Committed Spirituality

Christian faith can lead to a spirituality that can give strength and energy for just action. Conversely, human solidarity can open us up to the contents of the Christian faith. Christian hope, in particular, opens us to a universal solidarity that does not exclude others and never serves only one's own areas without others. Ottmar Fuchs has spelled out this connection in his entire practical theology in many works and now presents here important results of his work in collected form for an English-language readership. The churches are at the service of this commitment for all people. In the acute disputes between identitarian-fundamentalist and open-universal-solidarian formations, the author represents the position of a faith that accepts all people into the love of God and an ethics not limited by any borders. It is the vote for a church that is more self-giving than victorious at the expense of others and that profiles all its 'instruments' from the social and ritual organization of the church to its respective external relations in such a way. It is about a format of faith and church that does even not release the respective exclusivistic parts in churches and in society from the caring responsibility.

Dr. Ottmar Fuchs, Professor emeritus of Practical Theology at the University of Tübingen, Germany.