Hearts & Minds Books

I want to wax rhapsodic in giving a big old salt-water shout-out to my new friends at this year's Ocean City Beach Project, an intentional living/learning community across the street from the Ocean City NJ Presbyterian Church, sponsored as a leadership development and discipleship summer experience for college students sponsored by the Coalition for Christian Outreach (CCO.)  OCBP brings together a gang of collegians who read books together, attend several three hour lectures a week, learn Bible study skills and prayerfully consider how to offer their gifts and abilities for God's work on campus, in churches, and of course in the world.  I and my daughter, Marissa and her friend Natalie, had the great privilege to hang out with the '08 OCBP crew, and had the chance to deliver some lectures, lead some discussions, show a film, talk about Christ's reign and explain why book-buying is a good habit for serious Christians who care about such stuff. And I didn't get a sunburn in the hot south Jersey seashore.

My main presentations were on the development of a Christian worldview prepping them on their reading, especially, Derek Melleby and Donald Opitz's excellent The Outrageous Idea of Academic Faithfulness (Brazos; $13.99), a book that is ideal for that setting, mature and yet light, serious and joyful. (Please, if you know any college students, make sure they know about this one-of-a-kind resource!)  To invite students to meet God as clearly in their academic work as they might in a church service, to explore the relationship between faith and cultural engagement, to invite radical commitment to Christ's ways, even in science, sports or sexualtiy, to think through a Biblically-grounded view of citizenship and politics, well, it is all very exciting.   (Why is it that middle age folk like most of my peers are nearly dull to the radical implications for this large vision of making a difference in God's hurting world?)  Derek and Don's book helps students explore their sense of calling, their studies, their future work, and I gave a broad a hopefully exiting foundation and framework for thinking about this perspective of whole-life discipleship, this Kingdom vision, this reformational worldview out of which the CCO approaches their work with students and college staff.  We spent considerable time diagnosing the problems of a half-baked and legalistic or rationalistic faith, as we hoped to learn to discern ways to avoid, even as we keep ourselves well rooted in the historic Christian orthodoxies applied in fresh and formative ways.  I even got to tell them a bit about Abraham Kuyper!

As a very small part of one of my talks, I showed this provocative youtube clip of Brian McLaren, called "Domesticated Jesus." (Time didn't permit a showing of "Rethink Everything" or "The Societal Machine" two other good clips in this series of brief DeepShift presentations.)  This first great clip laments the increasingly troubled view of faith, the disconnect, the way Christ is domesticated and distracts us from the purposes of God.  This is a view where we do not submit to the grand story of the gospel, but rather, have Jesus as a "hood ornament" on the car we are already driving to our own destination.  Seeing Jesus as a mere accessory to our own autonomy seemed to be a helpful image for these students, and I invite you to ponder this short clip, too, and wonder about how we might rethink the faith in meaningful ways that can equip us to live in the ways of Christ in the contemporary world.  Notice Brian suggests we've lost the plot of the gospel message, we've somehow gotten confused about the Story.

To counter this kind of loss of story, and to offer a reliably Biblical foundation for this "everything must change" rethink,  I cited one of the most amazing books I've read in a while, a really fast-paced book packed with amazing information and really fantastic inspiration.  In a season of tremendous books that help us recapture the whole vision of God's work---these students watched N.T. Wright on the Colbert Report the week before talking about Surprised by Hope and were quite taken with his insistence on the notion that the final end of the Story is re-creation of creation, a healing of the planet and a reunion of heaven & earth---the new book, the last, by the late Robert Webber, is a must read.  It is called Who Narrates the
World? Contending for the Christian Story in an Age of Rivals (IVP; $15) and it argues that if Christians do not recapture the full story of a creation restored, other faiths or ideologies (think of radical Islam) will win the hearts and minds of the world's peoples, capturing their institutions and cultures.  Insofar as Islam presents an all encompassing vision, a coherent way of life and vision of history, they do, indeed, intend to narrate the meaning of life for the 21st century.  And, insofar as Christianity is presented as merely private, personalized and sentimental, spiritual and churchy, we will fail at the Kingdom call to disciple the nations.  If we do not narrate the meaning of life as purposeful and the nature of history as a response to God's sovereign unfolding of His rule, if we do not hold out a hope for the restoration of all things and the reality of the Kingdom, we will see other worldviews and ideological rivals to the God of the Bible win the day.  (For more about the excellent AEF statement that gave rise to this book, visit their website here.)

We unpacked Colossians 1 a bit, one of my favorite passages for decades, now, and of course, Romans 12:1-2. I showed a portion of the edgy and hard-hitting critique of hyper-reality and consumerism, The Trouble With Paris (a book and DVD curriculum I raved about in a post a few weeks back.)  We explored the implications of being "in but not of the world" and how other Christian traditions---liberal Protestantism's accommodation to culture and radical fundamentalism's world-flight avoidance of culture---fail at that mandated approach of Jesus.  Ahh, and then there is the cultural resistance of the new monastics and Shane Claiborne, who suggest it isn't proper to truly engage the institutions of power, and want to only elect Jesus for President.  Weeeee, what a great conversation that was: what does Shane and friends think of Christian citizenship action for the poor, like, say, the lobbying efforts of Bread for the World, or the Kuyperian vision of redemptive engagement within institutions as expressed by the Center for Public Justice?  Does the Colossians insistence that Christ made the powers and that they "hold together" in him, and that they are for him, mean that somehow we can be "in but not of" a traditional political party?  Can Walsh & Keesmaat's Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire help us here?

