The Old Rugged Cross
A History of the Atonement in Popular Christian Devotion
by Ben Pugh
Imprint: Cascade Books
Ben Pugh first trained as an artist with the University for the Creative Arts in Farnham, UK, and still has a love for creative endeavors, especially in written form. After becoming a Christian at the age of nineteen, his love of writing combined with a newfound love for the Bible and a growing interest in Christian doctrine, especially the life-changing truth that we are justified in Christ. In time, this interest in theology led to an MA from Manchester University and a PhD from Bangor. His first full-time academic role was as Director of Postgraduate Studies at Mattersey Hall College which, at the time, could boast of having the largest graduate school of its kind in Europe. However, Ben longed for more time in the classroom engaging with students, and, of course, more time to write theology. Along came the offer of the position of Lecturer in Theology at Cliff College, Derbyshire, where he has been happily employed since 2012. Ben is blessed to work at a desk in what was once Victorian country house from which he can look out across the second most visited national park in the world--Peak District.
"This is a book about the cross like none you have ever read. Ben Pugh takes us on a fascinating, eye-opening tour of some key sights in the history of popular Christian devotion to the cross. Here we witness the development of crucicentric practices such as the Eucharist, making the sign of the cross, following stations of the cross, veneration of splinters from the cross, the cult of martyrdom, the performance of Passion plays, medieval passion mysticism, as well as the Evangelical crucicentric piety of Moravians and the Wesleys, the sanctifying cross of the holiness movement, the victorious delivering blood of Pentecostalism, and the gushing blood of Mel Gibson's Passion of the Christ. This is the cross as experienced in the lived experience of ordinary believers, past and present; the cross as prayed, sung, painted, acted, meditated upon, and clung to. Highly recommended."
--Robin A. Parry, author of The Biblical Cosmos and (with Andrew Walker) Deep Church Rising
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