Hope for the Church

Published by Peeters-Leuven, 2021.

Hope for the Church(es)" argues the need for the Church to listen and learn from those who today are developing new languages to speak of timeless realities and values. This is especially true as we work toward the healing of the estrangement that afflicts the Church.

Among those to whom the Church should listen are couples married across denominational lines, and the children of those marriages. The former have had to learn to listen to the values each brings to their marriage, if the marriage is to survive and bear fruit. In the unity of their marriage, they carry the riches and challenges of two different traditions. The latter grow up absorbing those same riches and challenges, carrying them within one body.

Both have much to offer the Church and the churches, if they can be invited to tell their stories, invited to share what they have learned.

An example is also provided, in which the exact same words are presented, but in such ways that two very different stories are heard. This, too, lets us know that what we hear and absorb can depend as much on the telling of the story as it does on the story's content.

"Hope for the Chuyrch(es): Young People in an Age of Linguistic Dynamism" forms a chapter in the book "One Bread, One Body, One Church: Essays on the Ecclesia of Christ Today in Honor of Bernard P. Prusak", edited by Christopher Cimorelli and Daniel Minch, published by Peeters-Leuven, 2021.

• Hope for the Church(es): Young People in an Age of Linguistic Dyanism, in One Bread, One Body, One Church - Title, Index, Chapter
• Story-telling: One Text, Two Voices, Different Stories