The very ecumenical and balanced Robert Webber has seen it all, and tells in great prose and astute lectures just how the church has and hasn't walked that faithful balanced of "in not of" the culture over the long years of church history.  His explanation of how we have sold out due to our unhelpful synthesis with pagan dualism, how we've yet maintain some efforts to be redemptive within non-Christian contexts, how the Enlightenment befuddled us so, how the modern era present new opportunities, all of this is really insightful.  I wish Who Gets to Narrate the World? would have been an assigned reading, too, for OCBP, as it frames their passionate desire for relevant and faithful Kingdom discipleship with a good historical perspective, and offers hope for serious, global renewal as we relearn the proper Biblical narrative.  That is, as in the McLaren clip, we learn to regain the plot and story.  For Mr. Webber, rather than the "creation-fall-redemption-consummation" flow I taught, it is simply "creation-incarnation-recreation."  God is honored in all things, through creation and incarnation, the cosmos is reckoned redeemable, and Christ is seen as Savior of the whole world, the one who restores the Kingdom "on Earth as it is in Heaven" thereby giving hope within history.

I cannot recommend Who Gets to Narrate the World? enough. I wish I would have cited it more in my talks at OCBP because it really does offer a fabulous foundation for the development of a viable Christian worldview, and offers a helpful bit of insight about how we have gone wrong, and how we might, in God's grace, regain a fuller appreciation for the whole counsel of God, and present a view of faith that is compelling, coherent, and consistent.  Such a narration of the story of our lives is just what we need if Christ is going to be more than a bobble head doll hood ornament.

I've been wanting to write more about this guy since I've discovered him---hat tip to Caleb Stegall---a year or so ago.  Bill Kauffman's new one is called Ain't My America: The Long, Noble History of Antiwar Conservatism and Middle-American Anti-Imperialism (Metropolitian Books; $25.)  As the title implies, it tells the tale of the a movement and tradition, a longstanding tradition, that most of us simply haven't heard of.  In what few American history classes we've had and in the typical civics lessons we've learned, and even in the somewhat sophisticated PBS current affairs shows we watch, we are lead to believe that conservatives are hawks and liberals are doves. The cultural picture, nearly iconic, of the free-lovin' 60s counter-cultural peaceniks opposing the gray-suited businessmen of the military-minded technocracy only reinforces this simplistic and often wrong-headed perspective.  From the earliest days of our country, there were true patriots---some of the Founding Fathers, for crying out loud, who warned against foreign entanglements; today  there is serious debate and voices against the Bush administrations Iraqi war have been raging on the political right.  Conservatives have a notable history, if one can take note of it, of being against foreign wars.  Bill Kauffman, one who finds his joyful stand on his own small town front porch as he supports his local soft ball team and cares conservatively for the historic preservation of his upstate New York region, helps us take very detailed note.  Who knew?

Two other books of his that I've read, and thoroughly enjoyed, were full of historical arcana, interesting detail, and little known facts about middle American protesters against greed, big business and the ideologies of "bigger is better" progress;  the stories Kauffman tells are not about Wobblies, red diaper babies or 60s love children, let alone modern day lefties sympathetic to Chomsky or Obama.  No, these are rural folks, often, populists and isolationists who care about their traditional values in ways that neo-con "family values" advocates seem not to have a clue.  (His powerful and sad chapter about how the military damages families is important and yet would probably earn him scowls from Dr. Dobson for not being pro-Pentagon.)  He takes us on a ride across the decades, from Herbert Hoover to Wendell Berry, from James Madison to Mark Hatfield, and on to dozens of  (almost all unheard of) governors, pundits, poets, congressmen, and preachers who throughout our history have spoken up loudly against war and an expanding American empire.  Occasionally, he tells of liberal, if politically Democrat, leaders such as George McGovern, who had great sympathies for his upper mid-Western folk traditions, who at heart held the most agrarian of visions, and seemed a wholesome blend of liberal pacifistic politics rooted in old-school Americana values.  His admiration for these leaders and their "outside the beltway" integrity, is sincere and very well informed.

As Kauffman colorfully writes about this colorful array of peacenik farmers and social justice cranks who wrote poetry and stood against Bigness of all sorts, I'm struck by how different classical old-school conservative attitudes and values and principles are from what passes  as "conservative" nowadays on the political right.  It would be very helpful for our political discourse these days to remind ourselves that neo-conservatism with it's idolatry of the free market as the answer to all social concerns, is a far cry from the profound writers of the classical "paleo" cons or the older Whigs.  (Think, say, of the difference between George Bush and, say, Russell Kirk;  the difference between The Weekly Standard's "war-fighting Republican" Bill Kristol and anti-imperialists like Senator Robert Taft.)

