Rest Is Resistance
May 22, 2023
Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia HerseyMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
For me a timely and helpful book, as we near the end of a cruel and exhausting legislative session here in Nebraska.
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Books
Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto by Tricia HerseyMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
For me a timely and helpful book, as we near the end of a cruel and exhausting legislative session here in Nebraska.
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Essay on the Freedom of the Will
May 18, 2023
Essay on the Freedom of the Will by Arthur SchopenhauerMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Though I disagree with Schopenhauer's position on the freedom of the will (basically, that there isn't any), I recommend this essay as a model of fine philosophical writing. Well structured, clearly written, with cogent arguments, and reflecting an incredible breadth of scholarship and reading.
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Healing the Wounds of Sexual Abuse
May 17, 2023
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42249869-healing-the-wounds-of-sexual-abuse" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img border="0" alt="Healing the Wounds of Sexual Abuse: Reading the Bible with Survivors" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1540837076l/42249869._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/42249869-healing-the-wounds-of-sexual-abuse">Healing the Wounds of Sexual Abuse: Reading the Bible with Survivors</a> by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/673279.Elaine_A_Heath">Elaine A. Heath</a><br/>
My rating: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/5500505007">5 of 5 stars</a><br /><br />
This is an excellent book that I highly recommend. Both pastorally helpful and also full of rich interpretations of biblical stories from the perspectives of survivors of sexual abuse. So a helpful book for the preacher as well.
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Victory City
April 21, 2023
Victory City by Salman RushdieMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Rushdie returns to form in this marvelous, enjoyable tale. He is a masterful, imaginative storyteller, and this is a fun story.
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Good Christian Sex
April 21, 2023
Good Christian Sex: Why Chastity Isn't the Only Option-And Other Things the Bible Says About Sex by Bromleigh McCleneghanMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is a good book. A helpful book. Even a fun book.
McCleneghan states that her goal is to "lay out some of the theological and ethical questions that arise in your average, everyday experience of adult sexuality, and to walk readers through those discussions in a clear and engaging way." I think she achieves her goal.
Her authorial voice is funny and relatable, as she uses her own stories and experiences to explore pleasure, intimacy, being single, dealing with exes, being married, etc.
I highly recommend this book and know that I'm going to use it in my pastoral care for years to come.
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The Books of Jacob
April 21, 2023
The Books of Jacob by Olga TokarczukMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Yes, it is long. Yes, it took me a long time to read (I took breaks and read other things). Yes, there were times, particularly in the long middle, where it was less engaging and I sometimes felt lost in the thicket of characters.
But the book was enchanting in the beginning and held my attention for quick reading in the final two hundred plus pages. And I love Tokarczuk's style of using multiple voices to narrate a story.
And what the book seems to do is reveal how modern Europe also contained strange, mystical strands that also contributed to its growing cosmopolitanism. Clearly Tokarczuk's novel was a challenge to the current dominant narrative in Polish nationalism.
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Far Down Stream
April 21, 2023
Far Down Stream by Philip W. SmithMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Phil's career was as an infectious disease physician. He founded and ran the biopreparedness unit at the University of Nebraska Medical Center which distinguished itself during the Ebola epidemic and has expanded its leadership during Covid. As he pastor, he shared with me the spirituality of being a doctor. Much of that feeling and reflection appears here in a lifetime of poetry.
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The Shepherd's Life
April 13, 2023
The Shepherd's Life: Modern Dispatches from an Ancient Landscape by James RebanksMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
"This is an ancient, hard-earned, local kind of freedom, that was stolen from people elsewhere."
I highly recommend this book. It is "bloody marvelous" as the cover says. And read it slowly. I've taken my time with it over months, reading a few pages most mornings, almost like a devotional.
Rebanks describes a hyper-local way of life. Which reveals the deep ethical and spiritual connections of such good, hard work. Here is an example of a life lived in intimate knowledge of all that is difficult and struggle and, yet, how to find enjoyment, meaning, and reward in life.
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Christianity and the New Spirit of Capitalism
April 07, 2023
Christianity and the New Spirit of Capitalism by Kathryn TannerMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Tanner brings a profound Christian critique to current finance-based capitalism. And it's not at the points where such a critique would be most obvious (such as exploitation of workers or the Earth). Rather, she takes issue with fundamental ideas that underpin contemporary capitalism--how it marks time, how it views the past and the future, how it views individuals and their relationships to the whole--and in each case demonstrates how contemporary capitalism runs counter to what Christianity believes on each of these points. A worthy read that will prompt deep thought.
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Beowulf: A New Translation
March 29, 2023
Beowulf: A New Translation by UnknownMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Maybe the best paragraph in this whole translation comes near the very end:
Then another dirge rose, woven uninvited
by a Geatish woman, louder than the rest.
She tore her hair and screamed her horror
at the hell that was to come: more of the same.
Reaping, raping, feasts of blood, iron fortunes
marching across her country, claiming her body.
The sky sipped the smoke and smiled.
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