Summer days offer a perfect time to ponder the deep reflections found within Bonhoeffer’s writings. We invite you to join us as we continue to explore the selections for our Summer Reading with Bonhoeffer series.

Here are some questions for you to consider as you reflect on July’s Summer Reading book, Spiritual Care:

In the section, “The Mission of Spiritual Care,” Bonhoeffer writes, “A love is needed which will lead people back to hearing the proclamation of the gospel.” What are the qualities of such a love? How might spiritual care providers or all Christians express it?

Bonhoeffer is known for his emphasis on reality and the intersection between faith and the experienced world. In his chapter, “The Funeral,” how does Bonhoeffer’s discussion of cremation, internment, and mourning factor into his concern for reality?

Renowned scholars Isabel Best and Victoria Barnett help us to appreciate a too-often neglected, yet essential, aspect of Bonhoeffer’s life and work – his preaching ministry. In The Collected Sermons of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Volumes 1 & 2, they preserve the fruit of his preaching, which he thought of as being at the very core of Christian faith and worship.

To think of preaching as a moment in time, or as only ephemeral, is to discount its lasting impact. Best and Barnett defeat this phenomenon by preserving the power of Pastor Bonhoeffer’s ministry of “proclamation,” as he called it. As a result, we can benefit from this extraordinary preacher’s sermons today as much as his listeners did when he first delivered them.

Reading The Collected Sermons brings back this missing dimension to Bonhoeffer’s multifaceted past and ongoing work for the betterment of the world.