Book 7 of 2023 -- Value(s): Building a Better World for All

 

One day in late summer I was standing in a bookstore and started leafing through this one. I liked the premise so went home and ordered it. I was drawn to the idea that we need a discussion about how to build value while being intentional about the values that underpin our decisions.

To be honest it was a hard slog at times. I have taken exactly no economics courses and so there were a few places in the book where I was getting a bit lost in the economics of what Carney was saying. This was especially notable when he was discussing the lead up to the 2008 financial crisis.

After an introductory section of the book providing some historical economic background Carney uses three case studies of global events that both challenged (or are challenging/will continue to challenge) economics and our values as a culture. These were: a) the 2008 financial crash, b) the COVID-19 pandemic, and c) the climate crisis. I think he did a good job of laying out the realities and challenges of both. I also think that in the latter two his analysis does not actually reflect the culture where I live.

Overall in both his discussion of COVID and of the Climate Crisis I found Carney to be a bit overly positive. While his description of the initial response to the pandemic was accurate I think he missed the fact that the initial outpouring of community and "we are all in this together" faded well before the pandemic was over -- and that fading had a definite impact on how the pandemic played out, while also making a strong statement about societal values. In terms of the Climate Crisis I live in a province where 30 years ago the Premier insisted that reducing per-barrel CO2 emissions was enough and that Alberta would not try to reduce actual total emissions -- a logic largely followed by our current government insisting that Carbon Capture and Storage will solve everything and actually reducing use of fossil fuels is not needed.

In the end I found this to be a good book. The length of time it took me to read did make it challenging to recall exactly what had been said in earlier chapters so it is a book I wonder would have been better in hard copy so I could more easily flip back and compare. The other thing I would have found helpful was a list of acronyms. Carney is very good about spelling out an acronym the first time it is used but several hundred pages later it can be difficult to remember what those letters meant.

Book 6 of 2023 -- Pure Colour

 At the beginning of the summer I heard a radio interview with the author of this book. I was intrigued by the concept that the world as we know it is God's first draft and is being assessed to see what would be changed in the next draft. So I bought it for summer reading.

Frankly, I was disappointed. While the book is a novel it does not have a really clear narrative structure. It often seemed more like a stream  of consciousness exploration of some intriguing philosophical questions than a narrative. I prefer a novel to be a narrative piece.

That being said, the philosophical questions raised about the nature of life and the nature of grieving and the nature of relationships were certainly intriguing. IT was worth reading for that piece, it just wasn't what I was expecting or the sort of book I was looking for at the time.

Book 5 of 2023 -- Leisure Resurrected

What does leisure mean to you? How do you use your leisure time? Social Media? Reading? Watching TV? What is the role of leisure in our world today?

I found out about this book while cruising through Facebook one day. It is written by a colleague of mine in Ontario.

Crittenden seeks to explore questions like the ones I listed above. He does so by looking at the roots of our traditions: Greek and Roman understandings, Jewish Sabbath, early Christian understandings. Then he muses about what these might mean for us today.

I appreciated that Crittenden took us deeper into what leisure could mean. I think that for many of us it is more of an entertainment category, or "wasted time" or even moving into the modern equivalent of "bread and circuses" rather than something intentionally life-enhancing. I found it challenging to re-think what leisure could mean. I wonder also how we can push the discussion into our wider circles.

Book 4 of 2023 -- Leadership On the Line

 This was a book recommended in a course I took earlier this year so I started working my way through it. Leadership is sometimes a challenging task within the church, where one is called to lead but also called to empower/allow congregants to do the leading. Part of leadership is vision-casting, part of it is vision-keeping, and I have long pondered whether the casting or the keeping should get the higher priority,

As many people have learned over the years leading in a time of change/transition/upheaval is probably the most challenging leadership. It is unquestioned that the church right now, at the local regional and denominational levels, is in a time of change/transitional/upheaval. How do we lead in a time when we are not entirely sure which direction we are going?  That is why I read the book.

It was a slow read. I found I often needed to stop and think through a passage. Heifetz and Linsky draw on many years of experience and share multiple stories to explicate what they are tying to describe. There were certainly things I will need to remember (and probably go back to re-read) as time carries forward. I did like that they were open about the fact that leading through change is a risky, even dangerous, task and that the book is designed to help manage the danger to lead to a more positive experience.

THis is one I probably should have in hard copy rather than as an e-book so it would be easier to use as a reference volume.

Book 3 of 2023 -- God Doesn't Live Here Anymore

 

With a title like this how could I resist?

Like many other leaders within the church I have spent much time over the years pondering the decline and struggles the church has been facing for several decades (statistically the decline actually seems to have started, or at least been seeded, as far back as the 1950's, even if it took time to become more noticeable in many local settings). So when I saw this one I knew I had to give it a read,

Over half of this book is history. History as in back to the beginning of the Christian movement. Now given that I have been a bit of a history dweeb since I was a pre-teen I certainly enjoyed the historical summary. But I would have been just as happy or happier if more of the book ws looking at the present/recent past and exploring how we might respond to a God who may not live in the institutional church anymore.

When we did get to that analysis I found it very thought provoking. Now that might be because Daly follows along the same track that my thoughts tend to go.  He does have the courage to name openly that the church as we know it is dying (some might say dead but has yet to fall down). He encourages us to seriously consider if God has gone elsewhere and we need to leave this thing we call church behind to catch up to where God has led.

This week I am preparing for Easter. We are a resurrection people. If this thing we call church is dying or dead, maybe we need to go for a walk in the garden. And since resurrection does not mean resuscitation we need to open our hearts to what a resurrected church might look like. AS the saying goes, you can't go home again. The future of the church is not going to be a return to what we once were. If God doesn't live here anymore, where is God? Can we join them there?

