Sunday, September 10, 2006

REVIEW: THE HEART OF CHRISTIANITY

The Heart of Christianity by Marcus J. Borg

I almost put this book down after only 32 pages. Borg tries to get you to deconstruct & redo your thinking about major foundations of the Christian faith. But, to suggest changing your thoughts about key points like God and the Bible is just pushing it too far, in my opinion.

I originally picked up this book because I'd heard that Borg was deeply entrenched in the "emerging church" conversation, and I had to see for myself. Now I'm convinced.

There were a few good points/truths that I took from the book, so it wasn't a complete waste of my time. But, overall, it's not a book that I'd recommend to anyone.

Rated: C

Monday, September 04, 2006

REVIEW: BLAH, BLAH, BLAH

Blah, Blah, Blah: Making Sense of the World's Spiritual Chatter by Bayard Taylor

This was a very interesting book just packed-full with information! And, it was humorous, too, so not too heavy.

I loved that a lot of chapter titles & subtitles were names of books or movies that've been sometimes slightly tweaked: "Goodnight, Moon", "Where the Wild Things Are", "The Hitchiker's Guide to Atheism", "Clash of the Titans", etc.

The author talks of 6 commonly held worldviews:
- the Haunted Worldview
- Dueling Yodas
- Omnipresent Supergalactic Oneness
- WYSIWYG
- Designer Religion
- Biblical Worldview

...and outlines each one. He shows how they can be similar to, and how they differ from, the Biblical worldview.

Written for the college-age crowd, this book is easy-to-understand, and would make a great study/discussion tool for Youth groups or Sunday School classes! Too often we're not taught about other worldviews, and therefore don't know how to intelligently enter into conversations with people who hold ones different from our own.

Rated: B