A defense of the New Testament view that all things are to be united in Christ, which entails that the ultimate destiny of the universe, and of all that is in it, is to be united in God. Keith Ward argues that this conflicts with classical ideas of God as simple, impassible, and changeless--ideas that many modern theologians espouse, and which Ward subjects to careful and critical scrutiny. He defends the claim that the cosmos contributes something substantial to--and in that way changes--...

Christianity is not the only true faith. The Bible is not inerrant. Jesus is not God walking on the earth. Hell is not eternal. What's left? Everything important. The ultimate reality is cosmic mind, which generates the physical universe. Its goal is to liberate all beings from evil and suffering and to unite all beings to itself. God sets the goal, Jesus shows and attains the goal, and the Spirit guides the way to the goal. This is a spiritual path to God, to which the Bible testifies, fr...

‘It is remarkable how atheism is becoming fashionable. It has become almost compulsory to say that you do not believe in God. … I believe that science itself points in a very different direction. There is a huge amount of evidence for the reality of a spiritual dimension to the world.’ There is a level of being that is deeper than the physical universe, writes Keith Ward. It has purpose and value, and we can sometimes feel it and find in it resources of strength, hope, and inspiration. Thr...

Can theology be expounded almost entirely in jokes? This is an attempt to do so. But it is also a record of how one person recovered from fundamentalism, and found a different, more positive spirituality within Christian faith. It seeks to speak to those who only know an exclusive and dogmatic version of Christianity, and who feel the need for something more universally compassionate and friendly to informed scientific thought. Ward argues that we need to escape from the image of a vindict...

The concept of the 'social Trinity', which posits three conscious subjects in God, radically revised the traditional Christian idea of the Creator. It promoted a view of God as a passionate, creative and responsive source of all being. Keith Ward argues that social Trinitarian thinking threatens the unity of God, however, and that this new view of God does not require a 'social' component. Expanding on the work of theologians such as Barth and Rahner, who insisted that there was only one m...

Most people agree that Jesus' parables are about the kingdom of God. But what is that? They seem to have a lot about hell and judgment, but how is that consistent with the Parable of the Prodigal Son and Jesus' search for "lost sheep"? They speak of the "Son of Man," but who or what is that? Some have thought they predict the end of the world, but could that be a failure to understand biblical language? In a new survey of Jesus' parables, Keith Ward proposes that they imply a theology of t...

In this book, eminent theologian Keith Ward takes a fresh look at the ancient philosophy of Idealism, connects it with findings in modern science, and shows that a combination of good science, good philosophy, and a passion for truth and goodness, can underpin religious faith. Going back to first principles, he argues for the Idealist view that all knowledge begins with experience. Critically examining the idealism of Plato, Kant, and Hegel, Ward shows how this philosophy is strengthened b...

Karl Barth is one of the most influential theologians of the past century, especially within conservative branches of Christianity. Liberals, by contrast, find many of his ideas to be problematic. In this study, Keith Ward offers a detailed critique of Barth's views on religion and revelation as articulated in Church Dogmatics. Against Barth's definition of religions as self-centred, wilful, and arbitrary human constructions, Ward offers a defence of world religions as a God-inspired searc...

First published in 2002. This is Volume XII of twelve in the Library of Philosophy series on Ethics. Written in 1970, this book seeks to elucidate the fundamental characteristics of Christian ethics. The main concern has been with what is of most vital concern to the moral philosopher-the exposition of the formal characteristics of a system of morality rather than with the detail of its content and application.

Can religious beliefs survive in the scientific age? Are they resoundingly outdated? Or, is there something in them of great importance, even if the way they are expressed will have to change given new scientific context? These questions are among those at the core of the science-religion dialogue.In The Big Questions in Science and Religion, Keith Ward, an Anglican priest who was once an atheist, offers compelling insights into the often contentious relationship between d...

‘Keith Ward . . . makes complex matters readily accessible.’Rowan WilliamsAt the heart of Christian faith lies a vision of Christ present at the beginning of creation, in the crucified and risen Jesus, and at the end of all things. This vision retains its ancient power and gains new depth as it is reshaped in the light of our advanced understanding of a vast and evolving cosmos.To help us form a truly contemporary Christian spirituality, Keith Ward, writing in our ow...

Keith Ward introduces this volume on the world's greatest ever bestseller by suggesting that the Bible is neither a book dictated by God, as some believe, nor just a set of out-dated taboos and politically slanted histories, as those at the opposite extreme maintain.Rather, it is a very mixed set of documents, by many different writers, from many different times, which records the struggle of many people in one particular religious tradition to respond to their dis...