A wonderful quote from the book "You are the Beloved":
"if you dare to believe that you are beloved before you are born, you may suddenly realize that your life is very, very special. You become conscious that you were sent here just for a short time, for twenty, forty or eighty years, to discover and believe that you are a beloved child of God. The length of time doesn't matter. You are sent into this world to believe in yourself as God's chosen one and then to help your brothers and sisters know that they are also Beloved Sons and Daughters of God who belong together. You're sent into this world to be a people of reconciliation. You are sent to heal, to break down the walls between you and your neighbors, locally, nationally, and globally. Before all distinctions, the separations, and the walls build on foundations of fear, there was a unity in the mind and heart of God. Out of that unity, you are sent into this world for a little while to claim that you and every other human being belongs to the same God of Love who lives from eternity to eternity."
You Are the Beloved
Henri H. W. Nouwen
pg. 395
2018-12-30 [P-B]
Showing posts with label book. Show all posts
Showing posts with label book. Show all posts
Sunday, December 30, 2018
BOOKS: "The Experience of God"
Simon Kidd reviews the book "The Experience of God" by David Bentley Hart:
"The Experience of God is divided into three main parts, with a preceding ten-page ‘Introduction’ detailing David Bentley Hart’s motive for writing it. He explains that recent heated debates about the existence of God indicate a fundamental confusion about the subject. In some ways the book is a challenge to atheists to be clear about what it is that they don’t believe, a task DBH has undertaken at greater length in his 2009 Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies, also published by Yale.
"This is a book of philosophy, rather than theology, and at its core is the tradition of ‘classical theism’. Stemming from Plato and Aristotle, this tradition was developed in the early Christian centuries by the ‘Fathers of the Church’ as well as pagans like Plotinus, reaching its apogee in the writings of the medieval philosopher-theologians of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Apart from the ‘Religions of the Book’, DBH says that the definition of God that he is offering is one that can be found in ‘Vedantic and Bhaktic Hinduism, Sikhism, various late antique paganisms [and] even applies in many respects to various Mahayana formulations of, say, the Buddha Consciousness or the Buddha Nature, or even to the earliest Buddhist conception of the Unconditioned, or to certain aspects of the Tao’ (4). This universalism is also captured in the book’s subtitle, since ‘being, consciousness, bliss’ are translations of the Sanskrit ‘sat, chit, ananda’, which are usually combined into the portmanteau ‘Satchitananda’ (with variant spellings), a term referring to the ultimate reality, Brahman (see Wikipedia: ‘Satchitananda’). The Sanskrit terms are used explicitly in Part Two.
Read the entire review of The Experience of God
"The Experience of God is divided into three main parts, with a preceding ten-page ‘Introduction’ detailing David Bentley Hart’s motive for writing it. He explains that recent heated debates about the existence of God indicate a fundamental confusion about the subject. In some ways the book is a challenge to atheists to be clear about what it is that they don’t believe, a task DBH has undertaken at greater length in his 2009 Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies, also published by Yale.
"This is a book of philosophy, rather than theology, and at its core is the tradition of ‘classical theism’. Stemming from Plato and Aristotle, this tradition was developed in the early Christian centuries by the ‘Fathers of the Church’ as well as pagans like Plotinus, reaching its apogee in the writings of the medieval philosopher-theologians of Christianity, Judaism, and Islam. Apart from the ‘Religions of the Book’, DBH says that the definition of God that he is offering is one that can be found in ‘Vedantic and Bhaktic Hinduism, Sikhism, various late antique paganisms [and] even applies in many respects to various Mahayana formulations of, say, the Buddha Consciousness or the Buddha Nature, or even to the earliest Buddhist conception of the Unconditioned, or to certain aspects of the Tao’ (4). This universalism is also captured in the book’s subtitle, since ‘being, consciousness, bliss’ are translations of the Sanskrit ‘sat, chit, ananda’, which are usually combined into the portmanteau ‘Satchitananda’ (with variant spellings), a term referring to the ultimate reality, Brahman (see Wikipedia: ‘Satchitananda’). The Sanskrit terms are used explicitly in Part Two.
