Book reviews

Books reviewed this time include Liquid Ecclesiology, The Deconstructed Church and Flexible Church

Contextual inhabitation

Ed Olsworth-Peter points to the importance of the “where” of pioneer ministry and explores how people relate to their context.

Community development as a basis for becoming church

Sue Steer reflects on her experience of being a pioneer community worker as a new town forms around a tiny village and how church has formed and grown.

Knitting as a means of sharing the good news

Christine Dutton offers a reflection on knitting as encouraging the prophetic, porous and relational church that Clare Watkins and Stefan Paas are calling for in their articles.

The childless women of the bible: a hopeful metaphor for the church

Tina Hodgett playfully explores how the accounts of childless women in the Bible open up new metaphors to help us to reflect on church arriving somewhere surprisingly hopeful.

Some kind of community of people orbiting around a podcast: church in the new environment | Tim Nash and Jonny Baker [ANVIL vol 35 issue 3]

Jonny Baker and Tim Nash in conversation about the Nomad podcast, tracing the ways that it has developed into an online, and in some places physical, community.

Ek-centric ecclesiology

An outsider to the pioneer conversation, Roman Catholic theologian Clare Watkins both encourages and challenges those involved in pioneering and fresh expressions.

Pilgrims and priests

Stefan Paas suggests the “why” of Christian mission is a far more pressing and important question than most people realise.

Editorial: Church: Inside Out?

James Butler pushes us to reconsider our understanding of church and suggest that the church, and certainly the work of the Holy Spirit, goes beyond our carefully drawn lines and our own expectations.