Product Description: Most books claiming to be about the religious world of the Japanese exclude 'secular' practices, which in Japanese reality are not essentially different from 'religious' ones. This new introduction to religion in Japan blends the best methodological features from anthropology and religious and historical studies to present a new way of studying Japanese religion, highlighting the importance of the analysis of politics, the state and economics as ritual institutions in contemporary Japan...read more

Product Description: Religion has dominated colonialism since the 16th century. 'Religion and the Secular' critically examines how religion has been used to subject indigenous concepts to the needs of colonial powers. Essays present the colonial relationship from the perspective of colonized cultures - including Mexico, Guatemala, Vietnam, India, Japan, South Africa and Canada - and colonizing powers, namely England, Germany and the United States...read more

Product Description: In recent years scholars have begun to question the usefulness of the category of ''religion'' to describe a distinctive form of human experience and behavior. In his last book, The Ideology of Religious Studies (OUP 2000), Timothy Fitzgerald argued that ''religion'' was not a private area of human existence that could be separated from the public realm and that the study of religion as such was thus impossibility...read more

In recent years there has been an intensifying debate within the religious studies community about the validity of religion as an analytical category. In this book Fitzgerald sides with those who argue that the concept of religion itself should be abandoned. On the basis of his own research in India and Japan, and through a detailed analysis of the use of religion in a wide range of scholarly texts, the author maintains that the comparative study of religion is really a form of liberal ecumenical theology. By pretending to be a science, religion significantly distorts socio-cultural analysis. He suggest, however, that religious studies can be re-represented in a way which opens up new and productive theoretical connections with anthropology and cultural and literary studies.

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Product Description: We say of our liturgy: Christ is present! But what does that mean? The second Vatican Council challenged us to think more deeply about the presence of Christ in the liturgy. The Constitution on the Sacred Liturgy teaches that we are to attend not only to the Christ present in the consecrated bread and wine when we celebrate the eucharist, but to Christ present in the minister, the sacraments, the word proclaimed and the gathered people-the assembly...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Much is written about catechesis for Confirmation. For over fifteen years, parish ministers have used Confirmation: A Parish Celebration to guide them through the process of preparing a worthy liturgy to culminate that process. This revised edition contains the same thorough review of the Rite of Confirmation, the same sound liturgical principle and the same good pastoral sense. In addition, it includes insights and wisdom about Confirmation as a sacrament of initiation gained from the many changes our Church has gone through in implementing the catechumenate. Pastors, liturgy directors, directors of religious education, catechists who work with those preparing for Confirmation, and liturgical musicians will find this book invaluable in planning the infrequent but vitally important Confirmation liturgy. Published by Liturgy Training Publications.

Product Description: Liturgy and catechesis should happen together. We've brought together liturgists, catechists, pastoral ministers, and academic experts to address how a parish might pastorally care for families who are bringing their children to the Church for Baptism...read more

Product Description: This book challenges everyone who prepares the liturgy of infant Baptism to understand it is the action of the community that begets new believers. The author applies the standards of full, conscious, and active participation of the assembly; the word proclaimed and preached; the integration of music and ritual; and the abundant use of symbols, gestures, and movements to the Rite of Baptism of Children...read more