Read the entire review of The Experience of God
Sunday, December 23, 2018
BOOKS: Simone Weil
"Some lives are exemplary, others not; and of exemplary lives, there are those which invite us to imitate them, and those which we regard from a distance with a mixture of revulsion, pity, and reverence. It is, roughly, the difference between the hero and the saint (if one may use the latter term in an aesthetic, rather than a religious sense). Such a life, absurd in its exaggerations and degree of self-mutilation—like Kleist’s, like Kierkegaard’s—was Simone Weil’s. I am thinking of the fanatical asceticism of Simone Weil’s life, her contempt for pleasure and for happiness, her noble and ridiculous political gestures, her elaborate self-denials, her tireless courting of affliction; and I do not exclude her homeliness, her physical clumsiness, her migraines, her tuberculosis. No one who loves life would wish to imitate her dedication to martyrdom nor would wish it for his children nor for anyone else whom he loves. Yet so far as we love seriousness, as well as life, we are moved by it, nourished by it. In the respect we pay to such lives, we acknowledge the presence of mystery in the world—and mystery is just what the secure possession of the truth, an objective truth, denies. In this sense, all truth is superficial; and some (but not all) distortions of the truth, some (but not all) insanity, some (but not all) unhealthiness, some (but not all) denials of life are truth-giving, sanity-producing, health-creating, and life-enhancing."
Read the entire article: Simone Weil
2018-12-23 [P-B]
Read the entire article: Simone Weil
2018-12-23 [P-B]
Tuesday, December 11, 2018
RELIGION: The Book of Job - Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz
What could be better than a rabbi speaking on the book of Job?
2018-12-11 [P-B]
Saturday, December 8, 2018
BOETHIUS: Boethius, Session 01 - Whats Wrong with the World
An incredible TWO HOUR long lecture on the history of Boethius' "Consolation of Philosophy" by Professor Corey Olsen. He talks briefly about two famous British authors who were greatly influenced by him: J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis. But this is mostly about Boethius's life and influence.
2018-12-08 [P-B]
NDE: Howard Storm, Befriend God, Life With Jesus, SOZO Talk Radio EP0017
Sozo talk radio interviews Howard Storm! And it seems Howard has a new book out that I might have to put on my "must read" list....Howard talks about the importance of being friends with Jesus, and why he should be our BEST friend.
2018-12-08 [P-B]
Tuesday, December 4, 2018
PHILOSOPHY: The Consolation of Philosophy (FULL Audiobook)
05 Dec 2018 - Oh my goodness, someone recorded the entire book of "The Consolation of Philosophy" by Anicius Manlius Severinus Boethius in audio format! Feel free to listen to one of the most important philosophical works in Western civilization.
P-B
Sunday, July 29, 2018
BOOK: The Silent Corner
Sunday, July 29, 2018
Just got this book today, as a correction to my mistake of buying the wrong "Jane Hawk" novel to read first! This is the first book in the "Jane Hawk" series by Dean Koontz, the book that will setup all her subsequent adventures. So this is now high on my reading list.
About this book:
“I very much need to be dead.”
These are the chilling words left behind by a man who had everything to live for—but took his own life. In the aftermath, his widow, Jane Hawk, does what all her grief, fear, and fury demand: find the truth, no matter what.
People of talent and accomplishment, people admired and happy and sound of mind, have been committing suicide in surprising numbers. When Jane seeks to learn why, she becomes the most-wanted fugitive in America. Her powerful enemies are protecting a secret so important—so terrifying—that they will exterminate anyone in their way.
But all their power and viciousness may not be enough to stop a woman as clever as they are cold-blooded, as relentless as they are ruthless—and who is driven by a righteous rage they can never comprehend. Because it is born of love.
This should be an interesting read.
P-B
Just got this book today, as a correction to my mistake of buying the wrong "Jane Hawk" novel to read first! This is the first book in the "Jane Hawk" series by Dean Koontz, the book that will setup all her subsequent adventures. So this is now high on my reading list.
About this book:
“I very much need to be dead.”
These are the chilling words left behind by a man who had everything to live for—but took his own life. In the aftermath, his widow, Jane Hawk, does what all her grief, fear, and fury demand: find the truth, no matter what.
People of talent and accomplishment, people admired and happy and sound of mind, have been committing suicide in surprising numbers. When Jane seeks to learn why, she becomes the most-wanted fugitive in America. Her powerful enemies are protecting a secret so important—so terrifying—that they will exterminate anyone in their way.
But all their power and viciousness may not be enough to stop a woman as clever as they are cold-blooded, as relentless as they are ruthless—and who is driven by a righteous rage they can never comprehend. Because it is born of love.