These older brand of conservatives, unlike the subsidized bigwig neo-con think tanks, stand in the feisty patriotic linage of Daniel Webster and Benjamin Rush, of the Anti-Federalists of 1787, the critics of the War of 1812, the Mexican war, the Spanish-American War, the Louisiana Purchase, even, and worried about expanding our military reaches (opposing our violent involvements in places like the Philippines or Puerto Rico.)  Many of them, out of budgetary conservatism, opposed increased monies for wars like in Viet Nam (did you know there were conservatives who opposed the hawks who, in the early escalation of that war, recall, were Democrats!)  They opposed the Hawkish motivation for going to the moon, in part, because of the increased centralization of power, the bureaucratic mess, the militarization of technology and the reduction of human scale economies that occur in such modern schemes.  Was Lewis Mumford and his ilk a conservative or a liberal? (It was conservatives, Kauffman reminds us, that opposed the horrible social dislocation caused by the grand Inter-State Highway system, first promoted as a roadway for the Defense of the nation, and the equally bad social dislocation caused by urban renewal, all Big bad schemes of the utopian  left.)  Kauffman draws on deep sources, sorrowful of the loss of place, the derision of smallness, and highlights writers as interesting as G.K. Chesteron and the closing speech of President George Washington.

Ain't My America is detailed American history, sort of the flip side of Howard Zinn's colorful revisionist approach from the lefty side, which gives account of the poor and marginalized (the must-read A People's History of America. Wow, it would be great to have Zinn & Kauffman on a panel together, since they both are presenting a dissenting historiography.) I had little idea that there were such men and poets as these in our grand American past.  One can be sorry for the brutality of Kit Carson;  we can lament the carnage of Gettysburg and Bull Run;  we can hang our head in shame at the bombings orchestrated by McNamara and Bush I.  But we can be proud of true patriots and good Americans and caring voices who dared to insist that wars of aggression and the politics of expansion and the ideology of growth are not healthy for families and our towns and our country.  Voices like Henry Blake Fuller and William Vaughn Moody and Moorfield Storey, names I had never heard, present a richer, fuller, and, it seems to me on this day, more truly American vision.  Kauffman  presents these writers and poets and pundits and politicos in all their quirky glory.

Kaufmann's other books I've mentioned in these pages before, and are less systematic history.  Look Homeward America: In Search of Reactionary Radicals and Front-Porch Anarchists is a collection of vignettes, great stories of various small town folk who resist the secular left and religious right, who seem to live their lives in ways that call forth alternative, "third way" dreams and values. (In that volume he tells of Dorothy Day and contemporary novelist Carolyn Chute; of "American Gothic" painter Grant Wood and President Millard Fillmore.)  I loved those stories, each historically rich and well written.  For sheer enjoyment, I loved his tremendous, inspiring  memoir,  Dispatches from the Muckdog Gazette: A Mostly Affectionate Account of a Small Town's Fight to Survive, an example of somebody who "went far" to make something of himself, as the odd metaphors go, and eventually came home to his small town to root for the minor league ball team, the Muckdogs.  That one was truly wonderful, a tremendous memoir which is a must-read for those who appreciate James Howard Kunstler, say, or the rural novels of Wendell Berry.  He's long-winded, which, in this setting, for those with ears to hear, is a good 'ol compliment.  Sit back with some sweet tea or a cold beer and let this storyteller teach you some important civic lessons.  Let him tell you the long, noble history of antiwar conservatism and middle-American Anti-Imperialism.

Anti War Radio has a fascinating interview with him here.  Enjoy. 

                                                                                                                            


    
We have enjoyed promoting the "Church and the Postmodern Culture" series of books edited and pulled together by James K. A. Smith (whose wonderful article in Christianity Today about the blending of his Pentecostal and Calvinist traditions, Teaching a Calvinist To Dance, just thrilled me in its simple ecumenical clarity and good sense--hey, what do you expect from a bookstore called Hearts AND Minds?)  Jamie is a serious post-modern scholar, also involved in the Radical Orthodoxy movement, as well.  Whew.

The first small book in this series was his own brilliant Whose Afraid of Postmodernism: Taking Derrida, Lyotard and Foucault to Church, which I very highly recommend.  The second was John Cuputo's feisty (and very Christ centered) reaction to the Christian right cleverly called What Would Jesus Deconstruct?  Both of these are published by Baker Academic ($17.99.)

As brief and interesting as these are, I still most often recommend Truth is Stranger Than It Used to Be: Biblical Faith in a Postmodern Age by Brian Walsh & Richard Middleton (IVP: $18--new cover, too!)  Its overview of the socio-economic idolatries of modernity/ hyper-modernity and its ideology of modernism, and the subsequent culture of post-modernity and and the philosophy of post-modernism, and then the extraordinary Biblical study which forms the core of the book, makes it still my favorite book on this topic.  It is the one I look to see if other Christian thinkers cite.  Dr. Crystal Downing's How Postmodernism Serves (My) Faith: Questioning Truth in Language, Philosophy and Art (IVP; $18) is an excellent and quite positive overview and not only very enjoyable, but very clear.  Several customers have told me that Postmodernism 101: A First Course for the Curious Christian by Heath White (Baker; $17.99) is also one of the clearest for beginners so that, too, would make an excellent introduction if you haven't read any of the above.

