Though always an avid reader, I especially bulk up on books during the summer. Last summer was slim pickings. Even a book by an author I admired was a disappointment (my precious book budget! Wasted!! Umberto Eco's The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, if you are curious). But this year was excellent. I've had a long string of enjoyable readings.
Here's the most memorable:
The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. Yep, it's a vampire book, which isn't my thing. But it's also a well-written, moderately academic novel that mixes intriguing history, colorful descriptions of placed I'd love to visit (Eastern Europe), compelling characters, and the right amount of suspence.
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. Wow, this book is amazing. It has a clever overall design: 5 individual stories that interrupt each other, progressing in time from the 1800s to the future, and then resolving in backwards order. The stories at first seem unrelated, than related by minor, superficial things, and then suddenly it strikes you what they have in common: how powerfully they illustrate that civilization is uncivil and that we are doomed to oppress or be oppressed unless we learn to recognize this.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro. The most interesting thing about this book is that everything seems so normal, including that the book supposedly takes place now, but that the characters have a futuristic, spooky role in our society. The toughest part for me was their acceptance of this role as inevitable. Following right on the heels of Cloud Atlas in my reading list, it was especially powerful.
The Real Inspector Hound by Tom Stoppard. An older play by a playwright I really, really admire. This quick read during a rainy camping trip was a treat, particularly since it accurately and hilariously spoofed the country house murder mystery genre that I've always enjoyed on rainy days.
An Instance of the Fingerpost by Iain Pears. More on this later. The kids need attention.
Wednesday, August 30, 2006
Sunday, July 09, 2006
When Bad Arguments Go Well
As last shared (The Big Crutch in the Sky), I actually managed to have a spiritual discussion with friends -- not an easy or comfortable thing. And it wasn't very satisfying, since my arguments didn't seem nearly as powerful as my conviction that God is real. God's existence just can't be rationally explained -- if it could, then all rational people would believe in God and faith would be unnecessary. Believing in God would be like believing in gravity.
Fortunately, changes in people's hearts don't depend on human arguments. Case in point: one of my friends who was following the discussion told me several days later that she discussed the conversation with her husband and that they are interested in attending church. THANK YOU, HOLY SPIRIT! Whew, I'm glad it's not up to me -- too stressful.
Someday I'll ask her (if I get up the nerve again) what exactly she and her husband discussed. After all, some arguments that I didn't mention in the last entry were quite secular. For example, a parent might want to consider sending his/her child to church because:
1. Great literature is full of Biblical references, and you aren't going to learn the stories, names, etc. in public school, where it's considered too controversial
2. Where else is a very young child exposed to such abstract thinking? My preschool-aged son is learning the concepts of allegories and allusions at a young age and is thinking about matters beyond the alphabet, number, and waiting his turn (eg, mortality, faith).
Hopefully, these weren't the arguments that convinced her. I suppose they could get someone in the door though. Added to this could be the moral grounding issue, though I hate to argue that, since morality should be a response to faith rather than an empty practice (something that you just do because God or your mom says so).
Fortunately, changes in people's hearts don't depend on human arguments. Case in point: one of my friends who was following the discussion told me several days later that she discussed the conversation with her husband and that they are interested in attending church. THANK YOU, HOLY SPIRIT! Whew, I'm glad it's not up to me -- too stressful.
Someday I'll ask her (if I get up the nerve again) what exactly she and her husband discussed. After all, some arguments that I didn't mention in the last entry were quite secular. For example, a parent might want to consider sending his/her child to church because:
1. Great literature is full of Biblical references, and you aren't going to learn the stories, names, etc. in public school, where it's considered too controversial
2. Where else is a very young child exposed to such abstract thinking? My preschool-aged son is learning the concepts of allegories and allusions at a young age and is thinking about matters beyond the alphabet, number, and waiting his turn (eg, mortality, faith).
Hopefully, these weren't the arguments that convinced her. I suppose they could get someone in the door though. Added to this could be the moral grounding issue, though I hate to argue that, since morality should be a response to faith rather than an empty practice (something that you just do because God or your mom says so).
