Evangelical Hospitality : Catechetical Evangelism in the Early Church and its Recovery for Today

Christian faith is always a leap. When the leap takes particularly long in a society the Church has characteristically shortened that leap through a process approach to winning seekers known as "catechetical evangelism." Author Tory Baucum explores catechumenal evangelism in the early Church and its recovery in the early modern period in Methodism and late modernity (or postmodernity) in the Alpha course. Baucum seeks to describe the salient features of "catechetical evangelism" and why it is effective at creating an environment that shortens the leap from unbelief to belief. Evangelical Hospitality describes a church that has lost touch with its deep memory of evangelization, the recovery of that memory in catechetical ministry, and the kinds of practices this recovery spawns in the Church. After describing the social construction of faith communities, the bulk of the book examines four core practices, which are entailed in creating cultures of faith—places where believing in Christ becomes plausible and possible. The book concludes with some perennial principles from Christian communities who learn to construct faith cultures.

Christian faith is always a leap. When the leap takes particularly long in a society the Church has characteristically shortened that leap through a process approach to winning seekers known as "catechetical evangelism." Author Tory Baucum explores catechumenal evangelism in the early Church and its recovery in the early modern period in Methodism and late modernity (or postmodernity) in the Alpha course. Baucum seeks to describe the salient features of "catechetical evangelism" and why it is effective at creating an environment that shortens the leap from unbelief to belief. Evangelical Hospitality describes a church that has lost touch with its deep memory of evangelization, the recovery of that memory in catechetical ministry, and the kinds of practices this recovery spawns in the Church. After describing the social construction of faith communities, the bulk of the book examines four core practices, which are entailed in creating cultures of faith—places where believing in Christ becomes plausible and possible. The book concludes with some perennial principles from Christian communities who learn to construct faith cultures.