The new, third one in the "Church and the Postmodern Culture" is so far the most intellectually challenging of the three, and the most seriously insistence that postmodern perspectives are essential for faithful Christian outreach in our age.  GloboChrist: The Great Commission Takes a Postmodern Turn by Carl Raschke (Baker Academic; $17.99) is spectacularly fluent in the whole postmodern field, written with blunt Lutheran instincts, sort of a Bonhoeffer meets Kierkegaard interacting with Philip Jenkins and Lamin Sanneh and maybe Vinoth Ramachandra.  He is remarkably fluent in Islamic scholarship, too, and draws on resources about globalization that are wide and surprising.  He is deadly serious, of course, but ya gotta love a book that talks about globopomo.

Read a PDF of the introduction here.  And then come back to order from us!

Rev. Raschke (PhD, Harvard University) is an author to contend with and he surprises us often with his unique insights.  He has written a lot, and in his earlier contribution to the conversations about the postmodern turn is called The Next Reformation: Why Evangelicals Must Embrace Postmodernity (Baker; $22.)  You can see his really serious philosophical fluency by checking out this very arcane debate about Gilles Deleuze and other contemporary theorists.  Philosophy majors really ought to be paying attention to some of this important stuff although I admit it loses me...It is a blog site that brings together a variety of important theologians discussing this heady stuff.

For those who follow these things, you may want to know that Raschke has an appendix which includes a hard-hitting response to some anti-pomo critics, and a critical review of one of Brian McLaren's books (Generous Orthodoxy) which will hopefully generate some generous conversation within, at least, the emergent village. 

I've had a bit of writer's block these days, but not "reader's block"...I've got a dozen books that I'm in the middle of or have recently finished.  Besides the Big and Important ones that I announce here--scroll back over the last week if you don't recall--- and some that I am prayerfully reading devotionally, there are smaller, eccentric little volumes that keep me up and smiling late lately, bringing much interest and joy. Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia by Elizabeth Gilbert (Penguin; $15.00) is surely one of the most well-written and delightfully fascinating books I've read in a while (despite, or it is partially because of, her esoteric spirituality and frank descriptions of her libido.)  As you may know, since you mostly likely have talked to somebody who has been insisting you read it, EPL is the well-realized memoir of a respected fiction writer who, after a heartbreaking divorce, spends four months in Italy mostly eating, four months in an ashram in India, and then four months in Bali.  Sensuous and funny passages tell of her year long journey to discover important things about herself and life in the universe.  Please don't misunderstand, thinking this is written out of evangelical piety, as it isn't.  There is a lovely Anne Lamott quote on the front, but this is beyond her ways, even.  I still found it to be one of the best and most enjoyable books I've read this year!   I'd like this woman as a friend, or even a writing mentor, and can't wait for the sequel in '09...

Lost in the Museum: Buried Treasures and the Stories They Tell by Nancy Moses (AltaMira; $22.95) is a fun history book, inspired by the stuff in the back rooms of museums, artifacts that aren't seen by the general public.  It recounts the stories of the difficulties of curating museums, and preserving the vast amount of stuff;  the author's first-hand experiences (she was the former director of the Atwater Kent Museum of Philadelphia) are gloriously shared so we can all be "insiders" who know what is really going on behind the well lit cases.  Who knew how it all works, and how much untold/unshown stuff there is?  And how much of it is Really Cool.  Excursions to see John Audubon's birds (at the Academy of Natural Sciences), to weirdo glowing Blaschka sea animals at the Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, in a story about a biology/art interface) to John Brown's pike (!) held at the Civil War and Underground Railroad Museum in Philly and to pessaries (look it up!) at the famous morbid Mutter Medical Museum are just a few of the chapters here. This is an eccentric and rather random way to learn, but the back-rooms-at-the-museum structure ties the stories together.

I've been reading through a more serious history, too, with one chapter to go, written by a stellar and renowned conservative social thinker, Allan Carlson.  Carlson directs the Howard Center for Family, Religion and Society, and has given us a brilliant bit of social history called The  "American Way":  Family and Community in the Shaping of the American Identity (ISI Books; $15.)  What important stuff to know.   I had no idea that there were protests against German-American's using hypens in their ethnic designations in the early 1900s (indeed, the Democratic Party declared in their 1916 convention that it was "the supreme issue of our day" and the nature of national unity created a near civil war.  Who knew (but the radical feminists who despise it) that the New Deal of Roosevelt had such a traditional view of women working at home. (Maternalists fought for anti-industry child labor laws will feminists and unionists opposed such decent proposals.)  The chapter on the famous Luce publishing empire was fascinating--I had no idea that Paul Tillich or Neihbur or John Courtney Murray or Evelyn Waugh had written for them.  He started Sports Illustrated because of his vision of how American's should care about baseball and several suburban living magazines because of his hope that this would strengthen the wholesome family  (ahhh--how wrong he was, eh?)   How the American Dream was portrayed during the Cold War years is insightfully told in the next chapter as the argument unfolds that much bolder measures of cultural reformation are needed if we are going to create a society that is community and family-friendly.

