Dogmatic Ecclesiology, Volume 1: The Priestly Catholicity of the Church

by Tom Greggs

Publisher:

Baker Academic

, 2019

Overview

Ecclesiology is a key issue for the present age of church history. This groundbreaking work by one of today’s leading theologians offers a major Protestant ecclesiology for the church catholic. This volume, the first of three, considers the priesthood of the church in light of the priesthood of Christ. Tom Greggs shows the connection between Christ’s work as high priest and the universal church’s role in salvation. All together, the three volumes will offer a major statement on the doctrine of the church for Christians from a variety of backgrounds.

Key Features

• Offers a theological account of the place of the church within the work of God
• Explores the connection between Christ’s work and the church’s role in salvation
• Considers the priesthood of the church in light of the priesthood of Christ

Contents

• Preface: A Brief Prospective Theological Prolegomena to Ecclesiology
• The Spirit: The Lord of and the Giver of Life to the Church
• The High Priesthood of Christ: The Essential Hierarchy of the Church
• Participative Ontology and the Church’s Internal Priesthood: The Essential Hierarchy of the Church
• The Priestly Ontology and the Church’s Life for the World: The Essential Hierarchy of the Church
• Baptism: Entry into the Priesthood of the Church
• Holy Communion
• The Communion of Saints
• Intercessory Prayer
• Thanksgiving and Praise: Participating Graciously in Grace
• Congregation: Priestly Polity
• Sanctification
• Love
• Priestly Catholicity
• Coda: The Church as One

Praise for the Print Edition

Tom Greggs has produced one of the most substantial accounts of the church in recent times. In offering a theologically rich ecclesiology, he nevertheless remains alert to the complexity of Christian communities in their different forms and styles. While deeply influenced by Protestant theology, Greggs describes a church that is properly catholic, ecumenical, and extrovert in its relation to the world. The first in a trilogy, this volume will shape future discussion.

—David Fergusson, professor of divinity, University of Edinburgh

Tom Greggs is a wise and trusted guide in providing urgently needed reflections on ecclesiology from a Protestant perspective. Wide-ranging and deep, this volume repays careful study and reflection. A remarkable achievement.

—L. Gregory Jones, Williams Distinguished Professor of Theology and Christian Ministry and Dean of Duke Divinity School

There is a great need for a substantial, lively, and wise Protestant theology of the church, and Greggs is producing it. And he gives us even more: a beautiful architecture that works for this first volume and yet is open to the next two; daring, liberating insights and verdicts on major issues; and a profound, prophetic vision of what the church—local, regional, and international—is called to be in the twenty-first century. Whatever denomination you are in, and indeed if you are not attached to any, this is a book in which to immerse yourself and then to take as a companion as you let it shape and inspire your imagination, thought, prayer, and love.

—David F. Ford, University of Cambridge

Product Details

• Title: Dogmatic Ecclesiology, Volume 1: The Priestly Catholicity of the Church
• Author: Tom Greggs
• Publisher: Baker
• Publication Date: 2019
• Pages: 560
• Resource Type: Systematic Theology
• Topic: Ecclesiology

About Tom Greggs

Tom Greggs (PhD, Cambridge University), holds the Marischal Chair of Divinity at the University of Aberdeen in Aberdeen, Scotland, and is a founding codirector of the Aberdeen Centre for Protestant Theology. He previously taught at the University of Chester. Greggs has written several books, including Dogmatic Ecclesiology, Theology against Religion: Constructive Dialogues with Bonhoeffer and Barth, and Barth, Origen, and Universal Salvation. He has also served on the World Council of Churches’ Commission on Faith and Order.