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
The Big Crutch in the Sky
I just had a religious discussion with a group of friends of mixed faith, from agnostic to Jewish to Christian. An atheist in the group was talking about how she agreed with her father that religion is just a crutch. Of course, I made all my best counter arguments alone in the car on the way home. Here they are, for potential future use:
1. The world is really messed up and isn't improving. You need only read the newspaper to know that. But add to that thoughts of your own impending death, not a happy thought (only hopefully not a constant thought) but an inevitable occurrence that we all have to face someday.
2. Under these circumstances, why not have a crutch? A crutch is something that that helps you get by in the world. Heck, why not have lots of crutches?
3. So, yes, belief in God could be viewed as a crutch because it helps one get by in this world messed up life.
4. But look what else could be considered a crutch. Couldn't a group of mommy friends be viewed as a crutch in that light, letting us share our frustrations and support one another as parents? Likewise for comfort foods, spouses, jobs, parents, and thousands of aspects of human survival. Using a crutch in this sense, then, isn't something of which to be ashamed. It's normal and healthy.
5. Also, being a crutch makes it no less valid or true. A crutch is something to lean on when you need help. If God exists, isn't He the ultimate being to lean on? So you can't make the argument that God doesn't exist simply because "weak" people rely on Him. Regardless of whether or not He exists, weak people will rely on Him.
6. Finally, look at the other options. In a messed-up world with your own death imminent, which option would you pick as the most rational:
Option A- do it on your own, or
Option B- partner with an all-powerful, all-knowing God who designed the world, cares about/for it, knows how it ends, AND has your best interest in mind?
Really, even if God weren't real, it would simply make more sense to assume He is, just to be on the safe side. After all, if He didn't exist, you just get snuffed out with no consequences for having been so "weak". But if He does exist, you've got yourself a spot in eternal life!
1. The world is really messed up and isn't improving. You need only read the newspaper to know that. But add to that thoughts of your own impending death, not a happy thought (only hopefully not a constant thought) but an inevitable occurrence that we all have to face someday.
2. Under these circumstances, why not have a crutch? A crutch is something that that helps you get by in the world. Heck, why not have lots of crutches?
3. So, yes, belief in God could be viewed as a crutch because it helps one get by in this world messed up life.
4. But look what else could be considered a crutch. Couldn't a group of mommy friends be viewed as a crutch in that light, letting us share our frustrations and support one another as parents? Likewise for comfort foods, spouses, jobs, parents, and thousands of aspects of human survival. Using a crutch in this sense, then, isn't something of which to be ashamed. It's normal and healthy.
5. Also, being a crutch makes it no less valid or true. A crutch is something to lean on when you need help. If God exists, isn't He the ultimate being to lean on? So you can't make the argument that God doesn't exist simply because "weak" people rely on Him. Regardless of whether or not He exists, weak people will rely on Him.
6. Finally, look at the other options. In a messed-up world with your own death imminent, which option would you pick as the most rational:
Option A- do it on your own, or
Option B- partner with an all-powerful, all-knowing God who designed the world, cares about/for it, knows how it ends, AND has your best interest in mind?
Really, even if God weren't real, it would simply make more sense to assume He is, just to be on the safe side. After all, if He didn't exist, you just get snuffed out with no consequences for having been so "weak". But if He does exist, you've got yourself a spot in eternal life!
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
What Was I Thinking? Queen Esther's 1970's Pants Suit
My mother just sent me the Bible story book that our family read when we kids were very young. I think she gave it to me, rather than any of my 4 sisters, because of the famous family story about my misunderstanding of which drawing went with which story. Here's the illustration of the story of Jesus' birth. You see Baby Jesus sleeping in an elaborate purple-and-red manger. 
For unknown reasons (the long eyelashes??), I thought this was supposed to be the beautiful Queen Esther. As a child of the '70s, the manger looked like a typical pants suit. But I never quite understood why everyone thought Queen Esther was so beautiful. Her head and arms certainly aren't proportional. Oddly, it didn't phase me that she has hay sticking out of her sides (unruly belly hair??).