Still, this summer season is a time for even lighter fare, and I've started a novel called The Almost True Story of Ryan Fisher by Rob Stennett (Zondervan; $12.99.)  It is about a self-assured real estate agent who discovers a Christian business directory and places an ad complete with a Jesus fish, thinking he can, by pretending to be an evangelical, make a mint.  As the back cover puts it, "While watching a news special late one night, he sees evangelical Christians raising their hands in worship.  It's like they're begging for affordable but classy starter homes."  How many books published in the CBA world have a Kurt Vonnegut epigram in the front?
I think this is going to be very, very funny.

 The Almost True Story of Ryan Fisher is the second sort of edgy, funny and ironic bit of pomo fiction that Zondervan has released, the other being My Name Is Russel Fink by Michael Snyder, which is the story of a twenty-something copier salesman who lives with his mom, dates an actress, hates his job, and has a clairvoyant basset hound named Sonny that is murdered. Christian fiction ain't what it used to be, I can tell ya that...

Stories, either rich and lovely memoirs, history (either told specifically around certain artifacts or told grandly around broad social themes) or novels, are, it is often said, what makes us tick.  We love stories, we read the Bible as a Story, we allow our lives to unfold as stories.  Even newer books on evangelism are about story theology and inviting folks into the Story of God.  Even jokes can illustrate how we all love a good story.  And then there's movies, the chief medium for storytelling in our time.

Which brings me to a very great summer read, a fun and well written book of stories, which, to be honest, deserves to be announced as a BookNotes Really Important Book.  Craig Detweiler has just released a substantial and refreshing new book on movies entitled Into the Dark: Seeing the Sacred in the Top Films of the 21st Century (Baker Academic; $18.99.)  It is in the fabulous series about which we've raved here before, a series called "cultural exegesis."    It is a very enjoyable book, very smart and, as much as I hate to break my lite summer tone here, is truly a very helpful contribution to our formation of the Christian mind, and a Christian assessment of the current contemporary context. (Preachers, pastors, teachers, parents, are you listening?)  He has, as the subtitle says, chosen arguably the most important films of our times and grouped them around themes, allowing God to speak in even the fiercest and funniest.  His methodology included studying the IMDb, the Internet Movie Database, to select the most influential contemporary films.

Detweiler dissects 45 films, from Little Miss Sunshine to Million Dollar Baby, from Shrek and The Incredibles to Big Fish and V for Vendetta.  Some of the biggest sections explore issues of identity (in Memento and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind), community (in films like Crash and Talk to Her) and hstory (Finding Neverland and Spirited Away.)  His insights are nearly brilliant at times and a wide array of Christian film critics and Hollywood workers have raved about it. Although he is deeply theological (his PhD is from Fuller) he is very open-minded and positive about the common grace of these popular and influential stories.

Dick Staub, host of the fabulous The Kindlings Muse, author of the wonderful The Culturally Savvy Christian, writes about Craig and his new book,

Soak a brain in billions of digital bytes of filmic splendor and an equal amount of dynamic theology, awaken it to the 'sudden and miraculous grace' available at the intersection of faith and film, and you've got Craig Detweiler's tour de force.  A brilliant, timely, and useful piece of work...

So, summer is a time to rent some movies, think and talk about them, maybe read some books about film, stories, or leisure.  Craig Detweiler's bit of "reel revelation" is a great addition to any library on the interface of film and faith, and a very mature guide to your movie viewing enjoyment.

And, lastly, speaking again of enjoyment this summer: check out Jesus Laughed: The 
Redemptive Power of Humor Robert Darden (Abingdon; $16.00.) I know I've written too much in this post and can only hope somebody has scrolled down here to the bottom and will see this.  This is a winner---one of the only books about the theology of humor (there are a few, I hope you know) that is, uh, actually funny.  Robert Darden is the Senior Editor of The Wittenburg Door, if that gives you a clue.  Come on, people, how cool is this? 

Tell me that you're going to mail one to the grumpiest person you know and I'll give you an extra discount. Heee,heeee.  Subversive humor. Mirth abounds, in all kinds of stories.  Enjoy.

The painting above is Paul Gauguin's Chair With Books and Candle by Vincent Van Gogh, painted in 1888.  I don't use a candle, unless I have to.

One or two folks said they enjoyed my random little fun list from the last post, naming some titles I'm just enjoying---not the heavy and incredibly important stuff that I've mentioned recently, urgent and wise work like Brian Walsh & Steven Bouma-Prediger's Beyond Homelessness, say, or the new Gary Haugen, Just Courage or Who Gets to Narrate the World by Robert Webber.  You know from former posts how seriously I believe we need to be reading these kinds of books.  It doesn't take much to encourage me to digress, though, so here are a few more miscellaneous suggestions that came to mind, books that are around our bedside, beside the couch, on the picnic table, even though it is too hot to read until late at night when I take a lamp out just to read outdoors.

