John Henry Newman: A Mind Alive by Roderick Strange

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Takeaway: influential nearly a century and a half later.

John Henry Newman is a figure that is frequently referenced, but I have not read anything by or about him directly. The recent biography by Ian Kerr is a more comprehensive biography, but it also does not have either a kindle or audiobook edition and it is much longer and much more expensive. So I picked up this short introduction.

Roderick Strange is a Catholic priest that and inserts himself and his thoughts into the biography frequently. Mostly that is helpful and Strange’s interjections gives some historical import to how Newman is perceived today.

Mostly what I was interested in was enough background on Newman to be able to read two of his books that were recommended in Eugene Peterson’s Take and Read (Grammar of Ascent and Apologia Pro Vita Sua). I think this was helpful for that. In addition to the brief biography, Strange spent about half of the book talking about Newman’s ideas, which is helpful.

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All is Grace by Brennan Manning

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I am reposting this 2011 review because the Kindle Edition is free through Oct 20, 2015. All Is Grace

Takeaway: In the end, all really is Grace.

Spiritual biography and autobiography has a tendency to push the lesson before the story.  That is not all bad.  Since Augustine’s Confessions, Christians have learned much from those that have gone before us.  There are problems when the biography/autobiography verge into hagiography, showing only the good and never the bad.  There is equally problems with the tell-all conversion stories that seem to revel too much in the pre-conversion life and too little in the post conversion reality.  All is Grace does a good job of balancing the real, the history and the lesson.

Manning has had a hard life. This will be his last book.  His ill health has meant that he has not been capable of speaking and writing over the past couple years and this book was only completed with the help of John Blase.  This is the third such last book I have read this year.  John Stott’s Radical Disciple, Eugene Peterson’s The Pastor: A Memoir (probably not his last book, but still in a similar vein of concluding his public ministry) and now Brennan Manning’s All is Grace.  All three are very different, but are quite reflective of the lives that each have lived and the types of ministry they were called to serve.  Stott’s book was more theological and pastoral, prodding us to continue on.  Peterson’s book was reflective, asking us to look and see if we are adopting too much of the attitudes of the world instead of acting like the servant.  Manning’s is another call to understand grace by looking at his own life that was marked by both great grace, and great need of grace.

I have read several books by Manning, but this memoir provides some historical structure that does much to give context to his other books.  Brennan was born to a difficult family, marked by a lack of love and caring and a prevalence of alcohol.  Manning was drinking heavily by age 16.  But he also was a talented writer and started college young.  He dropped out of college, joined the Marines right before the end of the Korean War.  He became a war correspondent, went back to school to become a journalist, dropped out of college again, became a Franciscan, left the Franciscans to become a Little Brother, came back to the Franciscans and served as a college chaplain, participated in a experimental community like the Little Brothers in the US, again became a college chaplain.  Each time it was about 2 years before he moved on to the next thing.  By the last he was a clear alcoholic and was forced to seek treatment.  After some treatment and some success with the treatment he started a new career as a Evangelist speaking about grace and forgiveness as a recovering alcoholic priest.  But the alcohol never really was far away.  Some alcoholics are able to live full lives, clean for the rest of their lives.  Manning was not.

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A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety by Jimmy Carter

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Takeaway: Regardless of your politics, Carter is a fascinating man.

Carter is a fascinating man. I have read a couple of his books, but this the first of his that is more more memoir than policy.

I listened to this as an audiobook and he narrates it himself. This feels like a bit of a wrap up, especially since his recent cancer diagnosis. There is not a sense of finality about it, but rather a wrapping up.

Carter gives a brief review of his life. If you did not know anything about him, this is a good place to start. He spends time talking about his presidency, but not too much. A Full Life is about his life in general including politics, but not exclusively politics.

If anything it is the political portions that are less interesting. Carter, like many experts, thinks he is right. So the last chapter where he is talking about his post presidency and how he has interacted in the world has more than several places where he directly says that he thinks the world would be better off if the presidents after him had followed his policy or had listened to his advice or had let him help more. In some cases he might be right, in some cases I think he was likely wrong. But those sections are few.

