Jeanne Stevenson-Moessner

Mary Lynn Dell

A church can be a dangerous place. The perils may be so obvious, they become "elephants" standing in the fellowship hall, lurking in the sanctuary, ready to spring into the pastor's study, and tromp out of the choir room. The word "elephant" stands for an obvious truth or issue that is ignored or unnamed--a blind spot. Yet we allow elephants to occupy a large amount of space in the minds and hearts of those that tiptoe around them. Discussing common blind-spots of congregations and church leaders, the authors provide examples and illustrations for how to stop these "elephants" from ruining a ministry.

What You Don't See Can Kill Your Ministry

The Elephant in the Church

Bicultural individuals often articulate the themes of rootlessness, identity formation, cultural dissolution, and “home”, and reframe them into theological questions. Bicultural individuals who have spent their formative childhood years living in, and interacting with, two or more cultures can be found in immigrant, refugee, transnational, missionary, borderland, and hybrid communities. This book challenges the traditional understanding of human development. In particular, Portable Roots: Transplanting the Bicultural Child underscores the contextual and religious nature of development. By focusing on identity formation in children and adolescents who have grown up in more than one culture, the parameters of stage theorists such as Erik Erikson are expanded. Three samples of children of missionaries formed the initial research population. The children were raised in boarding schools, mission schools, and international schools – settings which have been likened to a hybrid or third culture or interstitial space. These original three samples first articulated a phenomenon of “rootlessness” that sent the author on an investigative journey spanning three decades. After interviewing many persons with portable roots, the study’s last sampling in Princeton, New Jersey, in 2012, articulated what was needed for the end of this quest: how transplanted roots thrive in terra firma.

Transplanting the Bicultural Child

Portable Roots

Women haven't always had the right to vote. From such diverse voices as John Stuart Mill and Cokie Roberts, the absolute right of both women and men to vote has been affirmed. And yet, resistance to women's suffrage even by women themselves has a long and painful history. In this exciting volume, thirteen theologians and religious leaders in America look back at the historic victory in 1920 when women in the United States won the right to vote. They then assess the current situation and speak into the future. Women with 2020 Vision: American Theologians on the Voice, Vote, and Vision of Women commemorates the 100th anniversary of women in the United States obtaining the right to vote, a story that must be told and retold and reflected upon in light of the current sociopolitical-theological realities.

American Theologians on the Voice, Vote, and Vision of Women

Women with 2020 Vision

"In Overture to Practical Theology, Jeanne Stevenson-Moessner takes a new route to introduce theology students and others to the field of practical theology. Although she is certainly aware of relatively recent efforts to show the academic credentials of practical theology through careful definition (citing that of David Tracy), analysis of components, and linkages to other disciplines within and without the overall framework of theology, she proceeds by means of a double analogy, rather than abstract academic precision, to illumine practical theology. Actual case studies also helpfully illumine aspects of her work." From the Foreword by James N. Lapsley. The book examines biblical foundations, historical roots, and current manifestations of social justice ministry. Stevenseon-Moessner shows how practical theology addresses racism, sexism, violence, anti-Semitism, ecological imbalance, and life at the margins of society--the vexing issues of today's ministry.

Jeanne Stevenson-Moessner

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