I hope you've heard of Rapture Ready! Adventures in the Parallel Universe of Christian Pop Culture (St. Martin's; $25.00.) Daniel Radosh is a "secular liberal" who writes for GQ and The New Yorker and suchlike, who enters the conservative Christian subculture and writes well about it in ways that are unpredictable, funny and fun.  Some of it is very well-rendered, much of it spot on, and occasionally is surprisingly moving.  Even when he doesn't get it fully right, it is a good glimpse into the lives of many Americans, many of us, and is a joy-ride of a good story.  As A.J. Jacobs (author of The Know It All and the fabulous The Year of Living Biblically) puts it, "Everyone should read this book--with the possible exception of Stephen Baldwin [see page 143.]"  It would be perfect if you loved, as we did, the "outsiders" exploration of Christian rock,  Body Piercing Saved My Life: by Andrew Beaujon.  Great book!

One lesser known book which we are very proud to offer is Life in Body  put out by the House of Mercy (Cathedral Hill Press; $15.00.)  I hope you know the extraordinary voice--literally and writerly--of hipster emergent pastor Debbie Blue.  She sounds like Anne Lamott, but more so, and has a poet's sensibility, even in her spoken word delivery. (Here is a brilliant, brillant talk she gave at Houghton College on flesh.) The wildly creative faith community House of Mercy--which I first heard of at the very end of one of my all time favorite memoirs, The Jesus Sound Explosion by Mark Curtis Anderson (University of Georgia Press; $29.95)---has a little artsy publishing venture (along with a rockabilly recording studio.  Go figure.)  You may know of Russell Rathburn, who wrote the much-discussed, incredibly weird apocalyptic, comedic tragic novel Post Rapture Radio: Lost Writings From the Failed Revolution (Jossey Bass; $12.95.)  He's a pastor there, if it helps you get the picture. 

Ms Blue's stunning Sensual Orthodoxy (Cathedral Hill; $13.95) was her first book and it is insightful and beautiful and important, about embodiment, creation, humanness, goodness and such.  (A very literate and kind UCC pastor friend told me about her, having heard her read at the Calvin Festival of Faith and Writing, and opined that evangelicalism is in fine hands if she is any indication of the up and coming leaders and writers.)  Brazos Press published her next eloquent and provocative one, From Stone to Living Word: Letting the Bible Live Again ($16.99) which should be getting much more attention.  Life in Body seems to have her imprint upon it, although only one chapter is her own;  this is a marvelous collection of essays, memoir, Bible study and poetry, all around the theme of body image, the journey of our human experiences from birth to death.  Ragged and lovely, scary and moving, this is a "lit mag" kind of collection, hardly known, and exceptionally rewarding.  My daughter once gave me a collection of essays of writers from Minnesota and I was surprised at how good these common folk were, this odd admixture of upper mid-West rural populism, creativity and localism.  Upper mid-west writers rock and this book is a witness. 

I've been taken with the look and feel of the paperback memoir Virgin Time: In Search of the Contemplative Life by Patrician Hempl (North Point Press; $14.00) who is another writer from St. Paul, and have had it in my room for over a year, I think.  I read the first page this week and was instantly hooked, just thrilled by the giftedness of the writing. Wow.  I don't expect it to be as full of whimsy and pluck as Eat, Pray, Love but it surely is going to be a journey worth taking. 

I actually haven't finished Animal Vegetable Miracle: A Year of Food Life yet, and I hope to pick that back up;  the paperback has a nice textured cover and a good interview with Barbara Kingsolver.  I've been saying I'm going to read her early novel Animal Dreams this summer, and I hope I can get to it.  Do you know her earliest fiction, before Poisonwood Bible?  I think Bean Trees and Pigs in Heaven are among our all time favs--tremendously enjoyable.  I was glad to see Brian and Steve (in Beyond Homelessness) cite her essays from Small Wonders too.  It was our old pal and former worker Gordon Carpenter who first turned us on to her;  he and his fam lived near Tucson AZ so naturally became fans. Her first non-fiction collection was High Tide at Tucson and that, too, makes for great summer reading, enjoyable, smart and inspiring.

Want a fun book to have around to dip into whenever you're between novels or wanting to remind yourself (or others) about the power of fiction and creative writing?   Dale Brown has gifted us all with another fabulous collection of interviews (as he did years ago with Of Fiction and Faith) called Conversations with American Writers: The Doubt, the Faith, the In-Between (Eerdmans) $18.00.  It isn't the kind of book that chain Christian bookstores are likely to promote;  it probably is not seen as essential reading in theological bookstores, either (although we echo Eugene Peterson's oft-quoted comments about the importance of preachers reading fiction.)  Yet, this is remarkable, and we hope you can tell folks about it!  Here are conversations with David James Duncan, Ernest Gaines, Ron Hansen, Lee Smith, Jan Karon and others.  These are writers whose work wrestle with the sacred and Brown has listened well, reporting from this community of thoughtful storytellers who (whether they identify themselves as Christians or not) raise important questions about meaning, doubt and how art can sustain faith, even in unexpected ways.  Kudos to Dale Brown, former director of the famed Calvin Festival and now head of the Buechner Institute at King College in TN.