I won't mention how old I was before finally realizing this is Baby Jesus...
Now here's the drawing that really illustrates the Queen Esther story, showing Esther between the king and Haman. Much better, eh? I'm sure a banquet with her would be much more appetizing to the king and his favorite advisor than a banquet with the "other" Esther.
(Little Ones Listen to God. Written by Martha Hook; illustrated by Tinka Boren. 1971. Zondervan Publishing House. Grand Rapids, MI.)
For unknown reasons (the long eyelashes??), I thought this was supposed to be the beautiful Queen Esther. As a child of the '70s, the manger looked like a typical pants suit. But I never quite understood why everyone thought Queen Esther was so beautiful. Her head and arms certainly aren't proportional. Oddly, it didn't phase me that she has hay sticking out of her sides (unruly belly hair??).
I won't mention how old I was before finally realizing this is Baby Jesus...
Now here's the drawing that really illustrates the Queen Esther story, showing Esther between the king and Haman. Much better, eh? I'm sure a banquet with her would be much more appetizing to the king and his favorite advisor than a banquet with the "other" Esther.
(Little Ones Listen to God. Written by Martha Hook; illustrated by Tinka Boren. 1971. Zondervan Publishing House. Grand Rapids, MI.)
Thursday, March 02, 2006
The Bible in a Year: 3 months down
I've challenged myself to read the entire Bible in the course of a year, starting January 1, 2006. My expectations were that I wouldn't make it more than a few well-intentioned weeks. But, other than a vacation week in a Hilton with no Bible (who would have thought?), I've been keeping up well and enjoying my reading.
The best part has been re-reading some Bible stories I hadn't heard in many years. I'm also getting a more "global" perspective of the text, rediscovering some interesting thoughts I wrote in my Bible years ago, and found parts I don't remember hearing before. [Example: Judges 12:5-7, Israelite tribesmen use a regional accent Shibboleth/Sibboleth to distinguish between friend and enemy]. My daily readings also have not been as time-consuming as I expected.
Since a blog is a good format for tracking my thoughts, I'll write some down as I read. Here are some thoughts from the past few months that have stuck with me. I'm using a method published on www.christiananswers.net that divides the text in such a way that each week has one reading from each of seven categories: law, history, psalms, poetry, prophecy, gospels, epistles.
On January 1, I obviously read the beginning of Genesis. I was struck by a note in my Bible margin by Genesis 3:21, right after The Fall and God's curse on man, woman, and the serpent. "The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them."
My first thought had always been God's loving care for their needs even after such loss and disappointment. But my margin note isn't about the love and care but about the horror of the situation. Imagine what it must have been like for Adam and Eve, vegetarians up until this point (Gen. 1:29; 2:16), to see an animal killed because of their sins. It's disturbing on several levels. First, up until now, they had been responsible for naming and caring for animals, so it's striking that one of their "subjects" is killed. It may have even been an animal they knew individually. Also, they had probably never witnessed death before, much less been responsible for it. It's hard to imagine trying to fathom death for the first time and coming face-to-face with their own mortality. Not only that but now they knew that they would need to regularly kill animals for food, clothing, and sin offerings to God. I can't imagine watching it die (to learn how) and then having to wear its dead parts to survive themselves. And all of these horrors are dwarfed by knowing they had brought this upon themselves by disobeying God and that they would be separated from God on account of their sin. Then remember that it's only a matter of a few verses before the first murder, one of their sons kills their other son. Now death is even more horrible and the killing turns to murder. (Another note in my Bible at Gen. 4:23-24 comments on how murder is taken a step further by Lamech, Cain's great-great-etc-grandson, who boasts of murdering someone.)
Whew! Happily, there are new testament and psalms readings each week too...