This should be an interesting read.
P-B
BOOK: The Whispering Room
Sunday, July 29, 2018
A new series that Dean Koontz started in 2017 about an FBI agent named Jane Hawk, who stumbled on a terrible conspiracy when her husband committed suicide. The only thing, he was a happy, normal person who had no reason or motive for committing suicide. As any good FBI agent would suspect, she thinks her husband was killed, and the suicide was just a cover. Now she finds a school teacher who committed suicide under very similar circumstances.
I meant to buy the FIRST book in this new series, but when I got it home, I found out it was the second book of the series! Oh well, an easy mistake to correct.
About the book:
“No time to delay. Do what you were born to do. Fame will be yours when you do this.”
These are the words that ring in the mind of mild-mannered, beloved schoolteacher Cora Gundersun—just before she takes her own life, and many others’, in a shocking act of carnage. When the disturbing contents of her secret journal are discovered, it seems certain that she must have been insane. But Jane Hawk knows better.
In the wake of her husband’s inexplicable suicide—and the equally mysterious deaths of scores of other exemplary individuals—Jane picks up the trail of a secret cabal of powerful players who think themselves above the law and beyond punishment. But the ruthless people bent on hijacking America’s future for their own monstrous ends never banked on a highly trained FBI agent willing to go rogue—and become the nation’s most wanted fugitive—in order to derail their insidious plans to gain absolute power with a terrifying technological breakthrough.
Driven by love for her lost husband and by fear for the five-year-old son she has sent into hiding, Jane Hawk has become an unstoppable predator. Those she is hunting will have nowhere to run when her shadow falls across them.
Conspiracy theory thrillers can be fun!
P-B
A new series that Dean Koontz started in 2017 about an FBI agent named Jane Hawk, who stumbled on a terrible conspiracy when her husband committed suicide. The only thing, he was a happy, normal person who had no reason or motive for committing suicide. As any good FBI agent would suspect, she thinks her husband was killed, and the suicide was just a cover. Now she finds a school teacher who committed suicide under very similar circumstances.
I meant to buy the FIRST book in this new series, but when I got it home, I found out it was the second book of the series! Oh well, an easy mistake to correct.
About the book:
“No time to delay. Do what you were born to do. Fame will be yours when you do this.”
These are the words that ring in the mind of mild-mannered, beloved schoolteacher Cora Gundersun—just before she takes her own life, and many others’, in a shocking act of carnage. When the disturbing contents of her secret journal are discovered, it seems certain that she must have been insane. But Jane Hawk knows better.
In the wake of her husband’s inexplicable suicide—and the equally mysterious deaths of scores of other exemplary individuals—Jane picks up the trail of a secret cabal of powerful players who think themselves above the law and beyond punishment. But the ruthless people bent on hijacking America’s future for their own monstrous ends never banked on a highly trained FBI agent willing to go rogue—and become the nation’s most wanted fugitive—in order to derail their insidious plans to gain absolute power with a terrifying technological breakthrough.
Driven by love for her lost husband and by fear for the five-year-old son she has sent into hiding, Jane Hawk has become an unstoppable predator. Those she is hunting will have nowhere to run when her shadow falls across them.
Conspiracy theory thrillers can be fun!
P-B
BOOK: Forever Odd
Sunday, July 29, 2018
Bought this book on Friday, it's book #2 of the "Odd Thomas" series. I listened to the first book on audio, and I'm currently re-reading it in paperback form. Dean Koontz is one very smart man, and is an incredible story teller.
As for what kind of novel these is, it's almost impossible to categorize. Odd Thomas is the actual name of the protagonist, his given first name was, in fact, "Odd." Odd is just a young guy working as a short order cook, but has one very interesting ability: he can see ghosts of the dead, including Elvis. Because of this ability, he can perceive crimes and murders, because some of the ghosts seek him out to bring them justice.
Supernatural crime fighters are nothing new, but a crime fighter who is nothing more than a short order cook with paranormal abilities is certainly not the way these things usually work.
About the book:
"I see dead people. But then, by God, I do something about it."
