Includes bibliographical references and indexes

Introduction : a sentimental education : on Christian action -- pt. 1: Incarnate significance : the body as background. Erotic comprehension -- The social body -- pt. 2: Sanctified perception. "We tell ourselves stories in order to live" : how worship works -- Restor(y)ing the world : Christian formation for mission

Sidebars: PICTURING THIS. Picturing the end of worship -- Picturing the limitations of worldview : reading Wendell Berry in Costco -- Picturing love and worship in David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest -- Picturing a feel for the world in Bright Star -- Picturing kinaesthetic conversion in The King's Speech -- Picturing the pedagogy of insignificance with Carson McCullers -- Picturing secular liturgies in Nicholson Baker's The Mezzanine -- Picturing the sanctification of perception in Jewish morning prayer -- Picturing a reflective, sentimental education -- TO THINK ABOUT. Longing lead to action -- Learning the hard way when it's the only way -- Shaping a worldview in Downton Abbey -- Existential maps of our world -- Chicken sexing and nonconscious knowledge -- Motor intentionality in Rise of the Planet of the Apes -- "Catching" sleep -- Newman on faith as love -- Schooling as ritual performance -- Slouching toward ritual -- Metaphor as godfire -- I can't say; let me tell you a story -- War games -- Imagining the reformation of manners -- Story and the economy of abundance -- The poetry of prayer -- Praying a world(view) -- Love's litany

"How does worship work? How exactly does liturgical formation shape people? And how does the Spirit marshal the dynamics of such transformation? In the second of James K.A. Smith's three-volume theology of culture, the author expands and deepens the analysis of cultural liturgies and Christian worship he developed in his acclaimed Desiring the Kingdom. Drawing on the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty and Pierre Bourdieu, this book helps readers understand and appreciate the bodily basis of habit formation and how liturgical formation--both 'secular' and Christian--affects one's fundamental orientation to the world. Worship 'works' by leveraging one's body to transform his or her imagination, and it does this through stories understood on a register that is closer to body than mind. This has critical implications for thinking about the nature of Christian formation and the role of the arts in Christian mission. Students of philosophy, liturgical studies, and theology will welcome this work as will scholars, pastors, worship leaders, and Christian educators. Imagining the Kingdom includes analyses of popular films, novels, and other cultural phenomena, such as The King's Speech, Rise of the Planet of the Apes, David Foster Wallace's Infinite Jest, the iPhone, and Facebook."--Publisher description