I hope to be writing here again but till then I’d love for you to join me there.

Lent creeps up on me every year.  Or well the last couple years when I’ve wanted to observe it.  I know it’s coming but for some reason I always feel surprised by it.

I’ve only been to one Ash Wednesday service in my life.   My church is not a traditional church, at least not the kind of traditions that involve a bowl of ash and a priest (just don’t mess with when we take the offering).  And I didn’t grow up in a church that looked favorably on such rituals.  I failed this year to find out soon enough if the Anglican church I sporadically attend had a service again this year and the time.  To be honest given my daughter’s low-grade fever (which every doctor says can’t be because of teething but the chunks missing from her book and the drool bath her kitty has received today say otherwise) and my current emotional state, I’m not sure I would have gone if I had found out in time.

My “want-to” seems a little off kilter.

It’s ironic that I feel this way given the point of Lent, or at least one of the purposes of Lent is to sacrifice, to get outside my own self-indulgence.  To not do or do something because of how it makes me feel.

But this is where I am at on the Jessica calendar and unfortunately, my mood isn’t lining up with the church calendar.

Perhaps that is why Lent is 40 days long.  It takes us that long to orient ourselves to what is going on.  It takes us that long to get outside our self and realign with something other than the self.

That something other being God in flesh and spirit, Christ and Holy Ghost (I know that’s old school but it fits so nicely here).

There is a sense of something larger-than-life that beckons us.  Devoted members of the liturgical church find they are not alone this time of year as curious former Pentecostals and Evangelicals join them with ash-covered foreheads and the most slack parish member feels compelled to give up something, even if the motives are rooted in tradition, curiousity or manipulation dressed in “church-going” clothes.

Lent tells us that there is more.  It’s just around the bend.

But … but we must be more.

We hear that.

We know it in that “throat-in-your-gut” way.

“To become all that we are meant to be, we must learn to become a little less than we demand to be” ¹

That’s a heavy phrase.  One that deserves to be twisted and turned around for awhile.  Maybe this is why Lent starts with Ash Wednesday, with putting ashes on your forehead and being told “Remember you are dust and to dust you shall return.”  We are reminded that we have fallen and the outcome of that fall is death.  We cannot escape it.  All of humanity has went the way of death and we will too.  It is our fate.  It is the only sure destiny we have.  

We are not gods.  We are not the center of the universe.  We are not God’s gift to humanity.  The world not built for us.

I wonder if I really got this how often would I let an offense go.  How many of my offenses are rooted not so much in the wrong behavior of another but in my own sense of worth, improperly inflated or deflated as the case may be?  If I really got this how quick would I be to dismiss someone’s request, say haphazardly “I’ll pray for you,” or pass by someone and not even notice them there?

If I understood this life is short and I am not alone.

Thankfully, they tell me that before I am sent away with ash on my forehead and a morbid sense of reality (not all that uplifting I might add), I am given the words of Christ.  Turn away and believe the good news.  And this is the question all of humanity has had to answer and now we face.  Will we turn away?  Will we believe the good news?

That we are not gods.  Not the center of the universe.  God’s gift to humanity has already been given and yes, the world is somehow designed for us.

That this life is short, but we are not alone.

If I somehow could marry these two ideas … that dust is the breeding ground for  good news … then maybe the next forty days would look different than just another indulgence of the self focused on my sacrifice .. maybe the Son-rise on Easter would affect those around me long after Sunday passes.

Maybe, no matter how taken aback by the arrival of a certain season or the creeping up of a specific day, I’d still be prepared for what God is doing.  You know that Easter stuff that happens the other 364 days of the year.  The Good News found in a Vessel of Dust that now chooses to dwell in me.

And interestingly enough, He is never caught off guard by me.

1 The Liturgical year: the spiraling adventure of the spiritual life by Joan Chittister

Some of the things I’ve read make me shout, “Amen!”  Others make me scratch my head.  Some challenge me or scare me.  Some might even make me angry.  As a disclaimer, I should caution you to not assume that they all represent my views, though some do.  The point isn’t to simply share my perspective (though I will) but to share anything that has made me think.

Here’s a couple things I’m doing or working on:

1. This past week I got to guest post at Soul Munchies.  This is a really encouraging blog with multiple writers.  This is my third guest post and I am excited about being a regular poster there.  You definitely need to go there as well as like them on Facebook.  And please check out my post on passing on doubt to my children.
2. My husband and I are in the process of hopefully adopting a little girl from Sierra Leone.  Her name is Precious Hope.  You can check out our story here.
3. I’m reading the most interesting book right now: Amusing Ourselves to Death.  Written over 20 years ago and about the rise of the television age, it is uncannily timely.  If you have read it, I’d love to hear your thoughts especially on how this relates to how we do church.

