The Menu, Draft 1: Choosing The Reading List

The attempt at list-making has begun, and it is already a very large list. I am overwhelmed, but excited. Ever since I left Regent College (Vancouver, BC) I have kept a running list in my head of books and authors I heard about but didn't get to read (yet). There are just too many to choose! I might end up choosing each book as I go, and let the books themselves recommend which ones should follow. My experience of spiritual reading and study is that it often occurs in waves, with recurring themes that weave together to make a larger picture that is often only perceived after the words and ideas have had time to mingle and meld inside my head. Books, scripture, news, sermons, and casual conversations all work together to hammer an idea into my stubborn mind and heart.

Anyway, here's a first draft of possibilities:

*already read

+partially read and/or currently reading

My Personal Wish List:

• *Letters to Malcolm – CS Lewis
• Dark Night of the Soul – St John of the Cross
• *Restoring the Woven Cord: Principles of Celtic Christianity for the Church Today – Michael Mitton
• Interior Castles – St. Theresa of Avila
• +The Transforming Friendship – James Houston
• The Wounded Healer – Henri Nouwen
• *Discipleship on the Edge – Darrell Johnson
• +The Cloister Walk – Kathleen Norris
• Discovering Biblical Equality – Ronald W. Pierce and Rebecca Merrill Groothuis, general editors, with Gordon D. Fee, contributing editor
• There is No Difference – Maxine Hancock
• Basic Christianity – John Stott
• +The Mind Matters – John Stott
• +Home Economics – Wendell Berry
• *The Rule of St. Benedict
• +The Practice of the Presence of God – Brother Lawrence
• +The Cost of Discipleship – Dietrich Bonhoeffer
• +A Year of Living Biblically – A. J. Jacobs
• Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance – Robert M. Pirsig
• *Confessions – St. Augustine
• Unspoken Sermons (Series One) – George MacDonald
• *Holy Masquerade – Olov Hartman
• *The Pursuit of God – AW Tozer
• Middlemarch – George Eliot
• *Till We Have Faces – CS Lewis
• *The Book of the Dun Cow – Walter Wangerin, Jr.
• Paradise Lost – John Milton
• +The Way is Made by Walking: A Pilgrimage Along the Caminode Santiago – Paul Boers
• Something by Eugene Peterson, GK Chesterton, Annie Dillard, Flannery O’Connor, Kathleen Norris, Ron Sider, Ann Lamott
• Something about earthkeeping and Christian Stewardship

Others' Suggestions:

• Divine Conspiracy - Dallas Willard
• +Studies in the Sermon on the Mount - D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones
• The End of Suffering: Finding Purpose in Pain - Scott Cairns
• The World of Silence - Max Picard
• Acedia & me: A Marriage, Monks, and a Writer's Life - Kathleen Norris
• Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion - Sara Miles
• A Holy Meal: The Lord's Supper in the Life of the Church (Gordon Smith)
• Freedom in Exile: The Autobiography of the Dalai Lama
• Many of Walter Wangerin's works: for you, I'd recommend (+)Little Lamb, Who Made Thee? (essays on parenting, etc.) and (*)The Book of the Dun Cow (novel)
• Just about anything by Henri Nouwen
• "The Life Giving Sword", Yagyu Munenori. "Wisdom From the Book of I Ching", Wu Wei
• Feminist Theory and Christian Theology - Serene Jones
• Sermons of Henry Codman Potter
• Sermons of Fleming Rutledge
• When God is Silent – Barbara Brown Taylor
• The Crime of Living Cautiously – Luci shaw
• “Weeds Among the Wheat: Discernment: Where Prayer & Action Meet" and "When the Well Runs Dry: Prayer Beyond the Beginnings" by Thomas H. Green
• "Sleeping with Bread: Holding What Gives You Life" by Dennis Linn, Sheila Linn & Matthew Linn
• Anything by Robert Farrar Capon, especially "An Offering of Uncles" (or the whole trilogy in which it appears: "The Romance of the Word") and "The Supper of the Lamb."
• Already Gone - Ken Ham and Britt Beemer
• Can We Be Good Without God?- Paul Chamberlain
• Brothers Karamazov
• *The Body - Chuck Colson
• The Sparrow - Mary Doria Russell

Yikes!

Many thanks to all the friends on Facebook who offered their best. I now have a list of good reading to last me beyond this one year.

So far I am finding it difficult to get any amount of (quiet, kid-free, uninterrupted and still conscious) time to devote to this blog, but I'll do my best to get the details finalized soon so I can get reading!

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Inspiration Strikes

I've been thinking about starting a blog for a little while now, primarily to encourage myself to do some regular writing. Although I'm sure my personal life would fascinate at least one person out here in cyberspace, I've decided on something that I hope will be a bit more rewarding, both to myself and any other readers who may pass through.

After rejecting many unimpressive and some downright embarrassing ideas for blog topics, inspiration struck, right in the midst of a good sermon - a common situation in which inspiration occurs, floating into my mind like a message in a bottle from a distant shore.

I will commit myself to a year of spiritual reading, and call it a feast. I will dine on the thoughts of great thinkers, past and present, and find nourishment for my own soul. With God's help, perhaps others will be fed also.

52 weeks, 20 books, that's the plan. Though I have many ideas of potential books/authors for this project, I welcome suggestions. I'll try to finalize a list in the next few weeks.

Stay tuned!

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