Imago Dei

All monotheistic religions are convinced that the world was created by a deity. For the Christian religion, the two creation narratives at the beginning of the bible (cf. art. Scripture) are of particular relevance. Christianity derives from these narratives an understanding of the origin, meaning, and purpose of all living things. However, conflicts of interpretation regarding the role and responsibility of humans in the overall context of creation are always present. It is interesting to note that the authors of the biblical texts were already aware that the world as they experienced it was marked by a deficit of justice.

• Anthropology

This article examines how democracy can be a way of enacting fundamental Christian commitments. It opens with a definition and then assesses the scriptural precedents for a commitment to democracy. The article closes by outlining the key modern theological arguments that exhort active involvement in democratic struggles for justice and liberation as well as responsibility for developing and sustaining democratic political systems. The entry as a whole outlines a theological grammar of democracy, providing a means to evaluate theologically whether a particular polity or form of politics is democratic.

Disability is not only a socially and medically relevant experience, but also opens up a fundamental theological path to knowledge. Disability theology questions central tenets of doctrine by reinterpreting concepts such as wholeness, normality, and salvation in the light of dependence, relationship, and the lived experience of difference. It criticizes the equation of healing with salvation, normativity with wholeness, and autonomy with humanity, and instead opens up physically situated life, based on resonance and participation, as a place of divine presence. This raises not only ethical questions about inclusion, medical boundaries, and social participation, but also systematic theological questions: How, for example, can our view of God, anthropology, Christology, pneumatology, and eschatology be rethought in light of physical diversity, relational interdependence, and shared dependence? Disability theology thus presents itself as an interdisciplinary but dogmatically distinct field that is gaining relevance both within the church and ecumenically.

• Anthropology