Justice

The relationship between non-human animals, the shared-world (Mitwelt), and human animals is characterized by mutual interdependence. However, since around the 19^th century, technical-industrial development has led to the extensive human exploitation of other animals and our shared-world. In the face of humanity’s destructive violence, Christian theology is called upon to reflect upon what kind of treatment of other animals and the shared-world is truly Christian. While this question most directly affects other animals and the shared-world, it also indirectly affects future human beings who will suffer severely from climate change and species extinction.

Feminist theology is gender-conscious, liberation-oriented, contextual, and experience-based theology. As such, it represents an important interdisciplinary perspective within theological reflection. It is therefore particularly important today to understand feminist theology as a theology that incorporates the construction and deconstruction of gender into every facet of its reflection. Personal experiences have been and continue to be the impetus and motivation to embark (anew) on a theological and scholarly journey in search of answers.

• Systematic Theology

Three main positions concerning hell can be distinguished. First, the Augustinian view of hell as place of eternal punishment, which stamped the Western tradition, with the variation of a purgatory (Roman-Catholic) or without it (Protestant). Second, in the Eastern tradition, universalist tendencies rendered hell a transitional phase after which all shall be saved. Third, annihilationism states that while believers live eternally, the damned are destroyed forever. Diverse interpretations of Biblical Scripture lead to a proliferation of all three options. Meanwhile, modern humanism has put the Augustinian option under pressure.

• Eschatology

The concept of justification is central in Protestant theology. Its theological meaning differs fundamentally from its meaning in non-theological language. In everyday language, the term refers to the act of explaining, or accounting for, a particular behavior or action before another entity. Within theology, it designates the relationship between human beings and God. It designates a divine act through which God frees human beings from the injustice of their sins and bestows righteousness on them. Questions about how God justifies, to what extent justification is an act of divine grace, whether and in what way human beings can contribute to their justification, and what constitutes the healing power of righteousness have been the subject of theological reflection and debate since ancient times.

Liberation theology is a theological and social movement. In fact, it is more accurate to describe it as a variety of movements that developed, first, among Christian communities, but that soon found expression in all major religious traditions during the second half of the 20^th century. “Liberation theology” therefore is not a uniform school of thought or movement. Rather, liberation theology is the name given to a family of viewpoints that gather around certain basic tenets or orienting principles, some of which are shared by nonreligious movements of liberation as well. Despite their differences, most theologies of liberation share the following four orienting principles.

• Systematic Theology

This article offers an introduction to the problem of theodicy and the arguments that have attempted to cope with it. To this end, it discusses the concepts from the philosophy of religion and theology that have been influential as well as the criticisms of them. Ultimately, the analysis makes the plea for a theology that is sensitive to suffering and that deliberately keeps open the theodicy question.