HOW TO READ THESE OR ANY BOOKS

Our thanks to Rev. Dr. Eugenia Gamble for these encouragements

 to read with the eyes of faith!

 It has been said that when a person is ready, the right book will appear. That has certainly proved true for me. Often friends have given me a book that has been helpful or enjoyable to them. Sometimes I pick them up right away and devour them, experiencing all that my friends did. Other times I read a page or two and put them down until years later when I feel an urge to pick the book up again and only then find its blessings.

Some books are to be read just for the fun and escape they offer. Others can be read for the beauty of language and the insight into the human experience. Still others, while read for both of those reasons, can also be read in the hope of receiving spiritual insight or wisdom. This insight can be gained from fiction and secular non-fiction in addition to specifically Christian or spiritual writings.  

All of life is shot through with the presence and tenderness of God. Each human life, whether intentionally or not, unfolds around the great Biblical themes of creation, love, sin, redemption & calling.

• New things happen (creation).
• Love blossoms, changes, is sought, is lost, is recovered, is given unexpectedly (grace)
• Selfishness, prejudice, fear and violence seem to rule decisions (sin).
• In the midst of the worst imaginable, people are given fresh, albeit sometimes chastened, new and unearned starts (redemption).
• People seek and discover their true identity and purpose in the world—where their greatest joy meets the world’s deepest need (calling).

One way to read a book for its spiritual support is to look for those great themes. The following questions might be helpful.

• Where in this book can I see something creative and nourishing?
• Where in this book do I see astonishing graciousness, forbearance, love or loveliness?
• What is the brokenness or fear that underlies the actions of the characters or the motives of the writers?
• What are the characteristics of the characters or writers that are somehow common to all of humanity?
• How are the characters like me? Unlike me?
• How is God, either in their awareness or not, at work in their lives? What can I learn from them about how God is also at work in my life?
• How do the characters behave in a Christ like way? How do they fall short?
• In what way might God be showing me love and grace by leading me to this book?  

To insure each person is able to share and no one monopolizes our discussion, the last year or so our group has used a process called “Mutual Invitation” developed by Eric Law.  We begin our discussion of the book selected each month with the person who recommended the book. That person typically shares why the book was recommended and says briefly what s/he has to say about it—maybe posing some questions, maybe not.  Each time a person concludes her/his comments s/he invites another person present to share observations about the book, or connections with the themes evoked by the book.  As each person concludes reflecting on the book, that person makes an invitation to someone else until all have shared at least once.  Everyone has the right to pass if they do not feel ready to share.  Some of us develop a list of questions or use the suggestions above to jump start the discussion.

Come read with us every 3rd Tuesday at 6:45 pm, at Kate’s Belt's to share in conversation & light refreshments.  Contact the church office for  more information. (503) 236-2430.

CHPC Reading and Reflection Schedule 2011-12  

September 20 – Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier:  A historical novel based on the life of Mary Anning, who uncovers unusual fossilized skeletons in the cliffs near her home on the English coast.  She sets the religious fathers on edge, the townspeople to vicious gossip, and the scientific world alight. 

October 25 – Wild Trees: a Story of Passion and Daring by Richard Preston (nonfiction/science):  Hidden away in foggy, uncharted rain forest valleys in Northern California are the tallest organisms the world has ever sustained, the coast redwood trees, forming cathedral-like structures in the air.  Until recently, the canopy at the tops of these majestic trees was undiscovered.  Preston unfolds the story of the daring botanists and amateur naturalists who found a lost world.  

November 15 – Uncommon Gratitude: Alleluia for All That Is by Joan Chittister, OSB and Archbishop Rowan Williams (nonfiction/spiritual aspects of gratitude):  “What if life itself was meant to be one long alleluia moment?  Here, indeed, resided the real meaning, the real hope of life. But was it possible?”  Reflections on faith, doubt, wealth, poverty, divisions, conflict, life, unity, suffering, darkness.

December 13 (Note date change to 2^nd Tuesday) – This Book is Overdue! How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All by Marilyn Johnson (nonfiction/librarians):  We need librarians, who won't charge us by the question or roll their eyes, no matter what we ask.  This book is a romp through the ranks of information professionals: bloggers, radicals and visionaries who fuse the tools of the digital age with their love for the written word, free speech, open access, and assistance to anyone in need.

January 17 – Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer (novel):  Meet Oskar Schell, an inventor, Francophile, tambourine player, Shakespearean actor, jeweler, pacifist, correspondent with Stephen Hawking and Ringo Starr.  He is nine years old. And he is on an urgent, secret search through the five boroughs of New York.  His mission is to find the lock that fits a mysterious key belonging to his father, who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11.  

February 21 – The Girl Who Fell from the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow (novel – 2012 Everybody Reads book):  Rachel, daughter of a Danish mother and a black G.I dad, becomes the sole survivor of a family tragedy.  She moves to a mostly black community in Portland to live with her grandmother, where her light brown skin, blue eyes and beauty bring mixed attention her way.  She learns to swallow her overwhelming grief and confronts her identity as a biracial young woman in a world that wants to see her as either black or white.  

March 20 – One Writer’s Beginnings by Eudora Welty (memoir, American novelists, 20^th century childhood and youth):  Book is taken from her lectures.  Parts about her family are by turns hilarious and affecting, a book not about but of herself – by her calculated disclosures, this writer makes herself and her writing powerful and free.  

April 17 – Let's Take the Long Way Home A Memoir of Friendship by Gail Caldwell:  Pulitzer Prize-winning author Caldwell reflects on her own coming-of-age in midlife, as she learns to open herself to the power and healing of sharing her life with a best friend.  

May 15 – The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig (novel)  “Can't cook but doesn't bite." So begins the newspaper ad offering the services of an "A-1 housekeeper” that draws the attention of widower Oliver Milliron in the fall of 1909.  And so begins the unforgettable season that takes Rose and her font-of-knowledge brother, Morris, to Montana.  When the schoolmarm runs off with an itinerant preacher, Morris is pressed into service, setting the stage for the "several kinds of education,” none of them of the textbook variety.  

June 19 – The Opposite Field by Jesse Katz (memoir):  The son of former Portland mayor, Vera Katz, marries a Nicaraguan woman and brings her family to the U.S. as refugees.  Faced with the collapse of his son's Little league, Katz finds himself thrust into the role of baseball commissioner for La Loma Park, where he soothes egos, brokers disputes, applies Popsicles to bruises and chases down delinquent coaches and missing equipment.  Also tells the story of Vera’s, who is Jewish, amazing escape from occupied France and a little of her history as Portland mayor.  

July 17 – Freedom by Jonathan Franzen (novel):  Idyllic lives of civic-minded environmentalist couple come into question when their son moves in with aggressive Republican neighbors, husband takes a job with the coal industry, and wife becomes unstable and deranged.  

August 21 – Our tradition for August is to bring a favorite book to share, instead of reading and discussing the same book.  Our 2012 theme is food – this could be a book about the science of food, a memoir with a food theme (for example travel, cooking, or spiritual), a cookbook, or book about the social customs surrounding food.  Also bring your list of suggested books to read for the following year – September 2012 – July 2013.

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