What is Reddit's opinion of Recovering the Scandal of the Cross: Atonement in New Testament and Contemporary Contexts?

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Hiya, I'm a PhD student in Theology doing my doctoral thesis on atonement. I grew up going to a conservative Pentecostal church and inherited some confusing ideas about what the cross means. Long story short: throughout Christian history there have been many ways to understand what "atonement" means. I'm currently working on a thesis that sees atonement as God's action through Christ, taking the weight of the pain we're subjected to by being part of a creation given over to greed and violence, and offering us healing and new life. For deconstructing how American evangelicalism got its current understanding of atonement and other possibilities, I highly recommend Recovering the Scandal of the Cross. Feel free to message me as well. :)

So many of your questions speak to why I left Christianity for such a long time. For me, I didn't want to be "forced" to go against my own way and have to follow "God's will," instead of doing what I thought was right. Especially since "God's will" as my church expressed it seemed to go against the way of love. For one thing, I was sexually abused as a child. I didn't realize until much later how much the penal substitutionary theory of atonement (at least as it was expressed by my church, and much of the evangelical church in general) seemed to play into unhealthy sexual metaphors. When I learned that there were other ways to understand how Jesus reconciles us to God that I could see as healing rather than abusive, it transformed my faith.

Rather than going too much into my own story, I'd like to recommend some books that helped me out a lot with this. (Note: I'm in seminary and wrote a paper on atonement from the perspective of sexually abused women. This research has changed my life and the direction I see myself going in academics/ministry):

Recovering the Scandal of the Cross

We Were the Least of These

Triune Atonement

Since two of these are more academic, they may not be in a public library collection, but you can always request them through interlibrary loan. Feel free to PM me if you'd like to talk more. I can pray for you, but only if you're okay with that.

I like that you slipped in “if not primary.”

And that’s interesting. Can you shoot me a link to some historians that’s make such an argument?

For books thoroughly covering the progression of Christian theology and atonement:

Recovering the Scandal of the Cross: Atonement in New Testament and Contemporary Contexts https://www.amazon.com/dp/0830839313/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_i_P6AYNJNBH8WRB60EAMD1

Practicing Christian Doctrine: An... https://www.amazon.com/dp/0801049334?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share

For a book thoroughly covering Paul’s theology where PSA usually comes from:

The Theology of Paul the Apostle https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802844235/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_i_X1WGPNRBMNGSPRW0Q5AF

However, there are some that argue there are elements of PSA present in the church fathers. An article for that is below. But, it is clear from the article that the author is reaching pretty hard.

https://www.9marks.org/article/did-the-church-fathers-affirm-penal-substitutionary-atonement/

Thanks.