Therapeutic and Prophetic Narratives in Worship - A Hermeneutic Study of Testimonies and Visions. Their Potential Significance for Christian Worship and Secular Society

Personal religious narratives, either as therapeutic testimonies or as prophetic visions, have played an essential role in shaping the liturgy of the early Pentecostal movement. The present publication takes as its aim to study these oral narratives in the light of religious, literary and social theories, in order to establish what relevance they have with regard to the secularization of Christianity.
The theses put forward are thought to be a contribution to narrative theory and practice. To theory formation, because they advocate a bilingualism in which religious and secular speech become part of the same metaphor. To religious practice, because they encourage communication in which the claims of the individual, society, and the Holy can be understood and answered responsibly.