380 Theology 119(5) Chris Maunder, Our Lady of the Nations: Apparitions of Mary in 20th-Century Catholic Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016); 220 pp.: 978019718383, £25.00/$39.95 (hbk) Chris Maunder has had a 35-year interest in Marian apparitions in modern Europe. His book, Our Lady of the Nations, is a comprehensive overview of a subject which to the secular world is regarded with curious and doubting amusement, but which to devotees of the various apparition cults is a matter of pressing importance. Some of the places associated with reports of sightings of Mary have become internationally famous. They have become loci of devotion. Fatima, Lourdes and Medjugorje continue to attract thousands of visitors long after the initial events. Their reputations have spread thanks to the developments in modern communication of the last century, from rail travel to the Internet. Other sites have enjoyed a short-lived burst of fame, such as Ballinspittle and the other Irish apparition sites of 1985, only to be relegated to a historical footnote. The author quotes a claim that perhaps as many as one in ten of the population has seen something which does not belong to the everyday material world. What the seer witnesses appears very real, but the seer knows it cannot be solidly of this world. Of course, few hallucinations, if that is what they are, take the form of visions of Mary. The shape an apparition takes depends on the cultural background of the observer. Visions of Mary come almost exclusively from within the Roman Catholic tradition. It is when stories of what is witnessed enter the public domain and are widely believed, that these visions become significant. That is when reports of local and subjective experiences can cast light on the state of the society in which they occur. Chris Maunder has researched the apparitions in the context of an era of unprecedented social upheaval in Europe. The visionaries of Fatima had their encounter during the fearful years of the First World War. Other visions are placed in the context of Nazism, Communism, secularism, persecution or austerity. The book examines the factors common to the many and various accounts of sightings. Women, children and the laity are the visionaries. The book contains a tabulated breakdown of visionaries by age and gender. These are initially grassroots events. They can occur as ‘epidemics’ with one claim sparking another and then another within the same region. The response of the Roman Catholic Church authorities is always one of caution. Folk faith Mariology sits uncomfortably with the theology of many of the bishops and yet events that stimulate significant renewals of faith cannot be dismissed out of hand. The idea of Mary, as seen as a bringer of consolation and reassurance, is encouraged; as are calls to repentance and renewal: however, the apocalyptic messages that are said to accompany many of the visions, warnings of imminent divine judgement, are seldom directly endorsed. The Church too has to consider whether events of a paranormal nature are of supernatural origin and whether they are divine or diabolic. Book reviews 381 The book is an excellent, objective and scholarly examination of a subject which will be of value to both believers and sceptics. Ted Harrison Aberystwyth Kevin J. Vanhoozer and Owen Strachan, The Pastor as Public Theologian: Reclaiming a Lost Vision (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2015); xi + 221 pp.: 9780801097713, $19.99 (hbk) This is an appeal for the pastor in the congregation to be seen essentially as the ‘public theologian’ or ‘pastor-theologian’. It is therefore another voice raised in recent years against the tendency, especially in America, to reduce the ministry to manager or to aspects of the helping professions and the often over-professionalization and specialization within academic theology that makes it remote from the wider community of faith. However, the discussion is rooted in a very particular tradition, that of Reformed evangelicalism, looking back in particular to the Puritans and especially Jonathan Edwards, with its emphasis on scriptural exposition though parallels with others are acknowledged. This leads to a particular notion of the nature and practice of public theology. It has to be distinguished from political or social theology and the recent interest in ‘doing theology’ in dialogue in the public square. Rather the pastor-theologian exercises a public ministry in and through and with the community of faith as it leads its life of witness and discipleship in the everyday life of the world. The image is of an alien people in a strange land. The pastor is the lynchpin as the one who has the task of articulating this gospel reality, so building up the congregation in its self-understanding, strengthening the faithful as they go about their business in the world. Thus ‘pastors are public theologians because they work for, with and on people – the gathered assembly of the faithful – and lead them to live to God, bearing witness as a public spire in the public square’ (p. 184). This thesis is set out in two key chapters, after an introduction and chapters on the theology of ministry and history of the tradition, viz. chapter 3 – the roots of theological understanding – and chapter 4 – the practice of pastoral ministry in preaching, worship and education. Each chapter is supplemented by case studies, some of which are from Britain, of good or interesting practice. Public ministry, however, also implies coming to grips with the realities that shape the world. There are, indeed, frequent references to the need to ‘be able to read one’s own world, one’s own historical situation and life in the light of the world of the biblical text’ (p. 115). But apart from exhortations to be culturally literate and to read fiction, there is almost no guidance as to how to evaluate the contemporary scene or how to use insights from other sources to understand better the human condition. It is all very church centred. It would appear, therefore, we are left where we came in, with the tension between the need to be rooted in the