Roberto Sirvent is Professor of Political and Social Ethics at Hope International University in Fullerton, California. He used to work for a US senator, but his obsession with the cafeteria's caesar salad and pecan pie made him a very unproductive employee. Even though he likes to teach and write about movies, he often relies on his wife to explain their endings. Duncan B. Reyburn is Senior Lecturer in Information Design and a researcher in philosophical theology and mimetic theory at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. He is the author of Seeing Things as They Are: G. K. Chesterton and the Drama of Meaning (Cascade, 2016). He used to be a professional designer and illustrator, but ended up in academia because of a bad life choice. If it weren't for GPS, he would get lost all the time, because he doesn't have a very good sense of direction.

• Acknowledgements ixContributors xi1. Theologies of Failure: An Inadequate Introduction 1Duncan B. Reyburn and Roberto SirventPART 1: FAILING WELLPART 2: FAILING BETTERPART 3: FAILURE AS RESISTANCEPART 4: FAILURE AND LIBERATION

In this moment when theology is in danger of failing along with its traditional institutions, when politics threatens to fail us all along with the Earth itself, these essays burst failure open from within. Vibrating with the art, the humility, and even the humour of our indelible inadequacies, this conversation enlivens a practice more important than success - an improvisational minding of failure that may indeed prove to be 'a condition of the possibility of theology itself'.

Roberto Sirvent is Professor of Political and Social Ethics at Hope International University in Fullerton, California. He used to work for a US senator, but his obsession with the cafeteria's caesar salad and pecan pie made him a very unproductive employee. Even though he likes to teach and write about movies, he often relies on his wife to explain their endings. Duncan B. Reyburn is Senior Lecturer in Information Design and a researcher in philosophical theology and mimetic theory at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. He is the author of Seeing Things as They Are: G. K. Chesterton and the Drama of Meaning (Cascade, 2016). He used to be a professional designer and illustrator, but ended up in academia because of a bad life choice. If it weren't for GPS, he would get lost all the time, because he doesn't have a very good sense of direction.

• Acknowledgements ixContributors xi1. Theologies of Failure: An Inadequate Introduction 1Duncan B. Reyburn and Roberto SirventPART 1: FAILING WELLPART 2: FAILING BETTERPART 3: FAILURE AS RESISTANCEPART 4: FAILURE AND LIBERATION

In this moment when theology is in danger of failing along with its traditional institutions, when politics threatens to fail us all along with the Earth itself, these essays burst failure open from within. Vibrating with the art, the humility, and even the humour of our indelible inadequacies, this conversation enlivens a practice more important than success - an improvisational minding of failure that may indeed prove to be 'a condition of the possibility of theology itself'.

Roberto Sirvent is Professor of Political and Social Ethics at Hope International University in Fullerton, California. He used to work for a US senator, but his obsession with the cafeteria's caesar salad and pecan pie made him a very unproductive employee. Even though he likes to teach and write about movies, he often relies on his wife to explain their endings. Duncan B. Reyburn is Senior Lecturer in Information Design and a researcher in philosophical theology and mimetic theory at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. He is the author of Seeing Things as They Are: G. K. Chesterton and the Drama of Meaning (Cascade, 2016). He used to be a professional designer and illustrator, but ended up in academia because of a bad life choice. If it weren't for GPS, he would get lost all the time, because he doesn't have a very good sense of direction.

• Acknowledgements ixContributors xi1. Theologies of Failure: An Inadequate Introduction 1Duncan B. Reyburn and Roberto SirventPART 1: FAILING WELLPART 2: FAILING BETTERPART 3: FAILURE AS RESISTANCEPART 4: FAILURE AND LIBERATION

In this moment when theology is in danger of failing along with its traditional institutions, when politics threatens to fail us all along with the Earth itself, these essays burst failure open from within. Vibrating with the art, the humility, and even the humour of our indelible inadequacies, this conversation enlivens a practice more important than success - an improvisational minding of failure that may indeed prove to be 'a condition of the possibility of theology itself'.