Without further ado …

In the spirit of the tumbleweed, let’s start with this video of a Tumbleweed Stampede

 The Cure of Souls: The Healing Art of the Kitchen Kate Weibe @ First Day Walking

“When we turn our home into a place that nourishes and heals and contents, we are meeting directly all the hungers that a consumer society exacerbates but never satisfies.” – “Cooking involves an enormously rich coming-together of the fruits of the earth with the inventive genius of the human being.”

Flinders notes how we balk at anything that takes us more than fifteen or twenty minutes to accomplish. Yet, there is no way around the fact that soul-deep satisfying care, the kind of care that can go on consistently and regularly through ordinary living, takes time. She encourages, “it may be that the time it takes to prepare good, wholesome food is as healthful and healing – for everyone concerned – as the food itself.”

She’s (Rarely) the Boss by Nicholas Kristof @ NY Times

Nature and social mores together make motherhood more all-consuming than fatherhood, yet the modern job was built for a distracted father. That’s not great for dads and can be just about impossible for moms — at least those who don’t have great wealth or extraordinary spouses.

Some people believe that women are more nurturing bosses, or that they offer more support to women below them. I’m skeptical. Women can be jerks as much as men.

But we need more women in leadership positions for another reason: considerable evidence suggests that more diverse groups reach better decisions. Corporations should promote women not just out of fairness, but also because it helps them perform better. Lehman Brothers might still be around today if it were Lehman Brothers & Sisters.

Country and Kingdom: I am not American by Tim Owens @ Inexhaustible Significance

Basically you need to read this whole series he is doing.  Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4

Dan and Me: My Coming Out as a Friend of Dan Cathy and Chick-fil-a by Shane L Windmeyer @ Huff Post Religion

In the end, it is not about eating (or eating a certain chicken sandwich). It is about sitting down at a table together and sharing our views as human beings, engaged in real, respectful, civil dialogue. Dan would probably call this act the biblical definition of hospitality. I would call it human decency. So long as we are all at the same table and talking, does it matter what we call it or what we eat?

A Defiant Dance of Power, Not Sex?  I Beg to Differ by Haley KC (a great response to this article)

Sex and power are no different when wielded by women.

As Audre Lorde [an African-American writer and feminist] said, as she railed against the racism she saw within the feminist movement, “The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house. They may allow us temporarily to beat him at his own game, but they will never enable us to bring about genuine change. And this fact is only threatening to those women who still define the master’s house as their only source of support.”

Please, please hear me when I say this: You cannot use the tools of those in power to dismantle that same power structure. It does not work.

Friendly Fire @ momastery

And if every woman made the same decision, how would my children learn that sometimes motherhood looks like going to work to put food on the table or stay sane or share your gifts or because you want to work and you’ve earned that right. And that other times motherhood looks like staying home for all of the exact same reasons.

When the Historical Adam Doesn’t Matter @ seePrestonBlog

“Because for a thousand years and then some, the Church has not been concerned with a literal creation account as being necessary for a person’s faith. What matters is belief in Incarnation, in cross, in empty tomb, in ascension. What matters is belief in Jesus.”

About that Beyonce Performance Being Like Soft Core Porn by Matthew Paul Turner

And secondly, if the halftime show concerned you, why doesn’t the rest of the 4 hour-and-forty-five-minute display concern you?

Because let’s face it. There’s nothing particularly holy and true about the Superbowl. In other words, if we want to get picky, we could point out a host of “sins” that got committed during yesterday’s big game. For starters, the Superbowl glorifies a sport that is violent and leaves many of its players with longstanding head injuries. It also puts athletes on pedestals to be idolized and worshiped. It accentuates and sexualizes some of America’s greatest vices: alcohol, fast food, commercialism, narcissism, among other things. It glorifies pride, humanism, other “worldly concepts”. And I could go on and on…

I mean, really, if we’re going to start talking about what’s wrong with the Superbowl and why it might not be the best choice of programming for us or our 10 year-olds to view, what Beyonce did on that stage last night might be the least of our worries.

The Theology of Ray Lewis by Tim Schenk @ Huff Post Religion

This not only turns faith into competitive blood sport, it sets up a dangerous dualistic approach where you’re either on God’s side or not. Everything becomes black and white with no shades of gray. Unfortunately, the human relationship with God is much more nuanced than this — our faith ebbs and flows, there are moments of inspiration followed by periods of doubt. Like the experience of the Israelites in the wilderness, faith is a living, breathing life-long journey of falling away and returning to God.

