Erotic Faith: Desire, Transformation, and Beloved Community in the Incarnational Theology of Wendy Farley

Edited by Mari Kim

From WIPF and Stock Publishers, 2022. AVAILABLE HERE

This is a compilation of essays on the wisdom and theology of Dr. Wendy Farley: “The thought of contemporary North American theologian and ethicist Wendy Farley is an unflinching clarion call to justice and compassion. Farley invites us to discover ways of embodying the deep compassion capable of resisting pernicious distortions and traumatizing injustices that harm and dehumanize us all. This volume of essays embodies her invitation to awaken as beloved community. And when we are overwhelmed by the magnitude of struggle and despair, Farley reminds us that the powerful longing of hope, at times against all evidence, refuses to give up on seeking justice and wholeness.”

Beguiled by Beauty: Cultivating a Life of Contemplation and Compassion

From Westminster John Knox Press, 2020. AVAILABLE HERE

Wendy Farley’s most recent book acknowledges that we are experiencing a period of darkness and discouragement, but insists that beauty offers a threshold to the divine. Arguing that we are “made for the Beloved,” we imitate the divine by learning to recognize the beauty of beings, to lament their suffering, and take joy in all that is good around us. Much of the book is devoted to describing practices that deepen capacities for justice, compassion, and joyfulness not only by paying attention to beauty in nature, art, and one another but also by paying attention to the inner workings of our minds and hearts.

This book is also the basis of a six-week fully-scripted worship series designed by Dr. Marcia McFee of the Worship Design Studio. Find out more about the worship series HERE.

The Thirst of God: Contemplating God’s Love with Three Women Mystics

Westminster John Knox Press, 2015. AVAILABLE HERE

To those seeking a more open, progressive approach to Christian faith, the Christian past can sometimes seem like a desert, an empty space devoid of encouragement or example. Yet in the latter years of the Middle Ages a quiet flowering of a more accessible, positive approach to Christian belief took place among a group of female mystics, those who emphasized an immediate, nonhierarchical experience of the divine. In this book, Wendy Farley eloquently brings the work of three female mystics—Marguerite Porete, Mechthild of Magdeburg, and Julian of Norwich—into creative conversation with contemporary Christian life and thought. From alternatives to the standard, violent understandings of the atonement, to new forms of contemplation and prayer, these figures offer us relevant insights through a theology centered on God's love and compassion. Farley demonstrates how these women can help to refresh and expand our awareness of the depth of divine love that encompasses all creation and dwells in the cavern of every human heart.

Gathering Those Driven Away: A Theology of Incarnation

Westminster/John Knox Press, 2011. AVAILABLE HERE

Wendy Farley presents a powerful expression of Jesus Christ as experienced by those who are marginalized and persecuted in contemporary society. Drawing on broader theological sources, she compellingly argues that the doctrine of the Incarnation is the basis for a radical inclusivity and defense of the preciousness of all human beings, especially those the church marginalizes.

To listen to Wendy Farley's interview about this book on WJK Radio with Dan and Jana, click here.

The Wounding and Healing of Desire: Weaving Heaven and Earth

Westminster John Knox Press, 2005. AVAILABLE HERE

Using refreshingly unconventional prose, Wendy Farley offers a theological account of the human condition that delves into the deepest dimensions of the soul. Considering human life from the perspective of the wounding and healing of desire, with desire being that within us which longs for connection, home, and beauty, Farley presents a passionate, moving account of the human condition that draws strongly upon the Christian meditative and mystical spiritual traditions. In doing so, she shifts the traditional images of sin and redemption into images of healing and power. The result reaches into the human depths and draws forth a response of the soul--in courage, compassion, and delight.

Eros for the Other: Retaining Truth in a Pluralistic Age

Pennsylvania State Press, 1996. AVAILABLE HERE

This book takes up the problem of how truth claims and ethical norms can survive the increasingly radical recognition of the historical, cultural, pluralistic, and often ideological character of human experience. Sharing with postmodernism a suspicion of totalizing forms of knowledge and practice, Wendy Farley parts with postmodernism in defending the possibility of truth and ethics. Arguing that reality occurs in the concrete existence of actual beings (human and otherwise), she develops an interpretation of the nature of knowledge as an eros for the other—as an openness to the distinctive beauties and fragilities of other creatures. Employing Plato, Levinas, Hannah Arendt, Iris Murdoch, Anne Carson, and representatives of Continental philosophy and feminist theory, Eros for the Other constructs an original argument for the interdependence of truth, ethics, and pluralism. Through dialogues with Western thought and its critics, an original vision emerges of the way reason discerns reality, experiences beauty, and lives compassionately in the midst of the plurality of concrete, historical existence.

Tragic Vision and Divine Compassion: A Contemporary Theodicy

Westminster John Knox Press, Spring, 1990. AVAILABLE HERE

Offering an alternative to classic Christian theodicies (justification of God’s goodness and omnipotence in view of the existence of evil), Wendy Farley interprets the problem of evil and suffering within a tragic context, advocating compassion to describe the power of God in the struggle against evil.

Women, Writing, Theology: Transforming a Tradition of Exclusion

Edited by Wendy Farley and Emily Holmes, Baylor University Press, 2011. AVAILABLE HERE

Women’s theology has traditionally been pushed to the margins; it is “spirituality” or “mysticism” rather than theology proper. Theology from women has been transmitted orally, recorded by men as sayings or in hagiographies, or passed on as “stealth theology” in poems, hymns, or practices. In the past forty years, women have claimed theology for themselves and others as womanists, feminists, mujeristas, Asian, third-world, disabled, and queer women. Yet in most academic and ecclesial theology, the contributions of women skirt the borders of the written tradition. This unique volume asks about the conditions of women writing theology. How have women historically justified their writing practices? What internal and external constraints shape their capacity to write? What counts as theology, and who qualifies as a theologian? And what does it mean for women to enter a tradition that has been based, in part, on their exclusion? These essays explore such questions through historical investigations, theoretical analyses, and contemporary constructions.