The Triumph of Christianity: How the Jesus Movement Became the World’s Largest Religion by Rodney Stark, HarperOne, 2011Did it ever occur to you that the fall of Rome was a liberating event, not the cause of descent into barbarism, and that therefore the so-called “Dark Ages” are an invention of later historians? That Constantine’s conversion to Christianity and subsequent support of the Church turned out to be a very mixed blessing? That a belief in the God of the Bible encourages and supports science? That the Crusades weren’t the horrible bloodletting that they’re usually made out to be?
Debi Simons
A Changed Life
The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert: An English Professor’s Journey into Christian Faith by Rosaria Champagne Butterfield, Crown & Covenant Publications, 2014. Link is to the author’s website.
This book recently came up in a discussion with my friend Clover. “You’d better not read that book if you’re not serious about your faith,” she said. How true. I had read it earlier when our pastor quoted from it in a sermon and kept thinking that I should include it in this blog. Clover’s comments spurred me on. There’s a new expanded version out now but I couldn’t find that image. The version includes some sections written by the pastor who reached out to Butterfield and was instrumental in her salvation.
I fell in love with this book when I read the following:
How It All Began
The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun by Gretchen Rubin, HarperCollins, 2009 (original hardback publication date; now available in several other formats)
It occurred to me that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to do a formal review (well, as formal as these things ever are) of The Happiness Project, since that book kicked off my whole “Intentional Living” thing. I give credit to the book in Intentional Happiness and also on the home page of this website, but here’s some further information. Gretchen Rubin certainly doesn’t need my help in selling any more books, as she’s sold about a gazillion already, and I would like for everyone reading this to buy a copy of my book first, but then after that you should buy a copy of her book if you’re one of the half dozen people who hasn’t already done so.
Eating Lean Is Pretty Mean
The Big FAT Surprise: Why Butter, Meat & Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet by Nina Teicholz, Simon and Schuster, 2014.
Let me say that I hope Teicholz makes a ton of money from this book. She deserves that, having spent the past nine years doing the research for the 337 pages of text plus 100+ pages of notes that comprise this book. And the message is: Whatever you think you know about what current research tells us constitutes healthy eating, you’re almost certainly wrong. If you go back and actually look at the original data for the studies that have been so influential in our dietary thinking over the past few decades, as Teicholz has done, you’ll find that they don’t actually say what it’s been said that they say.
So, for example, take a look at the so-called “Mediterranean Diet,” beloved in song and story. What does it consist of? Lots of vegetables, lots of whole grains, fish, and the very occasional serving of red meat. The fat of choice is olive oil, gallons of it.
The Importance of Humility
Humility: True Greatness by C. J. Mahaney, Multnomah Books, 2005. Link is to the book’s Amazon page.
This little book packs a lot into a few pages. We’d had it around the house for years and I’d never read it, which is a shame, as I could have benefited from it much sooner. At first I struggled to get through it, as I found it a bit dry. Come on, C.J.! Tell us a few jokes, the way you do in your sermons! (I’ve heard Mahaney speak several times when he was a guest preacher at a former church.) As the book went on, though, I became more and more involved in it. The best chapters come at the end.
Let me quote from chapter 9, “Encouraging Others”:
The Truth About Sugar
Sweet Poison: Why Sugar Makes Us Fat by David Gillespie, Penguin Books, 2008. Link is to the book’s page on the author’s website. Some parts of this website are subscription only.
You’ll find quite a few books about food and nutrition as this book blog continues. (I’m reading a book titled The Big Fat Surprise: Why Butter, Meat & Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet; it should show up soon.) David Gillespie is the most accessible writer I’ve found on the subject of the evils of sugar. Robert Lustig’s Fat Chance and Gary Taubes’ Why We Get Fat: and What to Do About It are both good resources but very dense. You have to be pretty interested in the subject already in order to be motivated to plow through them. Gillespie, on the other hand, is funny, smart, and brief, and he plentifully illustrates his ideas from his own experience. I have to admit that I did a little skipping in the chapter “Biochemistry 101,” but he does an admirable job of explaining the actual processes by which our bodies transform food into energy.
Two for the Price of One
Plato at the Googleplex: Why Philosophy Won’t Go Away by Rebecca Newberger Goldstein. New York: Pantheon Books, 2014. Link is to the author’s website.
So . . .a 400+-page book on philosophy. Real promising, isn’t it? I hope I can persuade you to read it, even though parts of it are quite challenging and dense. Sometimes you finish a book with a feeling of satisfaction: “I made it through.” Sometimes with almost a sigh of relief: “So that’s what happened!” But once in a great while, at least for me, there’s a feeling of regret: “Now I won’t get to be in the company of these characters any more.” And that’s how I felt about the character of Plato in this book. Suddenly I realized, “Oh no! I’m almost finished, and I don’t want to be. I want to go along with Plato into more of our modern world, hearing his take on all sorts of other situations.” I hope I can get across in this post what a charming, gracious, focused person Plato is in this book.