Speaking of Frederick Buechner, I suspect you know his three clever little books of short pieces, Peculiar Treasures: A Biblical Who's Who, Wishful Thinkers: A Seeker's ABC, and Whistling in the Dark: A Doubter's Dictionary have been combined, a few new entries added (to make 365), and released in a chunky one-a-day one volume book called Beyond Words: Daily Readings in the ABC's of Faith (Harper; $20.95.) I grabbed one from the shop last week and thought I'd start reading it a bit each day (I admit I've never read through all three, fully.)  Getting in a Buechner mindset will be helpful as we just got the brand new
release The Yellow Leaves: A Miscellany (Westminster/John Knox; $17.95.) You may recall, or have heard (I wouldn't have know!) that the line is taken from a Shakespeare sonnet, #73.  The book is a rare collection, various "leaves" left--fiction pieces, remixes and previously unreleased bits, a little memoir and some essay.  A must have for fans, and a nice intro for browsing if one is only a bit aware of his varied stylings.

I haven't started it, except for the afterward that starts out riffing on the popularity of "Bad to the Bone" by George Thorogood (which was even used in the Sponge Bob movie), but I've been eyeing up the latest collection of essays by one of the most literate guys on the planet, Alan Jacobs.  His latest is called Original Sin: A Cultural History (HarperOne; $24.95.)   It has garnered rave reviews from the likes of Buechner;  you have to love a Wheaton College prof who gets this said about his work  (by Alan Wolfe of Boston College): "I do not believe in original sin. I do believe in Alan Jacobs.  He is one of the smartest and wittiest writers around on matters involving religion and Original Sin is a gem"

Okay, everybody, take a long deep breath.  Hold it a bit.  Now go to the Hearts & Minds website page which is our monthly review column.  The June column is my telling of the work and seed-
sowing writing over the years of Tom Sine and his incredible importance.  His latest, The New Conspirators, is one I'm pretty jazzed about, and want to offer you this hefty review. Perhaps you might share it with someone who you think might find it helpful or interesting.  Thanks.

The deep breath together, by the way, is kind of a joke---a playful nod to a definition of conspiracy: "to breath together."  And, maybe an admission that my monthly columns are a bit longer than my blogs.  Take a deep breath.

And, if you are convinced that this would be a worthy addition to your library, or you want to have it to share with others, or consider for a reading group, you can order it here for $5 off.

Last week I posted a few times about various titles my wife and I are enjoying--history, humor, novels, memoir, alongside the important stuff we promote for more direct learning and serious Christian worldview formation.  I cited a few rare ones and a few fun ones that are kinda under the radar. And, I'm thinking I am going to read Truck: A Love Story by Michael Perry (Harper; $13.99) again, since he is a spectacular writer, and maybe something about outdoorsy stuff, hiking or wilderness, although I often get that bug in the early fall.  More great books keep coming into the shop each day, some that are exquisite and very richly written like Souls in the Hands of a Tender God: Stories of the Search for Home and Healing on the Streets by Craig Rennebohm (Beacon; $23.95) which is a very tender portrait of the mentally ill (and a passionate call for justice and grace.)  And there is the really interesting and fun romp pulling out the themes of faith and struggle, guilt and redemption, justice and hope,  through every one of the Boss' albums, The Gospel According to Bruce Springsteen: Rock and Redemption from Asbury Park to Magic by Jeffrey B. Symynkywicz (Westminster/John Knox; $16.95.)  Any Bruce fan has to get this one, as does anyone who wants ways into conversations about faith, values and popular culture    Late last night I started a brand new novel set in rural Appalachia, Dogwood, by Chris Fabry (Tyndale; $12.99.) It starts off with a pair of epigrams, one from Isak Dinesen and another by my man Jackson Browne so I had to see what this guy's up to.

Still, any quickie posts about fun stuff this summer would have to list a couple of odd albums, naming some of our soundtrack these days. You've read before that I listen to Indelible Grace a lot, and a month or so ago I did long reviews of some very rare recordings--if you haven't visited the May column at the website, please do.  Now, though,   I'd love to tell you briefly about some a few tha yo might not hear about otherwise.  CDs lay around our house almost as much as books, although my kids mostly use ipods.  I'm not so old school that I insist on vinyl, but I do love my CDs and their artwork and liner notes; I hate the idea of "downloading" a "song" without the full context.  Why not invest in a a couple of CDs before they start to disappear?  The lyrics and artwork and liner notes on these are nice, too.

So, here are a few unusual ones we are recommending these days.