]]> http://jessicamccracken.com/2013/02/06/wednesdays-tumbleweed-020613/feed/ 0 macrackalackin 7450188 http://jessicamccracken.com/2013/02/05/ybw-team-writing-recap/ http://jessicamccracken.com/2013/02/05/ybw-team-writing-recap/#comments Tue, 05 Feb 2013 14:00:51 +0000 macrackalackin http://jessicamccracken.com/?p=1123 ]]> Back in October, I had the privilege to be part of the Launch Team for Rachel Held Evan’s latest book, Year of Biblical Womanhood: How a Liberated Woman Found Herself Sitting on Her Roof, Covering Her Head, and Calling Her Husband Master.  It was an honor and a lot of fun.

I wrote a book review along with another post.  Here is a snippet from my review:

It highlights issues such as what does it mean to do something bibilcally or to be biblical.  What does it mean to follow the Bible literally?  What does it mean to be a “woman of God?”  Why do we follow some parts of the Bible and not others?  Why is it so important to get this right?  Or is it?

 

The answers to these questions are a good reason to read the book.  Not because Evans gives you the answers, though you can clearly see what her views are, but rather because no matter where you fall on the spectrum of what can a woman do and what should she do n the home or church, you will be challenged to provide a fuller answer, one rooted in Christ, and one that hopefully leaves you seeing the woman on the “other” side with more compassion, more dignity, and maybe a little more freedom to be who God called her to be.

I also got to be part of a team of writers who blogged (during the month of December) about each chapter of the book.  Soul Munchies hosted us and it was a great experience.  Below are snippets from each post.  You can click on any title and be linked to the rest of the article.

Enjoy!  I did!

Grace

That’s what this project has been about for me. Opening the Word. Really diving into it. Expectantly. Not about Rachel’s story as she lived it, but about discovering for myself, what it means to live a biblical life. To live a life true to the one God has planned for me. Not the life anyone else wants me to live.

Silence

Rachel Held Evans talks about some awkward moments in her retreat with the Benedictines. I had moments like that too with the Franciscans: I squirmed when I realized I was the only Protestant and the only person under 60. I awkwardly “outed” myself when we recited the Catholic version of the Lord’s prayer and continued with the last petition before I realized everyone else was done. The nuns offered to take our cell phones and laptops to provide a “fuller retreat experience”–and I’m sure my face revealed my horror at relinquishing my lifelines.

Justice

To change the world, we must first change ourselves. Which leads me – as an empowered woman – to think that if we truly desire justice and equality for our gender, if we truly want to be empowered as women, then we must first become perpetrators of justice and empowerment ourselves …until we find a spirit of justice within ourselves, permeating even the darkest, dustiest most unthought of corners within our soul, it will never roll down like a river through our world.

Submission

But I have a confession to make.  Sometimes the discussion is just an avoidance of something that goes against my very nature.  Not my nature as a woman, but as a human.  Something in us, all of us, resists the idea of submission.  Who wants to give up their rights, man or woman?  Who wants to allow another to have say over their choices?  Who wants to take the chance of getting hurt or not having the same attitude returned?  And who can resist power if given? … I fear we have reversed the process.  We submit to a role and hope that we will become like Christ when Christ intended us to submit to him and he’d transform our roles.

The Power of Touch (Purity)

She ends the chapter with the story of the woman in the gospels who suffered from bleeding for years. For years, this woman would have been an outcast. For years, this woman could not have had the comforting touch of her husband. She was isolated physically and emotionally.  As I think about this, and how we teach and talk about sex in the church and our culture, despite varying degrees and reasons for “wait until marriage” or “just be sure to use birth control”, what seems to be missing is talk of intimacy and talk of the importance of touch, and how to deal with being lonely and isolated.

Modesty

Whether you’re male or female, you make a statement with your dress.  It’s not about who you’re tempting or how you’re causing others to sin; that’s their issue.  It’s about honoring God in being appropriate for each situation, so that your words and actions speak louder than what you’re wearing.

Eye of the Beholder (Beauty)

The problem isn’t just that men are left out of the equation or that women should remain youthful, lovely, and slipper-free.  It’s that all of these people have bought into the lie that whatever culture says is attractive is the standard: jewelry, makeup, nice clothes, a thin body, a pretty face.

