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I found this insightful quote from Wright’s collection of sermons, Following Jesus. We often consider the relationship between heaven and hell, and heaven and earth, but earth and hell? We spend billions on smart missiles, and in the same breath we shut hospitals. These are the signs of a courtship between earth and hell that [...]

Letters to a Spiritual Seeker © 2004 W. W. Norton & Company 266 pages Let me just confess something up front: I bought this book because of the beautiful canoe on the cover. Sure, I rationalized it in other ways. “Spiritual” in the title peaked my interest, and I did appreciate Walden. But it was [...]

Now and Then: A Memoir of Vocation © 1983 HarperSanFrancisco: HarperCollinsPublishers © 1991 112 pages This is an important book. I expected an autobiography of Buechner’s life from when he decided to enter Union Theological Seminary until 1983. I received far more. This book is holy. It will not satisfy the intellectual curiosity of a [...]

Here’s a good (and classic) reminder of what Jesus has done for us (from The Institutes): If you contemplate yourself, that is sure damnation. But since Christ has been so imparted to you with all his benefits that all his things are made yours, that you are made a member of him, indeed one with [...]

Fasting: The Ancient Practices © 2009 Thomas Nelson 180 pages Fasting is the natural, inevitable response of a person to a grievous sacred moment in life (18). That statement summaries the entire book. McKnight identified a three step process in fasting: Something “grievous” happens We fast God responds Our culture is obsessed with short-circuiting this [...]

Adam, Eve, and the Serpent: Sex and Politics in Early Christianity © 1988 Vintage Books: Random House, Inc. © 1989 189 pages Adam, Eve, and the Serpent is a baptism into the various debates and controversies that swirled through the first three centuries of Christendom. It’s obvious on every page that Pagels knows the players [...]

It’s been a real long time since I had to get my wife to drive so I could listen to that brand-new Choir CD, “O How the Mighty Have Fallen” while reading the liner notes. Good news Choir fans: I just checked out their website, and they’re recording again. Here’s one of the songs: Smooth [...]

In Marva Dawn’s Keeping the Sabbath Wholly, I found a great rant about what the church is: To say “I am going to church” both reveals and promotes bad theology. . . . We are NOT “going to church”! We are going to a sanctuary to participate in an order of worship together with the [...]

Generation A © 2009 Random House Canada 297 pages Generation A is the story of how five young people’s lives become entangled after being stung by almost extinct bees. The plot’s little more than a vehicle to relate the meta-narrative of life in crumbling future. In the book, each of the five characters take time [...]

There were so many piercing observations in Now and Then: A Memoir of Vocation, you need to read it for yourself. For now, here’s the sentence that most accurately describes his observational outlook: There is no event so commonplace but that God is present within it, always hiddenly, always leaving you room to recognize him [...]