Spring/Summer  Jon Foreman  (Credential) $13.99  I love Switchfoot, and have a bunch of reasons to respect them, not the least of which is the powerful, thoughtful, allusive, rowdy, moving rock music. Their frontman, Jon Foreman, recently recorded a set of four very acoustic, nearly unplugged, solo sets, each for one season of the year. (They are not all that much about that season, but apparently a chronicle of his life's journey over a year.)  The first pair, Fall and Winter, came out a while back, and the second set is now available.  I'll tell ya what: a few of these jangling, whiny solo pieces are absolutely beautiful;  I keep hitting replay on a few of the songs while driving around in the car.  His setting of the 23rd Psalm is alone worth the price of the album (and has Sarah Mason singing, which is stunning in its understated alt-country simplicity.)  Foreman and his pals do a great song that incorporates the Lord's Prayer ("Your Love is Strong"), full of angst and bohemian sighs and longing and hope.  These two sets of short double albums have some great guitar work and his cool vocals, stuff from his own seasons of life, a few pretty overtly praise songs, a bit of pain, some sweetness, deep faith and some odd-ball hip arrangements (the Sufjan effect, I'd call it, what with the horns and hammer dulcimer and Eastern European tempos) that really, really work.  I love this, especially, now, Spring and Summer.   Highly recommended.

In The Name of Love: Africa Celebrates U2 various (Shout) $18.99 Okay, I'm a sucker for cover versions of stuff, and even bought the CCM cover disc of u2 songs a few years ago, knowing I'd only love few tracks of it.  (I've got a wonderful recording of all Bruce Cockburn songs by Steve Bell, My Dinner With Bruce, which is pretty darn cool.  Nanci Griffith did a whole album of covers that I like, I've raved to friends about The Band cover album--imagine Death Cab doing The Band!--and I one of my all time favorite albums is the Mark Heard tribute and we love the soundtrack to I Am Sam which has some wonderful version of Beatles songs, but I digress.)  But this, this is something else indeed.  This is a collection of well known, mostly recent, U2 songs done by 10 different African pop bands, produced as a fund raiser for The Global Fund.  A few have a fairly typically Western rock feel, versions pretty faithful to the original, just sung with a way cool accent and the bold bass lines that Graceland introduced to the pop music scene here.  Others are in native tongues, if still done in a pretty rock style, even though there are some unusual instruments being used.  (Nothing is quite like, say, Ladysmith Black Mombazo, really, if you wondered.)  Bands include the famous Sierra Leon Refugee Allstars, the Soweto Gospel Choir,  Waldemar Bastos, Les Nubians, Anglique Kidjo, Vieux Farka Toure, Cheikh Lo, and others...Wow.

This is fun, fun, fun, and at times really moving.  I won't lie to you: one song made me shed a tear or two, too.  Rolling Stone is right to say, that, as a tribute to Bono's work for Africa,  it is a "rootsy thank-you, not a world-music cheesefest."  Still, it is a nice way into the world music scene alongside all those cool Patamayo recordings we sell. 

Deconstruction Justin McRoberts (Justin McRoberts) $12.95  Oh, man, I am so glad I got to know this guy a bit, as we've sold a few of his albums in the shop before, and is pretty highly regarded in the younger singer-songwriter circuit;  he's also done some cool stuff with Young Life camps, and is a hit on the Christian college coffeehouse circuit.  Having heard him do a live show this past fall, and watching him lead worship at a college ministry event, I was amazingly taken, even more so as I got to know a bit about he and his wife and their urban ministry work in San Fran.  He's ordered some books from us and I realize he is a deep thinker, a serious activist, a fun and funny guy, and an artist of considerable depth.  (Who else has written a song inspired by writer Jonathan Kozol?)  Songs like "A Hope Deferred" and "America and the Soul" give a hint that this is an album with more than typical religious clichés.  Here, he does his thoughtful acoustic singer-songwriter stuff, with a voice that won't quit, deep and melodious, rough and gritty, soulful at times, almost booming like Bono (and that is not a cheap comparison.) Most of Justin's songs belie a deep seriousness about faith and doubt and struggle and art and excellence; a few could be used in particularly creative worship services.  (The lyrics to the song somebody judged or turned away by church, also about taking communion, "On the Night You Were Betrayed", just blew me away and I am sure it could be played in worship or in conversational settings to great benefit, for those who have the guts.)  Justin covers one of my favorite Patti Griffin songs, too, "When it Don't Come Easy" and does so with a great vibe and a very strong vocal performance.  We have a batch of these CDs to sell here in the store, and I'd love for you to know about him.  Buy Deconstruction now, and you won't regret it--and you'll be supporting  indie music, too.  Check out his really cool website (but come on back to H&M.) Thanks!

Ultimate Vivaldi: The Essential Masterpieces  (Decca) $18.00 Okay folks, check this out: five discs.  There are Wind Concertos, Cello Concertos, Guitar Concertos, Four Seasons and the Gloria and more.  Performances by the likes of the Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and conductors as esteemed as Iona Brown.  Here's the deal:  Decca has done these five volume sets for just $18.00 and they've released 5-disc sets of "ultimate" essentials for all the greats: Mozart, Chopin, Bach, Beethoven, Tchychovski, Handel, Rachmaninoff...which should I open next?  I can't afford 'em all, but a few are, well, almost essential.  Having picnics or garden parties or sleep-overs this summer?  Wanting a chill-out mood for reading?  Hey, these tunes aren't called Masterpieces for nothing.