12-Week Study & Discussion Guide

The Ragamuffin Gospel

by Brennan Manning·85 discussion questions

Week 1 — FreeRead the Preface and Introduction of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Luke 15:11-32 (The Parable of the Prodigal Son)

Discussion question your group will work through:

1.Manning opens by describing a Christianity that has become obsessed with performance, appearances, and moral scorekeeping. Does that description resonate with your experience of church, or your own inner life? Where do you see it most clearly?

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About This Study Guide

At a glance: this is a 12-week study and discussion guide for The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning, with 85 questions organized by reading assignment. Week 1 is free to read, with no card required.

Brennan Manning's The Ragamuffin Gospel is a passionate, unflinching meditation on the grace of God — a grace so extravagant, so unconditional, and so scandalous that most of us spend our lives half-believing it. Manning's central thesis is simple but revolutionary: God's love for us is not earned, managed, or maintained by our performance. It is freely given to the bedraggled, the beat-up, and the burnt-out — to ragamuffins. The book is both a theological argument and a personal confession, drawing on Manning's own struggle with alcoholism, self-contempt, and the long journey toward receiving rather than just preaching grace. It challenges the comfortable Christianity of the respectable and invites broken people to sit down at the table they feared they'd been excluded from.

This study guide is designed for small groups or individuals who want to move slowly and honestly through the book — not just to understand Manning's argument, but to let it do its work on them. Each week, read the assigned chapter before your group meets or before you sit down to journal. Then work through the discussion questions, which are designed to draw you into the text, into honest self-examination, and into conversation with the God Manning is pointing toward. Some questions will feel uncomfortable. That discomfort is worth staying with. You may want to keep a journal alongside this guide, writing out your responses to questions that feel most personal.

By the end of this study, you will not have arrived — but you may have begun to believe, in a deeper and more cellular way, that the gospel really is for people like you. You will have been invited to trade in your performance-driven, score-keeping picture of God for the reckless, pursuing, furiously loving Father that Jesus described. You will have been asked to be honest about your sin, your exhaustion, and your fear — and to discover that honesty, not achievement, is the door into grace.

Introduction — The Ragamuffin Gospel

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Read the Preface and Introduction of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Luke 15:11-32 (The Parable of the Prodigal Son)

Before diving into the chapters, take a moment to sit with this question: what do you actually believe, in your gut, about how God feels about you right now?

1.Manning opens by describing a Christianity that has become obsessed with performance, appearances, and moral scorekeeping. Does that description resonate with your experience of church, or your own inner life? Where do you see it most clearly?

2.The word 'ragamuffin' is Manning's term for the broken, bedraggled, and imperfect — in other words, all of us. How does that label sit with you? Does it feel like an insult, a relief, or something else?

3.Manning suggests that many believers assent to grace intellectually but cannot seem to receive it personally. What is the difference between believing in grace as a doctrine and actually living as a recipient of grace? Where do you fall on that spectrum?

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12-Week Schedule

  1. Week 1Introduction — The Ragamuffin Gospel7 questions
  2. Week 2Chapter 1 — Something Is Radically Wrong7 questions
  3. Week 3Chapter 2 — Magnificent Monotony7 questions
  4. Week 4Chapter 3 — The Victorious Limp7 questions
  5. Week 5Chapter 4 — Tilted Halos7 questions
  6. Week 6Chapter 5 — The Great, Compassionate Deal7 questions
  7. Week 7Chapter 6 — Grazie, Signore7 questions
  8. Week 8Chapter 7 — Paste Jewelry and Sawdust Hot Dogs7 questions
  9. Week 9Chapter 8 — The Discipline of the Secret7 questions
  10. Week 10Chapter 9 — The Second Call7 questions
  11. Week 11Chapter 10 — A Touch of Folly7 questions
  12. Week 12Review & Reflection — Living as a Ragamuffin8 questions

Chapter 1 — Something Is Radically Wrong

All 7 questions →

Read Chapter 1 of The Ragamuffin Gospel

1.Manning argues that many Christians live under what he calls a 'theology of fear' rather than a theology of grace. What does a fear-based relationship with God look like in practical terms — in prayer, in church attendance, in how we talk about our sins?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 2 — Magnificent Monotony

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Read Chapter 2 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Romans 8:38-39

