The Typepad Help Team are working on the problem of the sidebar feature where I usually list the Current Reading items. I'm being patient with them, because they are trying to fix a glitch and it is proving to be an obstinate glitch, and because they are courteous, quick to respond and work hard!
So just to keep the rolling catalogue up to date, here's some of the books I've recently read or am currently reading:
When I was a Child I Read Books, by Marilynne Robinson. This has been reviewed with enthusiasm elsewhere. My enthusiasm is for some of the essays, but some of them seem less urgent and relevant. But with Robinson that means the least appealing are very good, the good ones are brilliant, and two in particular are stand out pieces of Christian theological writing. Austerity and Ideology is as sharp a critique of penalising the poor by political fiat as you will read; and Wondrous Love is an equally astringent critique of the poor stewardship of Christians entrusted with a Gospel of love but preferring a Gospel much more self-centred.
The Mangan Inheritance, Brian Moore, is a novel I have re-read twenty years after the first read. I didn't enjoy it as much second time round. A washed up American returning to Ireland to try to trace the connection between himself and Mangan a famous and notoriously debauched poet. It may be the changed world of 20 years on, maybe I've become more morally sensitised, but the plot left me feeling the way I do when I watch a TV programme and find myself viewing something unpleasant I wish I'd been warned about beforehand.
Why Go To Church by Timothy Radcliffe is a very good book. I read it over a few weeks, a bit at a time. Sensible, spiritually alert, learned without showing off, pastorally realistic, he is one of the best writers of popular theology around – and by the way popular doesn'r mean dumbed down. After scathing preachers who think they are the most important part of the sermon, this:"Our words should gather in and heal. They belong to our discovery of the mystery of God's will to unite all things in heaven and on earth in Christ. Preaching makes peace." Oh yes!
Edith Stein. The Essential Writings, Ed. John Sullivan. This is in the series Modern Spiritual Masters – the irony of that gender exclusive name for the series is the more obvious, but I suppose Modern Spiritual Mistresses wouldn't be much of an improvement. Maybe Modern Spiritual Thinkers? Anyhow. I've only recently paid attention to the writing of Edith Stein (because of a connection with A J Heschel in a recently published book). Someone who rubbed shoulders with leading Catholic and Jewish intellectuals became herself a philosophical theologian of a contemplative disposition whose practical Christian service earthed deepest thought in daily realities. I like her.
Frederick Dale Bruner, The Gospel of John. This is the most remarkable commentary! I knew it w3ould be for I've used his two volume Matthew commentary for years. This would justify a year in the company of John's Gospel, stimulated by a commentary that is neither technical nor popular, which engages in historico- critical exegesis but pays attention to the reception of the Gospel and the history of interpretation. And Bruner loves this text – Augustine, Aquinas, Chrysostom, Luther, Calvin, Bengel, Matthew Henry and other classics are brought into conversation with the dozen or so best commentaries of the last hundred years. I don't use the word often, indeed I don't like the way it overstates everything – but in this case I use it advisedly – Bruner's work is awesome!
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