The best part has been re-reading some Bible stories I hadn't heard in many years. I'm also getting a more "global" perspective of the text, rediscovering some interesting thoughts I wrote in my Bible years ago, and found parts I don't remember hearing before. [Example: Judges 12:5-7, Israelite tribesmen use a regional accent Shibboleth/Sibboleth to distinguish between friend and enemy]. My daily readings also have not been as time-consuming as I expected.
Since a blog is a good format for tracking my thoughts, I'll write some down as I read. Here are some thoughts from the past few months that have stuck with me. I'm using a method published on www.christiananswers.net that divides the text in such a way that each week has one reading from each of seven categories: law, history, psalms, poetry, prophecy, gospels, epistles.
On January 1, I obviously read the beginning of Genesis. I was struck by a note in my Bible margin by Genesis 3:21, right after The Fall and God's curse on man, woman, and the serpent. "The LORD God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife and clothed them."
My first thought had always been God's loving care for their needs even after such loss and disappointment. But my margin note isn't about the love and care but about the horror of the situation. Imagine what it must have been like for Adam and Eve, vegetarians up until this point (Gen. 1:29; 2:16), to see an animal killed because of their sins. It's disturbing on several levels. First, up until now, they had been responsible for naming and caring for animals, so it's striking that one of their "subjects" is killed. It may have even been an animal they knew individually. Also, they had probably never witnessed death before, much less been responsible for it. It's hard to imagine trying to fathom death for the first time and coming face-to-face with their own mortality. Not only that but now they knew that they would need to regularly kill animals for food, clothing, and sin offerings to God. I can't imagine watching it die (to learn how) and then having to wear its dead parts to survive themselves. And all of these horrors are dwarfed by knowing they had brought this upon themselves by disobeying God and that they would be separated from God on account of their sin. Then remember that it's only a matter of a few verses before the first murder, one of their sons kills their other son. Now death is even more horrible and the killing turns to murder. (Another note in my Bible at Gen. 4:23-24 comments on how murder is taken a step further by Lamech, Cain's great-great-etc-grandson, who boasts of murdering someone.)
Whew! Happily, there are new testament and psalms readings each week too...
Friday, February 17, 2006
Two deep thoughts
Here are two things I've been thinking about that came from books read recently. The common thread is that they both have altered my thoughts on basic spiritual issues.
The first is again from Gilead, based on an observation of the main character while watching his son's cat. My adaptation is goes like this: A human trying to understand God's mind and workings in the world is like a cat trying to understand the political situation of the Middle East.
It sounds silly and simple, I know. But the part that strikes me about this analogy is that a cat doesn't even have the language or the understanding to get the underlying concepts (not even that a location could exist so far removed from the cat), much less the intricacies and complexities. There is nothing wrong with cats; they have enough understanding to thrive in their little cat lives. But there is nothing like Middle Eastern politics in the cat's world to help it grasp the subject matter. It's impossible.
If this analogy is correct, than it's no wonder that so many spiritual concepts seem contradictory or nonsensical. We just don't get it, and we are not even in the ballpark for grasping the basic elements essential to understanding God's big picture. In fact, it's comforting to have a God is so far ahead of us intellectually -- a God we perfectly understood would not be that much smarter than us, and so we might as well worship ourselves instead (as so some do).
The second comes from a book whose name and author escape me. I'll add it later. "Heaven" is described as a place where everyone goes when they die. It's a place of all virtue and goodness and beauty because it's in the presence of God. So, if you lived your life loving and worshiping God and growing in virtue, then you will love heaven. However, if you lived your life hating/rejecting God and not learning love, joy, peace, kindness, etc., then you will be miserable -- you'll be in hell.
Regardless of whether or not this is actually true, I like thinking about this concept because it shows that the goal isn't just to get into heaven. It's not a "you're-in-or-you're-out" situation, as most people think, in which you need to reach some threshhold of virtue to get into heaven. Rather, how you life on earth directly coorelates to what your experience in the afterlife will be. The more in tune your life is with God's will through loving Him and holy living, the more prepared you are to enjoy the afterlife with God. Worded differently, you are rewarded in heaven according to how much you learned on earth. Hell, then, wouldn't be a physical separation from God but a complete and painful disconnect. In some ways, that's more painful than physical separation: an analogy being a troubled marriage in which living together is more painful than separating.