Part of what is always interesting to me about listening to first person narrative from people toward the end of their lives is what they talk about. Carter certainly talks about his legacy and the things he tried to do. But he also is proud of his kids, he adores his wife. He is proud of some of his positions on race and integration. He also spends times talking about how much he loves woodworking and furniture making (I had no idea). And how much his mother was involved in his politics and the legacy his father left.

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The Pastor’s Kid: Finding Your Own Faith and Identity by Barnabas Piper

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I am reposting this 2014 review because the kindle edition $1.99

Summary: A pastor’s kid talks to pastors and other pastor’s kids about being a pastor’s kid.

I am a pastor’s kid. In fact, pastoring is a bit of a family business. My brother, father, and 3 uncles and an aunt are pastors, another uncle is not officially ordained but was the main interim pastor for a small church for several years. Also a grandfather, a great-grandfather, a great-great grandfather were pastors and a great-great-great grandmother was a traveling evangelist in the civil war era (if I have my history right.)

And I know a lot of pastor’s kids. When you go to Wheaton College, there are a lot of pastor’s kids (and Missionary Kids which has its own special set of issues.) I know pastor’s kids that have done well, and those that have not. So I picked up The Pastor’s Kids (a review copy) with interest.

This is a pretty short book (about 140 pages of content or 3 hours of audio). John Piper introduces it and acknowledges that at time the book was hard for him to read because it is being written by his son about the problems of being a pastor’s kid. But John Piper wants to assure the reader that anything critical is about wanting what’s best for the church as a whole and pastor’s families in particular.

The end really hits that tone by concluding with all of the good that can come of being a pastor’s kid.  Personally, that is where I and most other pastor’s kids I know end up.  All in all, we are glad we were pastor’s kids.

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Defeating Darwinism by Opening Minds by Phillip Johnson

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Phillip Johnson wrote this in 1997 to equip students for the intellectual battle over evolution in philosophy and science. While it discusses a few scientific points, the primary focus is on the philosophical naturalism that often undergirds evolution-affirming science (and which often remains unacknowledged), and how to challenge it.

That question–is philosophical naturalism necessarily and inextricably tied in with the real scientific elements of evolution?–is the primary idea I’ve pondered about this issue for a number of years now. The answer to that sets the stage and defines the parameters for what I am willing to accept and consider in this realm. Johnson makes a compelling case that the two are indeed inextricably linked, and thus must be challenged and fought.

For having been written almost 20 years ago, it’s surprisingly relevant: scientific research–particularly in the field of genetics–has continued to undermine the credibility of blind natural selection as an explanatory theory. And many of his tips about how to engage/challenge both lay persons and scientists are still helpful.

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The Liturgical Year by Joan Chittister (The Ancient Practices Series)

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I am reposting this 2009 review because the Kindle Editionn is on sale for $1.99
I grew up as a low church baptist.  We didn’t pay attention to the liturgical year, we didn’t use the Lectionary.  I have absorbed some things about the church year through my time at Wheaton College and seminary.  Some friends have paid more attention to the liturgical year and my wife and I have paid attention to Lent on and off since we went to Israel for Easter in 2001.  But this book was a good formal introduction to not only what the liturgical year is, but why it is.  The author describes it this way:

“The church year is not the marking of one lucelent, passing moment in the midst of eleven long months of dark nothingness all the rest of the year. It is month after month, every year of our lives, being taken back to the empty cross and the empty tomb, one way or another, in order to shape our own life in the light of them.” (From the 1st chapter.)

The author is a catholic nun, and writes using the Roman Catholic system as her primary focus.  She also talks about some of the differences between Eastern and Western calendars and where the differences arose.  It is not technical, fairly conversational and quite understandable to an outsider.  It was a quick read, I read it is in two evenings.

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The Last Policeman by Ben H Winters

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Summary: There is only 6 months before the world ends, but Detective Palace still has crimes to solve.

