Saving Paradise: How Christianity Traded Love of This World for Crucifixion and Empire, by Rita Nakashima Brock and Rebecca Ann Parker. Beacon Press, 2008. Pb., 552 pp., $34.95.
Hot, Flat and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution — And How It Can Renew America, by Thomas L. Friedman. Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008. Hb., 448 pp. $27.95
What happens when the celebration is over? When the fire has gone out and the food consumed; when the singing is over and silence descends upon the room, what happens in the morning? And not just the next morning but all the other mornings that come with ordinary regularity.
Feasting on the Word: Preaching the Revised Common Lectionary, Year B, Volume 1 (Advent through Transfiguration), edited by David L. Bartlett and Barbara Brown Taylor. WJKP, 2008. Hb., 463 pp. $39.99.
Christianity’s Dangerous Idea: The Protestant Revolution — A History from the Sixteenth Century to the Twenty-First, by Alister McGrath. HarperOne, 2007. Hb., 560 pp. $29.95.
Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy by Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt, and David L. Weaver-Zercher. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.: 2007. Hb., 203 pp., $24.95.
The Great Awakening: Reviving Faith and Politics in a Post-Religious Right America, by Jim Wallis. HarperOne, 2008. Hb., 352 pp. $25.95.
Before you read the first word of Jim Wallis’ transformative new book, you know something is different. Lined up like a political and theological renewal of the old television show The Odd Couple are names we know separately as representatives of vastly different worldviews.
Picturing Christian Witness: New Testament Images of Disciples in Mission, by Stanley H. Skreslet. William B. Eerdmans, 2006. ISBN 0802829562. Pb., 263 pp. $24.
In his book Imagining a Sermon (Abingdon, 1990), Tom Troeger suggests a marvelous image for readers in the church. He pictures the shelves of a pastor’s study as a “city,” the residents of whom are the authors of the books whom the pastor engages in conversation through reading.
This book is certain both to challenge and to enrich our preaching. J. Barrie Shepherd is both a poet and a preacher and so it is not surprising that his writing is more intuitive than analytic and more metaphorical than argumentative.
The liturgical renewal movement produced significant changes to the worship patterns of Roman Catholic and mainline Protestant congregations during the last fifty years. For Presbyterians, increase in communion frequency, recovery of a fuller liturgical year, and the use of the Revised Common Lectionary all serve as major milestones on the road to a richer worship life. In the midst of fairly rapid changes in worship practice, a fuller theology and practice of baptism has remained elusive.
Ten years ago I moved from a different part of the country to northern New Jersey, within easy commuting distance of New York City. Needless to say, the context of ministry changed dramatically for me. New Jersey is one of the most diverse and densely populated states in the country. Formerly, an interfaith marriage meant a Roman Catholic and a Protestant. Now, there are many Christian-Jewish and Christian-Muslim marriages in the congregation. The local clergy association includes Christians, Jews, Buddhists, and others.