[As an aside, I thought this concept of different "degrees" of heaven was Biblical (inspiration for Dante's Paradise and the term "seventh heaven"), but my NIV Study Bible footnote on II Corinthians 12:2, in which Paul describes a man "caught up to the third heaven", says "third heaven" just distinguishes the spiritual heaven from the physical heavens containing stars and so forth. I'll have to do more searching on this topic.]
Both these "deep thoughts" also explain why Christianity and rational intelligence don't correlate. You need not be smart or understand God's purpose for your life or humanity. (1) No matter how smart you are, it's impossible. In fact, intelligence can be a hinder, if you think you are smart enough to attempt understanding God. Those for whom life is regularly a mystery do not have to overcome the need to know before accepting (faith). (2) Anyone can live a virtuous life, regardless of intelligence. You don't need to understand more theology to love God more. You just need to practice love of God and others in your daily life.
The first is again from Gilead, based on an observation of the main character while watching his son's cat. My adaptation is goes like this: A human trying to understand God's mind and workings in the world is like a cat trying to understand the political situation of the Middle East.
It sounds silly and simple, I know. But the part that strikes me about this analogy is that a cat doesn't even have the language or the understanding to get the underlying concepts (not even that a location could exist so far removed from the cat), much less the intricacies and complexities. There is nothing wrong with cats; they have enough understanding to thrive in their little cat lives. But there is nothing like Middle Eastern politics in the cat's world to help it grasp the subject matter. It's impossible.
If this analogy is correct, than it's no wonder that so many spiritual concepts seem contradictory or nonsensical. We just don't get it, and we are not even in the ballpark for grasping the basic elements essential to understanding God's big picture. In fact, it's comforting to have a God is so far ahead of us intellectually -- a God we perfectly understood would not be that much smarter than us, and so we might as well worship ourselves instead (as so some do).
The second comes from a book whose name and author escape me. I'll add it later. "Heaven" is described as a place where everyone goes when they die. It's a place of all virtue and goodness and beauty because it's in the presence of God. So, if you lived your life loving and worshiping God and growing in virtue, then you will love heaven. However, if you lived your life hating/rejecting God and not learning love, joy, peace, kindness, etc., then you will be miserable -- you'll be in hell.
Regardless of whether or not this is actually true, I like thinking about this concept because it shows that the goal isn't just to get into heaven. It's not a "you're-in-or-you're-out" situation, as most people think, in which you need to reach some threshhold of virtue to get into heaven. Rather, how you life on earth directly coorelates to what your experience in the afterlife will be. The more in tune your life is with God's will through loving Him and holy living, the more prepared you are to enjoy the afterlife with God. Worded differently, you are rewarded in heaven according to how much you learned on earth. Hell, then, wouldn't be a physical separation from God but a complete and painful disconnect. In some ways, that's more painful than physical separation: an analogy being a troubled marriage in which living together is more painful than separating.
[As an aside, I thought this concept of different "degrees" of heaven was Biblical (inspiration for Dante's Paradise and the term "seventh heaven"), but my NIV Study Bible footnote on II Corinthians 12:2, in which Paul describes a man "caught up to the third heaven", says "third heaven" just distinguishes the spiritual heaven from the physical heavens containing stars and so forth. I'll have to do more searching on this topic.]
Both these "deep thoughts" also explain why Christianity and rational intelligence don't correlate. You need not be smart or understand God's purpose for your life or humanity. (1) No matter how smart you are, it's impossible. In fact, intelligence can be a hinder, if you think you are smart enough to attempt understanding God. Those for whom life is regularly a mystery do not have to overcome the need to know before accepting (faith). (2) Anyone can live a virtuous life, regardless of intelligence. You don't need to understand more theology to love God more. You just need to practice love of God and others in your daily life.
