Review of Binding Earth and Heaven: Patriarchal Blessings in the Prophetic Development of Early Mormonism

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2014-01-01
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Chase, Christopher
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Chase, Christopher
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Philosophy and Religious Studies
The Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies focuses on two areas of study. Its major in Philosophy seeks to examine human experience and reality through critical reflection and argument, developing skills in critical analysis and knowledge of ethics and philosophy. The major in Religious Studies seeks to investigate and reflect upon world religions in an objective, critical, and appreciative manner, providing students with knowledge of religion’s nature and its roles in social and individual life.
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Philosophy and Religious Studies
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Lucas Johnston’s study of the religious dimensions of the sustainability movement is an important example of the attempt by religious studies scholars to highlight the ‘‘religious’’ in unexpected contexts. Johnston looks closely at discourses of sustainability in three different types of sustainability movements: evangelical (creation care), interfaith, and secular ‘‘subcultures of resistance,’’ with special attention to their concern for social justice. In so doing, he overcomes a common tendency to see these groups as having little overlap. Johnston convincingly argues that in their adoption of sustainability discourses not only are they remarkably alike, but the leaders of these movements explicitly borrow from each other. He describes their participation in a kind of network of sustainability discourse, especially those that ‘‘draw on the language of core values and deep beliefs. . . . ’’ (18). What this cross-fertilization of values and practices suggests, Johnston argues, is that ‘‘sustainability is acting as a new metanarrative, a large-scale story that is able to weave together a wide variety of value sets’’

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This is a book review published as Gary Shepherd and Gordon Shepherd, Binding Earth and Heaven: Patriarchal Blessings in the Prophetic Discourse of Early Mormonism. University Park, PA: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2012. In Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions. 18:1 (2014) 115-117. doi: 10.1525/nr.2014.18.1.115. Posted with permission.

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Wed Jan 01 00:00:00 UTC 2014
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