authors raise questions about repentance and forgiveness from various perspectives: Jewish, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant. They also consider our present-day context, what has been called the "technoculture," as well as the practice of repentance and forgiveness.

Matthew E. Burdette is a theologian and an editor at Convergent Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House. He holds a PhD in theology from the University of Aberdeen, having researched the theology of Robert W. Jenson and James H. Cone.


In this volume theologians and pastors from varying Christian traditions, who are rooted in the church and share appreciation for the Christian theological tradition, grapple with the mixed blessings of their respective theological inheritances. Phillip Cary writes on Augustine, Frederick Christian Bauerschmidt on Aquinas, Amy C. Schifrin on Luther, Carolyn A. Chau on Balthasar, and David Luy on Pannenberg--each identifying where they see their theologian coming up short, but in light of what they got right. To conclude the volume, Chad Raith II unpacks how his own convictions changed regarding infant baptism. This collection of essays is a testament to the importance of ecumenical, church-based, critical yet appreciative receptive theology.