Valor

The “Proverbs 31 woman” is NOT A REAL WOMAN! … ven though Proverbs was written specifically to a young guy there is obviously still a lot that we can learn from it. Evans wasn’t saying saying otherwise. (And neither am I!). What she was saying though, and she quoted Judy Garland in saying, was, “Always be a first rate version of yourself, and not a second rate version of someone else.” Even if it is “the Proverbs 31 woman!”

Obedience

Rachel Held Evans had some “Jonah Moments” in this chapter. No matter which way she tries to go that seems challenging or downright strange and uncomfortable  (calling her husband master, learning about Biblical polygamy, coming to peace with the abused Biblical women, and surviving the masculinity of Christmas)–she is led to God. We can fight, we can try to run, we can try to make sense of these confusing rules and follow them, or choose not to follow them at all. But every way we go, leads us right back there to God.

Defiant Domesticity

I wasn’t taking off my shoes; I was too busy defending my own little shrub as the “right” one, in part out of fear that I had chosen incorrectly.  The truth is that all that matters is that whatever I do, I work at it as for the Lord and not for men.  I don’t have to defend myself to anyone–I only need listen to the one Voice that matters.

Gentleness

In the end, this definition of gentle holds best with who Jesus is and how he lived when he walked among us.  It is this way of reading – through who Jesus is – that Evans consistently calls us to use when reading the Bible.  And in the end that is what Evan writes about.  Not gentleness.  Not even womanhood.  But being more and more like Christ, regardless of our anatomy or the definitions we find.

While I have a few bloggers, news sites, or magazine websites I check in on during the week I most often just happen to stumble across things. One link leads to another link.  I’m curious.  I’m one of those people who turns down a road just because I’ve never been down it and want to know where it goes and thanks to my map-reading-for-fun-in-his-spare-time dad, I prefer a map (you know the kind made of paper and you unfold with your hands) to a GPS.

So in the spirit of the tumbleweed that goes where the wind takes it and scatters its seeds wherever they land, welcome to Wednesday’s Tumbleweed.  These are just a few of my pickings from the past week that have caught my eye.

They have made me say “Amen.”  They have made me scratch my head.  They may have challenged me, angered me, scared me, or made me want to join a band.  Don’t assume they represent my views though some do.  The point isn’t to provide articles that simply share my views but to share what has made me think this week in some way.

Virginity: New & Improved by Elizabeth Esther

Christians say that the world objectifies women through immodest dress and a permissive sexual ethic. However, by idolizing sexual purity and preoccupying ourselves with female modesty and an emphasis on hyper-purity, Christians actually engage in reverse objectivization.

When God Stops Answering Your Prayers  by Gabbing with Grace

There’s that part of me that wants to figure it all out. That wants to know why not them? Some will say there was a lack of faith. But I know it wasn’t mine, and it wasn’t theirs. Maybe it’s just that messy part of Kingdom living. That space between the now and the not yet. But even that hurts my heart to think about.

Suffering From a Condition by Heather Stocking @ Quad City Moms Blog

Being a mom is hard enough, couple that with friends, Facebook and Pinterest and being a mom and wife becomes even harder some days.

Untangling the Wires – A Christian Theology of Involvement for us Americans by Tim Owens @ inexhaustible significance 

We are desperate for a Christian theology of involvement.

In Which I am Damaged Goods by Sarah Bessey at Deeper Story

If true love waits, I heard, then I have been disqualified from true love. In the face of our sexually-dysfunctional culture, the Church longs to stand as an outpost of God’s ways of love and marriage, purity and wholeness.  And yet we twist that until we treat someone like me – and, according to this research, 80% of you are like me –  as if our value and worth was tied up in our virginity.

147 Meals Later by Jeff Shinabarger @ Huff Post Religion

We are consistently encouraged to organize to create a simpler, more organized life, but we don’t consider the implications of how that contributes to our excess. As we organize with cupboards and bins, it becomes easier to tuck away more things. Being more organized doesn’t mean we are living more simply. When we are organized, it’s easy to hold onto more because everything has a place.

3 Things I Wish I Knew Before I Got Married by Tyler Ward at Relevant

The point is that marriage has a higher goal than to make two people happy or even whole.

“i just feel like i’m one of the guys” and other subtleties working against equality by Kathy Escobar

what it often boils down is power continuing to attract the same kind of power with a different twist of a few strong women who know how to be “one of the guys.”  (I’d highly recommend you check out one of her other posts: We Let Women Lead).

the God of the sea and the sea monster by Jonathan Martin (LOVE HIM!)

The theoretical time “before the sea” is a myth.  It never existed.  The sea has always been here, and we’ve always been living on it.  What changed was not the world itself but our understanding of it.  Life didn’t get complicated when it got complicated for you; it was just that we hadn’t lived long enough to recognize the wildness that really had been there all along.