1.Manning uses the phrase 'magnificent monotony' to describe the relentless, unchanging consistency of God's love — it never rises or falls based on our performance. Does this feel liberating or unsettling to you? Why?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 3 — The Victorious Limp

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Read Chapter 3 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Genesis 32:22-32 (Jacob wrestling with God)

1.Manning uses Jacob's all-night wrestling match with God as a picture of the ragamuffin's life of faith — we are wounded in the encounter, but we are also named and blessed. What does it mean to you that God blesses Jacob not despite the struggle, but through it?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 4 — Tilted Halos

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Read Chapter 4 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Luke 18:9-14 (The Pharisee and the Tax Collector)

1.Manning uses the image of 'tilted halos' to describe the saints — people whose holiness is always slightly crooked, always imperfect, always in need of grace. What is the difference between a saint with a tilted halo and a hypocrite, in Manning's view?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 5 — The Great, Compassionate Deal

All 7 questions →

Read Chapter 5 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Isaiah 43:1-4; Luke 15:1-7 (The Lost Sheep)

1.Manning describes the compassion of God as something visceral and consuming — the Hebrew word for compassion (rachamim) comes from the word for 'womb,' suggesting a mother's fierce, instinctive love. How does that image reshape your sense of what God feels toward you?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 6 — Grazie, Signore

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Read Chapter 6 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Luke 17:11-19 (The Ten Lepers); Ephesians 2:8-9

1.'Grazie, Signore' means 'Thank you, Lord' in Italian. Manning uses this phrase to capture the posture of the person who has truly received grace. What is the difference between gratitude as a religious duty and gratitude as a natural overflow of having received something undeserved?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 7 — Paste Jewelry and Sawdust Hot Dogs

All 7 questions →

Read Chapter 7 of The Ragamuffin Gospel

1.Manning uses the vivid image of 'paste jewelry and sawdust hot dogs' to describe the hollow substitutes for authentic faith — impressive on the outside, empty on the inside. What are some of the spiritual 'paste jewelry' items that Christians commonly mistake for the real thing?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 8 — The Discipline of the Secret

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Read Chapter 8 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18 (The Sermon on the Mount — giving, praying, fasting in secret)

1.Read Matthew 6:1-6, 16-18. Jesus repeatedly tells his disciples to do their most important spiritual practices 'in secret' — not for an audience. What does this teach us about the difference between religion as performance and faith as relationship?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 9 — The Second Call

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Read Chapter 9 of The Ragamuffin Gospel. Key passage: John 21:15-19 (Jesus reinstates Peter)

1.Read John 21:15-19. Jesus asks Peter three times, 'Do you love me?' — mirroring Peter's three denials. Why does Jesus not simply announce forgiveness and move on? What does this tender, repetitive exchange tell us about how grace works in us over time?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Chapter 10 — A Touch of Folly

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Read Chapter 10 of The Ragamuffin Gospel (and the Epilogue, 'The Scandal of Grace, Ten Years Later,' if included in your edition). Key passage: 1 Corinthians 1:18-25

1.Read 1 Corinthians 1:18-25. Paul calls the cross 'foolishness to those who are perishing.' What is it about the gospel of grace — specifically its unconditional, unearned character — that strikes the world (and many religious people) as foolish or offensive?

+ 6 more questions in the full guide

Review & Reflection — Living as a Ragamuffin

All 8 questions →

No new reading this week. Review your notes, journal entries, and any passages you marked throughout The Ragamuffin Gospel

1.Which chapter or image from The Ragamuffin Gospel had the most impact on you? Was it Jacob's victorious limp, Peter's second call, the ten lepers, the prodigal's father running down the road — or something else entirely? What made it land so powerfully?

+ 7 more questions in the full guide
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About the The Ragamuffin Gospel guide

How many weeks is the The Ragamuffin Gospel study guide?

This study guide covers The Ragamuffin Gospel in 12 weeks, with week-by-week discussion questions, reading references, and closing prayers for each session.

How many discussion questions are included?

The complete guide includes 85 discussion questions across 12 weeks — an average of 7 questions per week, designed for group conversation.

Can I use this guide for a book club?

Yes — the questions are written for group discussion and work well for small groups, book clubs, church studies, and couples reading together.

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