Thursday, February 09, 2006
A trip into The Valley of the Shadow
I haven't written in over a month because things got too tough to write about. (There's the proof that I'll never be a "real" writer, if I ever needed proof.) The unexpected baby is no longer to be expected at all. It was a long, tough ordeal, knowing for several weeks that the child in me was dying. And then there's the guilt from knowing that it hadn't initially been wanted anyway. But the worst is the sense of losing someone who was special and whom I would have loved to know.
It's ironic that few people know that I had this miscarriage, and yet I feel strongly that women should discuss miscarriage more openly. Losing a baby during pregnancy is far more common than anyone is willing to admit. And, coming from a family of 5 healthy children (and married to someone from a family of 4 healthy children), I never imagined that 2 of 4 my pregnancies might end in loss. After the fact, I learned that both aunts, a cousin, and my grandmother on one side of the family all had multiple miscarriages. Going through mine alone, before learning what a large company I was in, was tough. Are we ashamed? Irrationally, I do feel a sense of failure, vaguely feeling that my body did something wrong or wasn't capable of something important and maternal.
When my very first pregnancy ended at 3 months almost 4 years ago, the shock was unbelievable. Everything had been fine at the first ultrasound, and I had enough nausea, food aversions, and exhaustion to warrant several babies. There was no hint of anything being amiss. I still can picture everything that happened the day I found out and I still have those emotions when I recall the experience. I cried every day for 3 months afterwards and thought about my baby every day for several months beyond that. Holding my first child 14 months later is the only thing that fully healed me.
This recent miscarriage was the opposite in many respects: the pregnancy was the unexpected part and the miscarriage no surprise. It was a prolonged horror of a wait, knowing that my symptoms were too weak and the ultrasound results were bad news. Most of the mourning was completed during the pregnancy instead of after it. The rest came out with the "pregnancy products" (did they really call my baby that??) as I lay unanesthetized on an exam table in the doctor's office in serious pain -- physical and emotional.
On the day of the first ultrasound last month showing that all was not well, my 3-yr-old son, who didn't even know of the pregnancy, asked me why God sends babies down from heaven instead of keeping them with Him. Darling, He DOES choose to keep some babies with Him. Blessed child!
How strange that this mother of 2 will be a mother of 4 when I get there too.
It's ironic that few people know that I had this miscarriage, and yet I feel strongly that women should discuss miscarriage more openly. Losing a baby during pregnancy is far more common than anyone is willing to admit. And, coming from a family of 5 healthy children (and married to someone from a family of 4 healthy children), I never imagined that 2 of 4 my pregnancies might end in loss. After the fact, I learned that both aunts, a cousin, and my grandmother on one side of the family all had multiple miscarriages. Going through mine alone, before learning what a large company I was in, was tough. Are we ashamed? Irrationally, I do feel a sense of failure, vaguely feeling that my body did something wrong or wasn't capable of something important and maternal.
When my very first pregnancy ended at 3 months almost 4 years ago, the shock was unbelievable. Everything had been fine at the first ultrasound, and I had enough nausea, food aversions, and exhaustion to warrant several babies. There was no hint of anything being amiss. I still can picture everything that happened the day I found out and I still have those emotions when I recall the experience. I cried every day for 3 months afterwards and thought about my baby every day for several months beyond that. Holding my first child 14 months later is the only thing that fully healed me.
This recent miscarriage was the opposite in many respects: the pregnancy was the unexpected part and the miscarriage no surprise. It was a prolonged horror of a wait, knowing that my symptoms were too weak and the ultrasound results were bad news. Most of the mourning was completed during the pregnancy instead of after it. The rest came out with the "pregnancy products" (did they really call my baby that??) as I lay unanesthetized on an exam table in the doctor's office in serious pain -- physical and emotional.
On the day of the first ultrasound last month showing that all was not well, my 3-yr-old son, who didn't even know of the pregnancy, asked me why God sends babies down from heaven instead of keeping them with Him. Darling, He DOES choose to keep some babies with Him. Blessed child!
How strange that this mother of 2 will be a mother of 4 when I get there too.
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