In our first Tov Book Club selection, Austin Carty’s The Pastor’s Bookshelf: Why Reading Matters for Ministry, we are treated to a chapter about reading as departing from our world into the world of another, with the implication that we learn to love others.
I am still digesting yesterday’s post from Scot, so as I read this I am thinking of the single women. Are they part of the invisible to us church people? Are we even stopping long enough to love them? I have read the chapter on love 3 times….it is beautiful and challenging.
Two that come to my mind this morning are Unbroken and Boys in the Boat. Both authors are talented writers who compel you into the story of the characters. Both deal with pain, trauma and the eventual call to forgive. Very formational for me. Both show me how to love our ones who brought deep harm through forgiveness.
Scot, one more connection! - I first read Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man thirty years ago (no The in the title as I recall) and It was probably the most powerful knock in the head for me about all that creates invisibility for those unlike our "own." But I'm having to chew on the notion that reading teaches us to love others. For me reading gives me understanding, but not necessarily "love" for others. But even as I write that, I recall that my definition of "love" may be the problem. If I take it merely as "positive warm emotion" reading doesn't do that for me. But if I move back into Scripture and see "love" as seeking the best for the other person, then reading does do that for me. So thanks for prompting this time for reflection re: all the reading that I do.
Readers are lovers! Yea! Love these statements: “Theology that is not loving, theology that is not lived theology, is not full theology.” Dallas Willard’s writings and Scot’s Jesus Creed (and many more) taught me to think lovingly of God, myself and others. They still do. Both of these authors, I met very briefly, and their demeanor, attentive listening, manifested deep love for the other. I read my first book ever at 24, having grown up as an orphan, and fell in love, and have stayed in love the last 50. And my love is growing, I’d say.
Hm, this question is hard. I can pinpoint novels that taught me about forgiveness, being brave, being a good detective, offering grace, maturing in ethics and morals, but oh my, love? I have read novels where the characters loved well and some loved poorly, but I cannot think of one where I went away thinking I have learned to love deeper and healthier. I just finished Mitch Album's , "Stranger in the Boat " , novel and I fell in love again with Jesus because of it, not that I had fallen out of love with him, but this was a sprinkling of love that was refreshing and I hope to be as "loving" as the Jesus character is and I hope I did not give too much away, if you have not read it!
Reading->empathy->love, so true! And novels can do that because the engage our right brain (which governs empathy) in ways that other genres cannot. George MacDonald has done that for me in his novels as well as his fantasy, e.g. Sir Gibbie and Phantastes. The latter contains one of the most powerful quotes about love I know outside the Bible, and it is the story that makes it so compelling: “It is by loving, and not by being loved, that one can come nearest the soul of another.”
This is an interesting idea which I've never considered. But looking back on some of the novels I've read I believe it's true. Ironically, I was talking to a fiction author the other day and told her I felt compelled to read more fiction. Now I have a very compelling reason why! Is there a good resource out there for finding the kind of fiction that stirs us to love?
Wizard of Oz , To Kill A Mocking Bird and The Christmas Carol by Dickens, all three demonstrate grace and forgiveness and present people who are marginalized.
Much of culture has interpreted it as a story about war, but I read Lord of the Rings as being about friendship, perseverance, and beauty. It has helped me in all three areas.
I am still digesting yesterday’s post from Scot, so as I read this I am thinking of the single women. Are they part of the invisible to us church people? Are we even stopping long enough to love them? I have read the chapter on love 3 times….it is beautiful and challenging.
Two that come to my mind this morning are Unbroken and Boys in the Boat. Both authors are talented writers who compel you into the story of the characters. Both deal with pain, trauma and the eventual call to forgive. Very formational for me. Both show me how to love our ones who brought deep harm through forgiveness.
Scot, one more connection! - I first read Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man thirty years ago (no The in the title as I recall) and It was probably the most powerful knock in the head for me about all that creates invisibility for those unlike our "own." But I'm having to chew on the notion that reading teaches us to love others. For me reading gives me understanding, but not necessarily "love" for others. But even as I write that, I recall that my definition of "love" may be the problem. If I take it merely as "positive warm emotion" reading doesn't do that for me. But if I move back into Scripture and see "love" as seeking the best for the other person, then reading does do that for me. So thanks for prompting this time for reflection re: all the reading that I do.
https://smile.amazon.com/Brendan-Novel-Frederick-Buechner/dp/0060611782/ref=sr_1_1?crid=23RVLCK5A6DHR&keywords=Brendan+novel&qid=1652785196&s=books&sprefix=brendan+novel%2Cstripbooks%2C72&sr=1-1 This is one of the few books that I have read more than once. It saved my life.
Readers are lovers! Yea! Love these statements: “Theology that is not loving, theology that is not lived theology, is not full theology.” Dallas Willard’s writings and Scot’s Jesus Creed (and many more) taught me to think lovingly of God, myself and others. They still do. Both of these authors, I met very briefly, and their demeanor, attentive listening, manifested deep love for the other. I read my first book ever at 24, having grown up as an orphan, and fell in love, and have stayed in love the last 50. And my love is growing, I’d say.
Hm, this question is hard. I can pinpoint novels that taught me about forgiveness, being brave, being a good detective, offering grace, maturing in ethics and morals, but oh my, love? I have read novels where the characters loved well and some loved poorly, but I cannot think of one where I went away thinking I have learned to love deeper and healthier. I just finished Mitch Album's , "Stranger in the Boat " , novel and I fell in love again with Jesus because of it, not that I had fallen out of love with him, but this was a sprinkling of love that was refreshing and I hope to be as "loving" as the Jesus character is and I hope I did not give too much away, if you have not read it!
Reading->empathy->love, so true! And novels can do that because the engage our right brain (which governs empathy) in ways that other genres cannot. George MacDonald has done that for me in his novels as well as his fantasy, e.g. Sir Gibbie and Phantastes. The latter contains one of the most powerful quotes about love I know outside the Bible, and it is the story that makes it so compelling: “It is by loving, and not by being loved, that one can come nearest the soul of another.”
This is an interesting idea which I've never considered. But looking back on some of the novels I've read I believe it's true. Ironically, I was talking to a fiction author the other day and told her I felt compelled to read more fiction. Now I have a very compelling reason why! Is there a good resource out there for finding the kind of fiction that stirs us to love?
Wizard of Oz , To Kill A Mocking Bird and The Christmas Carol by Dickens, all three demonstrate grace and forgiveness and present people who are marginalized.
Much of culture has interpreted it as a story about war, but I read Lord of the Rings as being about friendship, perseverance, and beauty. It has helped me in all three areas.
City of Joy