Why I Am Still an Evangelical by Alister Chapman @ Huff Post Religion

So I am still an evangelical, and plan on remaining one. But it would make me happy if more people thought of evangelicals with nuance and charity — in contrast to those British people who lumped all Americans together with George W. Bush.

Sideways Glance by Megan @ crazy little thing called loved

I rip my God-given dignity out of my Saviors hands and toss it haphazardly into the brothel of human approval.

Hating President Obama (in Jesus’ name) by Matthew Paul Turner

hese are the same people who believe the “The Left” to be void of God, Jesus, faith, religion, and morals (and that’s not true) AND YET, they still hold these “godless liberal good-for-nothing voters” to the same values that Christ called them too. How can you expect a group of people who are supposedly “godless” to be kind and diplomatic when you, “The God-Fearing-and-Loving Evangelical Right” have zero ability to showcase your frustration with sanity and spellcheck?

Books Recently Finished

• Outliers: The Story of Sucess by Malcolm Gladwell
• Misreading Scripture With Western Eyes by E. Randoplh Richards & Brandon J. O’Briend
• a long way gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah

A couple weeks ago I listed my 2013 Reading Wish List which contained way too many books that I’d like to finish or start, many of which I owned already.  They are a mix of fiction, creative non-fiction and non-fiction (from gender issues to social issues to theology and history).  So far I’ve managed to knock off three books on my list (granted two were from the 1/2 read pile).

My sister loaned me A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier  by Ishmael Beah last summer along with several other books that are on my list.  It is a memoir or what you might call creative non-fiction, but it is not light reading or for the faint of heart.  It is a factual telling in narrative form of Ishmael’s life once war comes to his village.  His story takes us from a typical day in the life of a 12 year old boy in his hometown to the destruction of all that he knows, including his own self.  We follow him as he learns of his family’s fate, is separated from his brother, chased by rebels, feared by other local villages, and must steal to eat.  Through his first hand account, we learn of the cruelty suffered at the hands of the rebels.  Horrors that are usually referred to as ‘unspeakable.’  Branding, limbs being cut off, villagers being burned, firing squads, rape, torture, and forced servitude.  Here his memory is detailed and we are drawn in, running with them through the forest, hiding behind bushes, waiting to see if the people in the next town will believe them and help them or try to harm them.  The telling of his first 6 months or so on the run takes up more than half of the book.  The rest of the book smacks us in the face with what the NY Times rightly calls an “oxymoron.”  “The unbelievable violence and dread, the blood and death, seem – if this does not appear too awful an oxymoron – somehow guileless and innocent, random, unpremeditated.”

If you read the jacket cover before reading the book you will know that Ishmael will go on to become a soldier himself for the Sierra Leone Army and you will assume that the things you read about the rebels doing he will do.  And yet, before you get there you will wonder how that is possible and if you have misread the jacket cover.  This is perhaps what makes the book a compelling read, and a necessary read.  You have invested in Ishamel.  He is the victim.  You want to fight for him.  He is innocent.

But suddenly he is not.  In such a short amount of time, Ishmael is the one holding the gun.  Along with the gun he is given an odd assortment of drugs: marijuana and what is called “brown-brown,” a combination of cocaine and gunpowder.  What has been done to him is used and manipulated, along with the drugs and his youth, to tear away the last of his innocence, dull his conscience,  incite his hate, and gives him power to survive, something that he had not had up to this point.  The Army, which one hoped might be a notch above the rebels, seems not all that different.  Same war.  Same tactics.  Different colored headbands.

This part of the book moves much faster and is a bit more fact telling than story telling.  Two years of killing … no massacring, is told in half the time it took to tell of the first 6 months on the run.  As I read there were so many questions I had, moments of moral conflict that seem to never get addressed.  Yet I imagine this mirrored what was happening to Ishmael.  There was no time for questions to be asked or for moralizing.  Not only would that have brought more trauma, there simply was not the time for it if you wanted to survive.  To live.  As you read you are both disgusted and yet it all makes sense in a world that makes no sense.  You now ache for this young boy in new ways and wonder if there is any hope for him, or for the thousands like him, for a normal life.

The book has a happy ending.  Ishmael is rescued by UNICEF, along with many other child soldiers.  He is rehabilitated by several caring people, namely a nurse.  He is united with an uncle and his family where he is loved and begins to heal.  He eventually makes his way to America where he finishes high school and goes on to college.  But even this happy ending comes at a price.  He will once again find war at his front door and face the decision to pick up a gun again or to run.  He will travel at great risk to a neighboring country where there is no guarantee that he will be able to get help or out of that country.  All at the age of 16.