I am thinking that I should recommend this book to some of my colleagues and to members of our congregational council.

Thoughts on Life and Death and Life Again

 Two weeks from today is Easter Sunday, the day when Christians around the world will celebrate the triumph of life, hope, and love over fear, despair and death. And so I have started to ponder what the Easter message needs to be this year.(The title I have listed for that sermon is What Are You Looking For?)

At the same time, this morning in worship we read about Ezekiel in the valley of dry bones and the raising of Lazarus. A time to talk about whether we see the finality of death or the possibility of renewed life (or more likely both). In that sermon I talked about the need to actually face the reality of the death in order to be able to look for the possibility of life. I also talked about the reality of the church that has talked about dying, or its imminent demise for several decades and pondered if part of the issue is that in all that lamenting we have, due to our cultural discomfort with death, steadfastly refused to name the reality that a way of being the church has died. Has that left us unable to realistically look for the possibility of renewed or new life?

Also I am in the midst of reading this book. I am between half and two thirds of the way through it thus far. The chapter I finished this afternoon was looking at the rise of the "nones" and what the statistics tell us about that phenomenon. And I had a thought (which may make it into the Easter sermon yet).

Do we miss the possibility of new life because it is not what we expect or want it to be? I know this is hardly a new thought but in terms of the church I thought of a new twist. And it shaped in my head in relation to the Scriptural story of defeat and exile.

When the first temple fell the people went into exile. When in exile they mourned. When they returned from exile they wanted to rebuild what had been lost. Indeed there is a sense that there was a great deal of discomfort in how hard it was to rebuild what had been lost. And while the temple was eventually rebuilt as a grand edifice the glory days of David and Solomon never returned.

Then the second temple was destroyed and the people were sent into diaspora. This time the people responded differently. Out of this experience the Talmud was written and rabbinical Judaism grew. I suspect there may be outliers who expect/hope that some day the land will be reconquered and the temple will be rebuilt but that does not appear to be the general hope of Judaism (recognizing that the question of "reconquering" the land is a very complex one in relation to the nation of Israel and the reality of the Palestinians). New life after the Romans dispersed the people was not a return to what once had been, it was a new thing altogether.

Is that what resurrection for the church means?  [Personally I think it most definitely is.]. Even when we name that there is a death and loss, even when we lament we claim to b people of resurrection. But I think we see resurrection in the wrong way. I think we are making the choice that the people of Israel made after the first temple fell, a choice that, in the end, was not actually the path to a lasting future. WE think resurrection means finding the magic bullet that will give us back what we once were. That is in fact resuscitation.

Resurrection is new life out of death. It is new hope out of despair. It comes as a surprise. It is not what is expected. And most importantly, it is not the same as what was before. There is still something lost, even as there is something gained. In the Jesus story the relationship with Jesus is different before Easter than it is after Easter. The old relationship, the ability to walk the streets of Jerusalem and ask him questions has been lost forever. There is a continuing relationship, it is just different.

So what might resurrection mean for the church? What will be the points of continuity and what things are lost forever? Will we even know until after we have started to live into the resurrection? I think we can not predict the answers to those questions. I think we have to be willing to look for something different than what we know or what we want. I have no doubt those first disciples would have rather having Jesus walking amongst them as he had been before, instead they got resurrection and a transformed life.

Do we have the courage to name that our losses are in fact lost, not to be reclaimed? Do we have the courage to let go of what we dearly want and expect to leave room for God to work resurrection in our midst? Or are we still looking to rebuild and resuscitate what was comfortable and known?

I think I know what answer we have been giving over the years. Maybe it is time to change our answer and actually live as resurrection people...

Book 2 of 2023 -- Following Jesus Today

 News about this little piece popped up in my Facebook feed one day and I thought I would buy it to read in Lent. As it turns out I started it before Lent and finished it just days into the season....

This collection of short pieces by various authors invites us to explore how we experience Jesus. Each author speaks from their experience and so each one is very different.Within the church we have a variety of different understandings of and experiences with Jesus and I think we are in fact enriched when we allow and encourage each other to share those various pictures.

As I was reading I found myself wondering what I might have written. My experience of the Divine presence has largely been more pneumo-centric (Spirit centered) than Christo-centrc (Christ centered) and my understanding of Jesus has always been shaped by a low Christology. Still, like so many others over the years, I ponder who Jesus is for me. I may yet take a stab at the question....

Book 1 of 2023 -- Models of the Church

 This is a title that came up in a clergy FB group when someone asked about good books on ecclesiology. So I went shopping....

THe book was originally written 40 years ago, with some expansion (the final chapter) added in 1987 and then an appendix (an essay about the ecclesiology of Pope John Paul II)  added in this version. I think it would be interesting to ask Cardinal Dulles how he sees the patterns he identified in the first decade following Vatican II developing and being lived out in the 21st century.

Given that the author is a Cardinal, the book tends to skew toward a Roman Catholic perspective. however the methodology that Dulles uses was quite helpful. The 5 basic models (or perhaps schools of thought) that he lays out for understanding the church open up a number of possibilities.

In the end I tend to suggest that none of those models is what any one congregation should aim for. Each model adds something to our understanding. As is the case for much of the life of faith, any of our descriptors are only partial. The Church is more than any of them. Dulles talks about the element of Mystery, something that always fits when we try to explain how God is at work in the world,

I suspect that many people will find themselves drawn more to one of the 5 models than another. Personally I found things I really appreciated in at least 3 of them (community, sacrament, and servant) but, as I suggested above, the church will be at its best when it is an amalgam of all 5 -- probably an amalgam that itself shifts which model gets emphasized as circumstances dictate and God touches the hearts of the members.