Sabbath Rest as Vocation: Aging Toward Death

Description

Autumn Alcott Ridenour offers a Christian theological discussion on the meaning of aging toward death with purpose, identity, and communal significance. Drawing from both explicit claims and constructive interpretations of St. Augustine's and Karl Barth's understanding of death and aging, this volume describes moral virtue as participation in Christ across generations, culminating in preparation for Sabbath rest during the aging stage of life. Addressing the inevitability of aging, the prospect of mortality, the importance of contemplative action and expanding upon the virtues of growing older, Ridenour analyzes how locating moral agency as union with Christ results in virtuous practices for aging individuals and their surrounding communities. By responding with constructive theology to challenges from transhumanist, bioethical and medical arenas, the volume highlights implications not only for virtue ethics, but also for the goals of medicine.

Autumn Alcott Ridenour is Assistant Professor in the Department of Religious and Theological Studies at Merrimack College, USA.

Sabbath Rest as Vocation is an important and needed contribution with theological depth and powerful cultural awareness that can leads us to age towards death meaningfully. * Reading Religion * Through its insightful interpretations of Augustine and Barth and its deep understanding of the later stages of life, this wonderful book reclaims aging as a moral and spiritual practice, not only for the aging themselves but also for those who accompany them. It is both theologically rich and practically wise, and it deftly manages to be hopeful without being sanguine. I strongly recommend it to everyone who is concerned with the theology, ethics, or pastoral care of the aging and especially to those who are preparing for this stage of life. * Gerald McKenny, University of Notre Dame, USA * A generation of 'boomers' and their families are daily managing the aging process--with its limits, losses, and care demands. Religious faith can seem disconnected from realities or unhelpfully focused on 'eternal life.' From a strong experience of faith community, Autumn Ridenour envisions how life, aging and death take meaning together from relationships, community and "participation in Christ"-- theologically proclaimed and existentially validated. This is an eloquent and beautiful book. * Lisa Sowle Cahill, Boston College, USA *