Again, we know he does (we even have an picture of him as a young man smiling having overcome much), but his story ends not with him graduating from college or even finding his way to America where he will be safe.  The story ends with Ishmael in the “in-between.”  Stuck between opportunity/possibility and a reality that most of us reading will never comprehend.

This seems a fitting ending as for every Ishmael there are hundreds, thousands more, that did not get out of Sierra Leone, who did not live, who did not find homes, who had families refuse to take them back in, or who returned to the battle because it was the only home they had or the only way to not die.

I highly recommend this book.  While reading it is not always pleasant and you are left with very disturbing images, I think that it is too easy for us in conflict-free zones of the world to ignore or put away what is happening in other places.  We can also easily assume there is nothing we can do.  Sometimes that is true.  Sometimes it isn’t.  Sometimes we can’t do much but we can do something.  But we can’t make those decisions about what can or cannot be done without being first aware.

Books like this also save us from the arrogance that our lack of understanding can bring.  We have no right to critique that which we do not take the time to know, yet we often do.  This doesn’t mean we have to fully understand or know everything or have experienced to offer insight but without taking the time to first learn and understand we often end up making unfair judgments.

Sierra Leone is known for being a corrupt country.  This is changing, especially in the last few years.  There are many good, honest, people working toward a better country.  There is still much to overcome in the way of corruption and it is easy to assume a bad people vs. good people mentality.  We might question why or how the government could give jobs to those in the Rebel Army.  However, when we realize the decisions that many had to make to survive – not just make ends meet but literally live – we realize that few are innocent and many evil decisions were made by once good men.  We can also understand how a culture where the mentality, as Ishmael points out, is “killed or be killed,” can lead to corruption.  This does not excuse wrongdoing necessarily but it does bring more understanding and help us see that not only must the solutions be more than one-dimensional but that even we, given the right circumstances, are capable of such evils.

It is a man’s own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.  Buddha

The battle line between good and evil runs through the heart of every man. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Someone shoot me.

As I went through the books I read I also realized that there are more books I want to buy.  I mean the last book in the Wicked Series by Gregory Maguire came out in October!  How did I miss this?  Where was I?

So I thought I’d share some of the books that I have read that I would recommend you read at some point.  They are a mix of fiction and non-fiction.  Most of the non-fiction covers gender issues, theology/religion, and social justice related themes.  While I don’t have this entire list, I do have most of them which leaves me figuring out which books to get rid of and which to keep and how might I spread the love of books and earn a little cash.

• Unladylike by Pam Hogewiede
• Year of Biblical Womanhood By Rachel Held Evans
• Will Jesus Buy Me A Double Wide:  Cause I Need More Room for My Plasma TV by Karen Spears
• Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide by Nicholas D. Kristoff & Sheryl WuDunn
• I’m Down: A Memoir by Mishna Wolff
• The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel Series by Michael Scott
• Beauty Will Save the World by Brian Zahnd
• The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer
• Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
• Circle Maker by Mark Batterson
• Seeing & Living the Script in New Ways: The Bible as Improv by Ron Martoia
• The Missional Mom by Helen Lee
• Self-Made Man: One Woman’s Year Disguised as a Man by Norah Vincent
  
• Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin by Norah Vincent
  
• Nickel and Dimed : On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich
  
• Picking Dandelions: A Search for Eden Among Life’s Weeds by Sarah Cunningham
• Cinderella Ate My Daughter by Peggy Orenstein
• Half the Church: Recapturing God’s Global Vision for Women by Carolyn Custis James
• the Good Body by Eve Ensler
• The Vagina Monologues by Eve Ensler
• Insecure At Last: A Political Memoir by Eve Ensler
• The Irresistible Revolution: living as an ordinary radical by Shane Claiborne
• Secondhand Jesus: trading rumors of God for a firsthand faith by Glenn Packiam
• Losing Our Religion by S.E. Cupp
• Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin
• Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture by Ariel Levy
• The Porning of America: The Rise of the Porn Culture, What It Means, and Where We Go from Here
• Bait and Switch: The (Futile) Pursuit of the American Dream by Barbara Ehrenreich
• Jesus for President by Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw
• Bright-Sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America by Barbara Ehrenreich
• Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott
• Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott
• Grace (Eventually): Thoughts on Faith by Anne Lamott
• Their Eyes Were Watching God by Nora Zeale Hurston
• Sula by Toni Morrison
• Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat
• Three Junes by Julia Glass
• The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
• The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd
• The Dance of the Dissident Daughter by Sue Monk Kidd
• Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories by Sandra Cisneros
• O Pioneers by Willa Cather
• Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
• Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner
• In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner
• Little Earthquakes by Jennifer Weiner
• Goodnight Nobody by Jennifer Weiner
• Certain Girls by Jennifer Weiner
• Wicked by Gregory Maguire
• Son of a Witch by Gregory Maguire
• A Lion Among Men by Gregory Maguire
• The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making by Catherynne Valente
• The Land of Stories: The Wishing Spell by Chris Colfer

So tell me how does one decide which books to keep and which to get rid of? 

