The Body of Christ: Rethinking a Classic Ecclesiological Model

Abstract:   The image of the church as the body of Christ is deployed by Karl Barth and Robert Jenson in the service of very different and equally unsatisfactory ecclesiologies. While Barth's concern for divine freedom causes him to accentuate the distinction between head and members to the point of positing two churches, Jenson's stress on Christ's objective presence in the world risks collapsing Christ into the church. Against both positions, attention to the fact that human bodies can be encountered in what may be distinguished as second- and third-person modes allows the image of the body of Christ to be deployed in a way that precludes both any confusion of divine and human agency and any separation of Christ from the earthly-historical community.     

Family Therapy of Schizophrenics with High Risk of Relapse

Three families that demonstrated factors associated with relapse of florid symptoms in a schizophrenic family member underwent a course of 25 sessions of behavioral therapy in a multi-family group. Details of the treatment and assessment procedures are presented along with evidence of significant beneficial change in two families. The problem of providing continuing care for schizophrenic patients and their families is discussed.     

Developing Support for Alcohol and Drug Education: A Case Study of a Counselor's Role

A small group of individuals successfully helped a rural community deal with its adolescent drug problems and illustrated important roles for counselors and community leaders.     

'Willing Is Not Choosing': Some Anthropological Implications of Dyothelite Christology

Abstract:  The dyothelite Christology of Maximus the Confessor provides a basis for countering modern worry that an Augustinian doctrine of the bondage of the will undermines human integrity. Modern discomfort with Augustine presupposes an anthropology that equates genuine agency with freedom of choice. In defending the principle that Christ has a fully human will, Maximus challenges this presupposition by denying that a human agent's willing is to be identified with choosing. Thus, while Maximus does not share Augustine's doctrine of original sin, he offers a framework within which to explore possible convergence between Eastern and Western understandings of the will.     

The link between belongingness and depressive symptoms: An exploration in the workplace interpersonal context

Interpersonal factors are crucial to a deepened understanding of depression. Belongingness, also referred to as connectedness, has been established as a strong risk/protective factor for depressive symptoms. To elucidate this link it may be beneficial to investigate the relative importance of specific psychosocial contexts as belongingness foci. Here we investigate the construct of workplace belongingness. Employees at a disability services organisation (N = 125) completed measures of depressive symptoms, anxiety symptoms, workplace belongingness and organisational commitment. Psychometric analyses, including Horn's parallel analyses, indicate that workplace belongingness is a unitary, robust and measurable construct. Correlational data indicate a substantial relationship with depressive symptoms (r = ?.54) and anxiety symptoms (r = ?.39). The difference between these correlations was statistically significant, supporting the particular importance of belongingness cognitions to the etiology of depression. Multiple regression analyses support the hypothesis that workplace belongingness mediates the relationship between affective organisational commitment and depressive symptoms. It is likely that workplaces have the potential to foster environments that are intrinsically less depressogenic by facilitating workplace belongingness. From a clinical perspective, cognitions regarding the workplace psychosocial context appear to be highly salient to individual psychological health, and hence warrant substantial attention.     

Kant's Conception of Analytic Judgment

In the Critique of Pure Reason Kant appears to characterize analytic judgments in four distinct ways: once in terms of "containment," a second time in terms of "identity," a third time in terms of the explicative-ampliative contrast, and a fourth time in terms of the notion of "cognizability in accordance with the principle of contradiction." The paper asks which, if any, of these characterizations—or apparent characterizations—has the best claim to be Kant's fundamental conception of analyticity in the first Critique. It argues that it is the second. The paper argues, further, that Kant's distinction is intended to apply only to judgments of subject-predicate form, and that the fourth alleged characterization is not properly speaking a characterization at all. These theses are defended in the course of a more general investigation of the distinction's meaning and tenability.