Life Books

At the beginning of 2008, one of my objectives for the year (which doesn't sound as risky as "resolutions") was to identify some life books. The impetus for this came from reading The Contrarian's Guide to Leadership a couple of years ago. It was written by Steven Sample, the President of USC. One of the chapters was called, "You are what you read..." He argued that rather than reading all the latest, fadish books (like his), those who aspire to become better acquainted with humanity ought to read old books, and to master a few of them. So, I'm aiming to put together a list of less than ten of my "Life Books"--books that I will read over and over.

After about five months of this, I'm thinking that the objective might need to be modified slightly (which is always easier than breaking a resolution!). There is certainly something universal about the human condition, and the greatest of literature (fiction and non-fiction) captures this. But there is also something about our particular contexts--our situatedness, to anticipate a future posting--that I don't want to conceal or obliterate. To that end, I may need two lists. And right now I think I'm separating those lists rather arbitrarily, by the year 1900: those written before, and those written after. (And for the post-1900, I've only considered fiction so far.) Aside from dates, I'm trying to have some reasonable cultural distribution too, but ultimately I'm relying more significantly on the criterion Robby Prenkert gave me for such purposes: does the book enchant?

Here are the working lists so far:

Pre-1900:

1. The Holy Bible
2. The Iliad, Homer
3. The Republic, Plato
4. Confessions, Augustine
5. Don Quixote, Cervantes
6. King Lear, Shakespeare
7. Meditations, Descartes
8. Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics, Kant
9. The Brothers Karamazov, Dostoyevski
10. The Scarlet Letter, Hawthorne

Post-1900 Fiction:

1. The Great Gatsby, Fitzgerald
2. Lord of the Rings, Tolkein
3. Chronicles of Narnia, Lewis
4. Things Fall Apart, Achebe
5. The Chosen, Potok
6. Silence, Endo
7. 100 Years of Solitude, Marquez
8. Name of the Rose, Eco
9. Beloved, Morrison
10. A Thousand Splendid Suns, Hosseini

Objectives may be revised at any time without further notice.

Masterson and God

Justin Masterson got his second start for the Red Sox tonight (see blog on first start here), and tonight the bullpen did its job and he comes away with his first big league win. He went six and a third innings, giving up only one earned run (and that one came after he left the game). The Red Sox only scored two, but it was enough as Papelbon came on for the save.

During the game, I started wondering how much God cares about baseball. I remember since I was a kid being skeptical about praying for my team to win. But it seems to change things when we move from a generic prayer like that to a specific prayer about this individual player that we know. I find myself trying to suppress the prayer that involuntarily came to my lips with every payoff pitch, "God, let Justin strike that guy out." Because there is also someone that the batter knows who is praying for him to hit a home run on that same pitch. It seems like such prayers cancel each other out and make a mockery of God's involvement in the affairs of the world.

Yet, it doesn't seem wrong to pray, "Let him do his best." Is it problematic that "doing his best" seems to mean "pitching really well... and most likely winning"?? And every batter's mom is praying for him to do his best, which means getting a hit most of the time?! If this is what we mean, we're still stuck in a mode of thinking that our prayers are about affecting the outcome of the game. And in that theological masterpiece, Angels in the Outfield, we learned that at least championships have to be won on their own.

I'd like to think that "Let him do his best" means something closer to "Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven." There is a sense that when anything is functioning as it ought to, it is reflecting the kingdom of God. I think this is true of the natural world just as much as the spiritual realm. But that doesn't mean that everything will always go the way we want it to go. Even when baseball players are functioning as they ought, they're going to win some and lose some. We can pray for peace for the player, for him to be free from distraction, to function as he is capable of; and I believe that God assists in those things. But especially in a game of baseball, there are lots of things that are left to chance. The kingdom mindset is that no matter the outcome, I know that all will be well. With that perspective, we can see how there could be things like games in heaven without both teams winning all the time!