Odd Thomas never asked for his special ability. He’s just an ordinary guy trying to live a quiet life in the small desert town of Pico Mundo. Yet he feels an obligation to do right by his otherworldly confidants, and that’s why he’s won hearts on both sides of the divide between life and death. But when a childhood friend disappears, Odd discovers something worse than a dead body and embarks on a heart-stopping battle of will and wits with an enemy of exceptional cunning. In the hours to come there can be no innocent bystanders, and every sacrifice can tip the balance between despair and hope.
You’re invited on an unforgettable journey through a world of terror and transcendence to wonders beyond imagining. And you can have no better guide than Odd Thomas.
Looking forward to reading this one!
P-B
Bought this book on Friday, it's book #2 of the "Odd Thomas" series. I listened to the first book on audio, and I'm currently re-reading it in paperback form. Dean Koontz is one very smart man, and is an incredible story teller.
As for what kind of novel these is, it's almost impossible to categorize. Odd Thomas is the actual name of the protagonist, his given first name was, in fact, "Odd." Odd is just a young guy working as a short order cook, but has one very interesting ability: he can see ghosts of the dead, including Elvis. Because of this ability, he can perceive crimes and murders, because some of the ghosts seek him out to bring them justice.
Supernatural crime fighters are nothing new, but a crime fighter who is nothing more than a short order cook with paranormal abilities is certainly not the way these things usually work.
About the book:
"I see dead people. But then, by God, I do something about it."
Odd Thomas never asked for his special ability. He’s just an ordinary guy trying to live a quiet life in the small desert town of Pico Mundo. Yet he feels an obligation to do right by his otherworldly confidants, and that’s why he’s won hearts on both sides of the divide between life and death. But when a childhood friend disappears, Odd discovers something worse than a dead body and embarks on a heart-stopping battle of will and wits with an enemy of exceptional cunning. In the hours to come there can be no innocent bystanders, and every sacrifice can tip the balance between despair and hope.
You’re invited on an unforgettable journey through a world of terror and transcendence to wonders beyond imagining. And you can have no better guide than Odd Thomas.
Looking forward to reading this one!
P-B
Friday, July 13, 2018
ARTICLE: INEVITABLE SCHOLASTICISM: A REVIEW OF "INTRODUCTION TO SCHOLASTIC THEOLOGY"
Friday, July 13, 2018
Excellent book review on the importance of Scholasticism from First Things:
P-B
Excellent book review on the importance of Scholasticism from First Things:
Leinsle shows that many truisms that animate the standard narratives of Catholic theology are false. For example, he refutes the notion that Scholastic methods were introduced into theology as an alternative to scriptural reading and biblical commentary. On the contrary, from the sixth century onward, collections of theological sentences were gathered within glosses on Scripture precisely to help readers interpret the sacred text. Patristic citations were assembled by monastic communities in the eleventh and twelfth centuries in order to facilitate understanding of the discrete senses of Scripture (the literal sense, the typological, the moral, and the analogical). The first concordances of terms and Bible verses were created by twelfth-century Scholastics in order to compare terms and analyze the meaning of Scripture as a coherent whole.
More decisively, Leinsle shows that our presumption that Scholasticism encourages an insular and isolated mentality is exactly the opposite of the truth. The theology of the high Middle Ages was focused on a central question: In light of the discovery of Aristotelian philosophy, what is the scientific status of Christian theology? In other words, in what sense is Christian theology the queen of the sciences, the most complete view of the world available to human beings? How does it relate then to philosophical or scientific knowledge that derives from natural experience as such—in a respectful and critical way? These are not easy questions to contend with. But they are also unavoidable for an intellectually serious Christian culture.Read the full article here: INEVITABLE SCHOLASTICISM: A REVIEW OF INTRODUCTION TO SCHOLASTIC THEOLOGY
P-B
Thursday, July 5, 2018
TV: CSPAN2: "Treating People Well"
Thursday, July 5, 2018
A wonderful little book TV from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, featuring the two authors of the book "Treating People Well".
"Former White House Social Secretaries Jeremy Bernard and Lea Berman shared their thoughts on professional and public civility."
I've seen that book at Barnes & Noble, and have thought about getting it, maybe this is a sign I should...
Find out more here: "Treating People Well"
P-B
A wonderful little book TV from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library, featuring the two authors of the book "Treating People Well".
"Former White House Social Secretaries Jeremy Bernard and Lea Berman shared their thoughts on professional and public civility."
I've seen that book at Barnes & Noble, and have thought about getting it, maybe this is a sign I should...