I read quite a few books each year.  I have never kept track of how many but this year in an effort to save money, finish what I start, and use what I have I am going to try to get through several books that I have in my house that are unread or not finished.

I also want to add a bit more fiction to my reading.  I read a few each year but I want to add more.  I have forgotten just how good fiction is, how good it is for the spirit and for the skill of writing.

They tell me that if you write it down you are more apt to do it as well.  So I decided to come up with a list of all the books I have that I need to finish or read, some fiction books I’d like to read this year, and then a few (and I do use that term loosely) more books that I’d have to buy, borrow, or attempt to return to the library.

As I’ve talked about my list, a few have asked me to share.  So this is my list.  I call it a Reading Wish List because it has books I plan on reading and books I’d like to read and with the total list being closet to 60 books it’s clearly wishful thinking to think I’ll get them all read, especially considering I have a Bible to read and textbooks for a new course every 5-6 weeks.

It is broken up into 3 sections with the third section having an additional section.  There is a ReRead section; these are books that I think have value rereading every few years or as I look at my year ahead would be good for me to reconsider.  There is a Fiction/Creative Non-Fiction section followed by a Non-Fiction section which covers gender issues, social justice, and theology.  Finally the third section continues with a Wish List section of books that I’d like to read at some point.  Some of them may get moved up but most will probably sit there waiting for next year (especially since I have to buy those).

If you have read any of the books on the list feel free to share what you thought about them in the comment section (good or bad).  If  you have any you would add, especially in the Fiction section, leave your suggestion and why in the comments.  Or just share what you are reading or hope to read this year.

Rereads (6)                                              

• Beauty Will Save the World by Brian Zahnd
• The Knowledge of the Holy by A.W. Tozer
• Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
• Circle Maker by Mark Batterson
• Seeing & Living the Script in New Ways: The Bible as Improv by Ron Martoia
• The Missional Mom by Helen Lee

Fiction/Creative Non-Fiction (14)                        

• The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton
• Surprised by Oxford by Carolyn Weber
• God Grew Tired of Us by John Bul Dau
• The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad
• The City of Joy by Dominque Lapierre
• The Guardians Series by
• William Joyce:  Nichola
• s St. North and the Battle of the Nightmare, K
• ing
• E. Aster Bunnymund and the Warrior Eggs at the Earth’s Core!, Toothiana, Queen of the Tooth Fairy Armies
• Finish The Secrets of Nicholas Flamel Series by Michael Scott: The Necromancer, The Warlock, The Enchantress
• They Killed My Father by Loung Ung
• They Poured Fire on Us From the Sky by Benson Deng, Alephonsion Deng, & Benjamin Ajak
• The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There by Catherynne M. Valente

Non-Fiction (21)                                                   

• The Liturgical Year by Joan Chittister
• There Is a Season by Dennis Billy
• Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell
• Unnatural Selection by Mara Hvistendhal
• Misreading Scripture With Western Eyes by E. Randolph Richards & Brandon O’Brien
• The Next Christians by Gabe Lyons
• The Price of Motherhood by Ann Crittenden
• The Meaning of Wife by Anne Kingston
• How to Be Perfect by Daniel Harrell
• Paradise Lust by Brook Wilensky-Lanford
• The Naked Truth About Small Group Ministry by Randall Neighbour
• Jesus, A Theography by Leonard Sweet & Frank Viola
• The Skinny Rules by Bob Harper
• The Meaning of the Bible by Douglas Knght and Amy Levine
• Authentic Faith by Gary Thomas
• Sun Stand Still by Steven Furtick
• How God Became King by N. T. Wright
• The King Jesus Gospel: The Original Good News Revisited by Scott McKnight
• The Beauty Myth by Naomi Wolf
• Reading Jesus by Mary Gordon
• Wheat Belly by William Davis

Wish List  (21)                                                      

