Speaking of Dying—Recovering the Church's Voice in the Face of Death

This book reminds the church of its considerable resources when it ministers to the terminally ill. Typically, a terminal diagnosis triggers denial of impending death and a full-scale resort to the techniques and resources of modern medicine. If a cure is not forthcoming, the patient and his or her loved ones experience a sense of failure and bitter disappointment.Here the authors show what is lost when the church abdicates its own resources of faith in the face of dying. They outline a practical theological response to terminal illness and the event of dying, showing how the liturgy--particularly baptism--prepares Christians to die and how the Eucharist sustains us in our dying. They also discuss how to talk to a dying person and how to preach on death and dying. Thus this is not a book on grief or even on death so much as it is on the process of dying and how the church can more faithfully and effectively engage those who are dying. The book includes a foreword by Stanley Hauerwas.

Fred Craddock (PhD, Vanderbilt University) is a widely acclaimed preacher and author, selected by Newsweek as one of the twelve most effective preachers in the English-speaking world. He has written numerous books on preaching, several commentaries, and The Cherry Log Sermons. He lives in Cherry Log, Georgia. Dale Goldsmith (PhD, University of Chicago) taught for several years at McPherson College and at the Baptist Seminary of Mexico. He is the author of New Testament Ethics and lives in Amarillo, Texas. Joy V. Goldsmith (PhD, University of Oklahoma) is associate professor and chair in communications studies at Young Harris College. Her books include Communication as Comfort and Dying with Comfort. She lives in Blairsville, Georgia.