Find out more here: "Treating People Well"
P-B
Sunday, June 17, 2018
BOOK: "A Brave New World"
A new book for the Pseudo Boethius library:
It's been at least 30 years or more since I last read this book, but it's influence was profound. It's been on my mind a lot the past couple of years, and hence I decided it might be time to buy a copy.
There are three truly great dystopian novels in the realm of science fiction: Orwell's "1984", Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" and Huxley's "Brave New World". "1984" warns us about the coming surveillance state, the great Opticon that hears and sees all, and lies about absolutely everything. Brandbury's "Fahrenheit 451" is about the dangers of anti-intellectualism, and the dumbing down of people via technology. And Huxley's "Brave New World" is about the state using hedonism and genetics to make a paradise on earth. All three novels accurately predicted the situation we now find ourselves in.
Huxley's book might be the most accurate of the three however, especially in regards to the way that society is consuming pills and drugs of every kind to be "happy" and to stay in a state of perpetual adolescence.
It's been at least 30 years or more since I last read this book, but it's influence was profound. It's been on my mind a lot the past couple of years, and hence I decided it might be time to buy a copy.
There are three truly great dystopian novels in the realm of science fiction: Orwell's "1984", Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" and Huxley's "Brave New World". "1984" warns us about the coming surveillance state, the great Opticon that hears and sees all, and lies about absolutely everything. Brandbury's "Fahrenheit 451" is about the dangers of anti-intellectualism, and the dumbing down of people via technology. And Huxley's "Brave New World" is about the state using hedonism and genetics to make a paradise on earth. All three novels accurately predicted the situation we now find ourselves in.
Huxley's book might be the most accurate of the three however, especially in regards to the way that society is consuming pills and drugs of every kind to be "happy" and to stay in a state of perpetual adolescence.
BOOK: Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs
A new book for the Pseudo Boethius library:
The Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs
2003 - Out of Print
ISBN = 9780785355618
Purchased a used copy in "new" condition from Abebooks.com as a Father's Day gift to myself. I originally saw this book at Half Priced Books, but it was in terrible condition, but I was amazed at the dinosaur artwork it contained within, and made a mental note to find and buy this book online. Should be good! I ordered it today, hopefully I will have it at the end of the week, or the beginning of next week.
The Encyclopedia of Dinosaurs
2003 - Out of Print
ISBN = 9780785355618
Purchased a used copy in "new" condition from Abebooks.com as a Father's Day gift to myself. I originally saw this book at Half Priced Books, but it was in terrible condition, but I was amazed at the dinosaur artwork it contained within, and made a mental note to find and buy this book online. Should be good! I ordered it today, hopefully I will have it at the end of the week, or the beginning of next week.
Saturday, June 16, 2018
MOVIE: "Jurassic Park"
The strange synchronicities of the world are often rather striking....
Soon after watching the 2015 film "Jurassic World", I turned on regular television, and found the 1993 film "Jurassic Park" playing on NBC! This was the film that started the entire "Jurassic" series that is still going very strong to this day.
So after watching "Jurassic World", I found myself easily going back to "Jurassic Park". One thing I really appreciated about both films, is that good old Tyrannosaurus Rex turns out to be the unsung hero of both films.
To find out more about the film "Jurassic Park", click the following link:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107290/?ref_=nv_sr_3
To find out more about the book "Jurassic Park", click this link:
https://www.amazon.com/Jurassic-Park-Novel-Michael-Crichton-ebook/dp/B007UH4D3G/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1529210890&sr=8-3&keywords=book+jurassic+park
The book is a thousand times better than the film.
Soon after watching the 2015 film "Jurassic World", I turned on regular television, and found the 1993 film "Jurassic Park" playing on NBC! This was the film that started the entire "Jurassic" series that is still going very strong to this day.
So after watching "Jurassic World", I found myself easily going back to "Jurassic Park". One thing I really appreciated about both films, is that good old Tyrannosaurus Rex turns out to be the unsung hero of both films.
To find out more about the film "Jurassic Park", click the following link:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107290/?ref_=nv_sr_3
To find out more about the book "Jurassic Park", click this link:
https://www.amazon.com/Jurassic-Park-Novel-Michael-Crichton-ebook/dp/B007UH4D3G/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1529210890&sr=8-3&keywords=book+jurassic+park
The book is a thousand times better than the film.
Friday, June 15, 2018
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