• A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah
• Love Without Walls by Laurie Beshore
• Jesus by Walter Wangerin
• Bad Religion by Ross Douthat
• Amusing Ourselves To Death by Neil Postman
• The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything by James Martin, SJ
• The Invested Life by Joel Rosenberg & Dr. T.E. Koshy
• There Is No i in Church by Keith Drury
• Evangelicals on the Canterbury Trail: Why Evangelicals Are Attracted to the Liturgical Church by Lester Ruth*
• The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How It Has Undermined All Women by Susan Douglas*
• Jesus Have I Loved, but Paul?: A Narrative Approach to the Problem of Pauline Christianity by J.R. Daniel Kirk*
• Every Bush Is Burning by Brandon Clements*
• Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking by Susan Cain*
• Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion by Elizabeth L. Cline*
• Longing and Belonging: Parents, Children, and Consumer Culture by Allison J. Pugh*
• Slaves in the Family by Edward Ball*
• From Slavery to Freetown: Black Loyalists After the American Revolution by Mary Louise Clifford*
• The Noonday Demon: An Atlas of Depression by Andrew Solomon*
• The Story of God, the Story of Us: Getting Lost and Found in the Bible by Sean Gladding*
• Mystery of God, The: Theology for Knowing the Unknowable by Christopher A. Hall*
• Reading the Apostolic Fathers: A Student’s Introduction by Clayton N. Jefford*

*Sadly, or fortunately, these are the  (only) books I’d have to buy 

Lighting candles to pray was most often associated with praying to Mary or to saints.  It seemed an exercise in pointlessness when 1) they saints couldn’t do anything for you and 2) you could go directly to God.

Over the last year or so, I have a better understanding, though still very lacking and imperfect, of liturgy in general and on the theology behind praying to saints and to Mary.  One of the best explanations I have heard is by an Orthodox Christian.  I still have many questions and I doubt I will ever make the theological jump.   Yet, I think that we may have throw the baby out with the bathwater when Luther nailed his 99 thesis to the church doors.  

There is something to lighting a candle.  To stepping inside a church, to a place deemed sacred and holy and bending our knee.  Pausing.  Considering.  Then pulling the match out and lighting the wick.  Keeping it lit.  Letting it go out on its own.

Prayer is intangible.  It’s art and not science.  Sometimes it feels like the rules even change as we go.  Prayer can move mountains and sometimes it doesn’t fix a darn thing.  There is this mysticism and mystery to it.  A vagueness.  A possibility that can’t be guaranteed.  

Somewhere in prayer the subjective and the objective meet.

It’s rarely neat and tidy.  Usually it’s messy.

And so we light candles.  A tangible expression of what is taking place.  A marking of time.  A recognition of the life that is praying and the life that is being prayed for. 

It’s our attempt to do something when by the very virtue of praying we acknowledge our limited ability to do anything or, at least, our struggle to do the right thing.

It’s an act of faith to light a candle.  It’s one thing to utter a prayer but another to acknowledge it with an act that defies logic and gives up control.

I think this is why I’ve come to lighting candles when I pray.  I’m a fixer.  I don’t have to get my way or even know how it’s going to end.  I just need to know the possible outcomes so I can prepare and be ready, whatever comes my way.

But sometimes in life you can’t know the outcomes.  You can’t determine how you’ll respond even if you know them.

So you light a candle.

Because that’s all you can do.

Yes, you can pray and do.

But sometimes life requires more but there is nothing more you can do.

So you light a candle.

You light it to acknowledge that you are here.  You light it to declare that someone else is here.  

You light it to acknowledge pain and sorrow, joy and gladness.  You light it because each feeling, each person, each moment should be seen and heard.

You light it because it makes the space holy in some way that you can’t explain.  

Maybe that is the mystery.  The candles and the space aren’t holy and therefore our prayers our heard.  No, the candles and space become holy because of the prayers we offer.

Our prayers become holy not because of who we are or where we offer them, but because we offer them in the first place.  Perhaps, it’s the act and not the prayers themselves that moves the One we pray to.

I hope so because yesterday my kitchen counter became my kneeling place, my kitchen a holy place all because I did what I could do.

I lit a candle not to pray but because I prayed.

• An Introduction by Crystal
• Gentleness by me
• Defiant Domesticity by Amy
• Obedience by Rachel
• Valor by MamaMely
• Eye of the Beholder by Amy
• Modesty by chickpastor
• The Power of Touch by Kelly J Youngblood
• Fertility by Crystal
• Submission by me

And still to come are Justice by Meagan, Silence by Rachel, Grace by Crystal and A Male Perspective by David.

When we are all done I post all the links again with some of my favorite parts from each post.