What I'm Reading
From Ikon
Contents |
Reading at the moment
Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton
The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins
Books I have read recently
Miss Wyoming, Douglas Coupland
Engaging novel satirising the banality of modern life. I liked this quotation from the last page:
He looked at Susan's reflection in the black window glass. John remembered once yelling at a cameraman on film, whom he was convinced was color-blind. During a break John went off to props and brought back with him a piece of shiny black plastic. He gave it to the cameraman, and the cameraman asked him, "What's this for?" and John said, "It's something the Impressionist painters used to do. Whenever they were unsure of the true color of something, they'd look at its reflection in a piece of black glass. They thought that the only way they could ever see the true nature of something was to reflect it onto something dark.
Whit, Iain Banks
Iain Banks is one of my favourite authors. The characters in this novel are members of a religious cult in Scotland. Very funny, but asks some probing questions about the nature of belief.
Sex, Economy, Freedom & Community, Wendell Berry
The word Sex was obviously put in the title by the publishers to sell more copies, as sex is not actually mentioned in the book until the last chapter (although what he has to say about when he gets there is interesting). The book is eight essays about how local community is important because people have a stake in where they live, but multinational companies, absentee landlords, etc. don't, and therefore are willing to screw us all and then move on to fresh pickings. There is a great essay about the Gulf War. I think this book would appeal to most people in Ikon.
Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser
Great book, not just slagging off the burger chains but a well researched and damning critique of the way food is grown, processed and sold in America and other industrialised countries.
Soul Survivor: How My Faith Survived the Church, Philip Yancey
Vignettes of people who have been a spiritual inspiration to Yancey and helped to take him out of the narrow conservatism in which he was raised.
A Generous Orthodoxy, Brian McLaren
Helpfully subtitled Why I Am a Missional, Evangelical, Post/Protestant, Liberal/Conservative, Mystical/Poetic, Biblical, Charismatic/Contemplative, Fundamentalist/Calvinist, Anabaptist/Anglican, Methodist, Catholic, Green, Incarnational, Depressed-yet-hopeful, Emergent, Unfinished Christian. McLaren is from an evangelical background and his critique of church is hardest on his own tradition. Yet he doesn't want to throw everything out and looks for the good in evangelicalism. Helped to restore my faith in church without needing to ignore all the failures and inadequacies of church.
Wired Magazine
Wired is mainly a magazine for technophiles but often has articles on philosophical or religious themes where there is a scientific or technological slant. All the articles are available to read online. Here are a few that may be of interest:
- The Church of the Non-Believers, November 2006, about Richard Dawkins and the New Atheists
- Mission From God, November 2006, review of Left Behind: Eternal Forces, video game based on the book series by Tim LaHaye.
- The Second Coming of Philip K. Dick, December 2003, discusses the philosophy of the science-fiction writer whose books have now been made into films including Blade Runner, Total Recall and A Scanner Darkly. There is an interesting sidebar entitled The Metaphysics of Philip K. Dick which claims that Dick encountered a cosmic force he later called VALIS, which stands for Vast Active Living Intelligence System - a cybernetic God. To sneak into our fallen world, Valis must disguise itself as TV ads or trash (or pulpy sci-fi entertainment).
- What Would Jesus Play?, December 2003, claims that in 2002, sales of Christian videogames, music, books and cinema tickets in the USA reached USD $3.6 billion.