Mostly I picked up this book because I liked the concept. A large asteroid is coming toward earth and because of its odd orbit it was not detected until just about a year before it is scheduled to hit the earth. At the time of the book, it is six months until it hits. It has been confirmed that it is a certainty that the asteroid will hit and it will likely wipe out most of the population of the earth.

The world economy is in shambles (reminiscent of Station Eleven), but there is a longer preparation time. What would you do if you had six months to life, and so did everyone else?

Hank Palace is a young detective. Only 25, but he is sure that his recent suicide case (his ninth in 3 months) is not actually a suicide. But he not only has to fight for the freedom to solve it, he has to try to solve it in the context of a system that is breaking down.

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The Scorch Trials, a Step Away From the Book

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Unfortunately for Thomas and his fellow Gladers, the maze was only the beginning. With an impressive opening weekend in the box office, the second installment in The Maze Runner series solidifies the latest dystopian trilogy as a hit. Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials is just the latest in a long line of dystopian fiction to hit the market. In recent years, the young adult dystopian genre has seen a boom of new books published and adaptations continue to hit the big screen at a continuous and steady rate.

Of these adaptations, some have risen to the top of the heap, while others have fallen to the side of the road. The Maze Runner adaptation was initially written off by many critics, and even a few fans, as another mediocre entry into a flooded market. As if to prove these naysayers wrong, screenwriter T.S. Nowlin and director Wes Ball have returned with an even more action-packed adventure straying further from its source material than the original.

The Scorch Trials sees Thomas free of the Maze but far from true freedom. Upon discovering that the omnipotent group known as World in Catastrophe: Killzone Experiment Department – or WCKD – had been responsible for trapping the group in the maze as a sort of experiment to fight against a post-apocalyptic threat, we once again watch as Thomas leads his fellow Gladers out into a desolate area known as the Scorch and fight to escape WCKD’s experimentation plan. After being rescued by a mysterious third-party group and becoming suspicious of their true intentions, Thomas and the group once again venture out into the Scorch taking us on a wild ride coming up against deadly superstorms, depraved scoundrels, and lethal “œCranks.”

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The Children Act by Ian McEwan

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Summary: A family law judge wrestles with the ethical issues of her job and the personal issues of her life.

I once primarily read science fiction because it was in science fiction that I thought that ideas were best explored. I have since grown and experimented more in my reading choices. And recently I have come to think that “˜literary fiction’ should be defined more by its ability to interact with bigger ideas than any other measure.

The Children Act (and the Susan Howatch books I have been reading much of this year) are prime examples of what I mean by this description of literary fiction.

Fiona Maye is a UK High Court judge. She has very difficult cases in areas that in the US we would call family law. Divorce, child abuse, medical treatment of children, etc. While she is at the top of her career, a career that she has sacrificed her own chances of motherhood for, her husband has decided that his life needs a change. And so he is asking her permission to have an affair, although it is clear he has decided to have one regardless of her permission.

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The High Flyer by Susan Howatch

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Summary: A high flying lawyer, with no time for the spiritual life, is forced to confront the spiritual world.

Carter Graham is a no nonsense lawyer that has a life plan and is sticking to it. That life plan includes getting married at around 35 and having children sometime before 40. When Carter meets Kim Betz, she thinks she has found a perfect partner to continue her life plan.

As with most of Susan Howatch’s books the story is important, but the story is also a means to work through spiritual and philosophical issues. In this case, the atheist Carter Graham, confronts the reality of the spiritual world through unexpected spiritual manifestations (ghosts, spiritual healers, curses, etc.) and then has to work through her issues around theodicy, the problem of evil, the role of God in evil, why God didn’t create a perfect world, her role in sin and how her sin affects others and other’s sin affects her, etc..

More than most of Susan Howatch’s books I have read this is a book of explication. Carter spends a lot of time talking through issues with counselors, doctors, psychologists, spiritual directors, friends, etc. This allows for a lot of different perspectives, but also a book that is as much theology as story.

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