Incarnating Grace: A Theology of Healing from Sexual Trauma

Incarnating Grace is a book that reexamines Christian ideals about suffering and salvation to prioritize survivors of abuse. It argues that God stands against violence and suffering and that the suffering of sexual violence serves no higher purpose or greater human value. The book introduces the Spanish Carmelite Saint Teresa of Avila and her theological insights, which are helpful for constructing a post-traumatic theology of healing. It also examines the notion of "senseless suffering," a technical term that comes from Edward Schillebeeckx, a Catholic twentieth-century Flemish priest and theologian. The book opens a new dialogue about salvation and violence that does not allow evil to have the last word.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 240 pages
Publication date: 07 November 2023
Publisher: Fordham University Press

More than half of women and almost one in three of men in the United States have experienced sexual violence at some time in their lives. Yet our Christian tradition has failed survivors of sexual violence,who have been taught to believe that traumatic suffering brings us closer to God. Incarnating Grace attempts to save our broken ways of talking about Gods grace by unearthing liberating resources buried in the Christian tradition. Christian ideas about salvation have historically contributed to sexual violence in our communities by reinforcing the idea that suffering is salvific. But a God worth worshiping does not want human beings to suffer. Drawing on the sixteenth-century Spanish mystic Teresa of Avila as well as contemporary political and feminist theologians,philosophers,and legal scholars,author and Associate Professor of theology Julia Feder offers an account of Christian salvation as mystical-political. Feder begins by describing the breadth of traumatic wounding and the shape of traumatic recovery,as articulated by psychologists. Since the fullness of post-traumatic healing requires reserves deeper than those which can be articulated by the secular field of psychology alone,the book then introduces the Spanish Carmelite Saint Teresa of Avila and her theological insights,which are most helpful for constructing a post-traumatic theology of healing. Arguing that God stands against violence and suffering,the book also examines the notion of “senseless suffering,” a technical term that comes from Edward Schillebeeckx,a Catholic twentieth-century Flemish priest and theologian. The suffering of sexual violence serves no higher purpose or greater human val.

More than half of women and almost one in three of men in the United States have experienced sexual violence at some time in their lives.

Yet our Christian tradition has failed survivors of sexual violence,who have been taught to believe that traumatic suffering brings us closer to God.

Incarnating Grace attempts to save our broken ways of talking about Gods grace by unearthing liberating resources buried in the Christian tradition.

Christian ideas about salvation have historically contributed to sexual violence in our communities by reinforcing the idea that suffering is salvific.

But a God worth worshiping does not want human beings to suffer.

Drawing on the sixteenth-century Spanish mystic Teresa of Avila as well as contemporary political and feminist theologians,philosophers,and legal scholars,author and Associate Professor of theology Julia Feder offers an account of Christian salvation as mystical-political.

Feder begins by describing the breadth of traumatic wounding and the shape of traumatic recovery,as articulated by psychologists.

Since the fullness of post-traumatic healing requires reserves deeper than those which can be articulated by the secular field of psychology alone,the book then introduces the Spanish Carmelite Saint Teresa of Avila and her theological insights,which are most helpful for constructing a post-traumatic theology of healing.

Arguing that God stands against violence and suffering,the book also examines the notion of “senseless suffering,” a technical term that comes from Edward Schillebeeckx,a Catholic twentieth-century Flemish priest and theologian.

The suffering of sexual violence serves no higher purpose or greater human val.

Weight: 372g
Dimension: 229 x 152 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781531504724