Undoubtedly, Justin is going to pitch in some more major league games. And there are enough Christians in his life, that I'm sure there will be lots of people praying for him when he pitches. And I'll bet he'll win some of those games and lose some of them--and that won't be dependent on how fervently we're praying for him. Through it all, I'll keep praying that the kingdom of God will be evident through his pitching. (But it sure is fun when he wins!!)

Congrats, Justin.

Silence

I finished rereading Shusaku Endo's Silence last night (the first time I read it was in 2005). This strikes me as a very important novel--which probably doesn't mean anything more than, "I really like it."

Probably most of us have thought about what we would go through for our faith. Would we be able to die for what we believe? Would we go through torture and be martyred? As we see in Silence, those are the easy questions...

At the next level, would we allow others to be tortured because of our own faith? And, what does it mean to apostatize? Is there a difference between some external action that has always been associated with relinquishing one's faith and the internal commitment? How do we respond to God's seeming silence and indifference?

And perhaps most profoundly, what is the cultural garb of our faith?

I know that a few of you out there have read and appreciated Silence. I'd be interested to hear your takes on it.

500

I started running more regularly last June, and that's when I started keeping a running log. With today's six mile run, I went over the 500 mile mark.

It also makes two days and twenty-one hours worth of running in the past year. Physical exercise is certainly a spiritual discipline for me (part of that whole "beating my body and making it my slave" thing). I wonder, though, if I've prayed for two days and twenty-hours in the past year?

Something seems wrong to me about keeping a prayer log in terms of the number of minutes prayed per day. Lots of people keep a prayer journal, though. Is that the same sort of thing? More qualitative than quantitative, I suppose.

Can we push the comparison further? One of the big things in getting more effective in running is just logging lots of miles. It doesn't really matter how fast; your body "remembers" the miles and benefits from them when you try to run more seriously. I pray the Lord's prayer just about every day. Does that do anything analogous? Does the regular habit of praying somehow make my prayers more effective?

Library Update

So I saw that Howie Mandel (sp?) commercial the other day for buy.com claiming to sell books for cheaper than Amazon and Barnes & Noble. I'm always up for a good challenge in buying books, so I put it to the test. And since my last post on this subject, I've had the good fortune of acquiring a few other books via the largess of publishers who think I might somehow become a spokesman for their products. And there were a couple of others I found in the basement of the Griffon in downtown South Bend waiting for the symphony to begin the other night. So here are the newest citizens of Stump Bibliotheque Nation:

• J.M. Coetzee, Diary of a Bad Year (This is for Robby's book club. 50 pages in, I'm not enchanted yet...)
• Hans-Georg Gadamer, Truth and Method (This is for John's book club. 5 pages took me the same amount of time to read as the 50 in book #1. This doesn't bode well for the next 576 pages, but there is a greater enchantment factor going so far.)
• Timothy Paul Jones, Christian History Made Easy (I'm a little embarrassed to list this one here, but it's got lots of great lists that are saving me lots of time.)
• E.P. Sanders, The Historical Figure of Jesus (one of those found at the second-hand store; allowed me to give back my borrowed copy.)
• Frederick, Buechner, Secrets in the Dark (A book of sermons by one of my favorite writers. His name is pronounced BEEK ner.)
• Edward Slingerland, What Science Offers the Humanities (A freebee that looks pretty interesting.)
• Peter Harrison, The Fall of Man and the Foundations of Science (Here is a bigwig in the history of science and religion claiming that scientific techniques throughout the scientific revolution were developed in order to ameliorate the cognitive damage wrought by the Fall. Now that's an interesting thesis... can it really be defended?)

For those wondering about Howie's pitch... it was true. The first three books on the list were cheaper to get through buy.com than the same three from either Amazon or B&N. You have to be careful of the shipping, though. You qualify for free shipping for $25 or more of qualified purchases; only one of the books qualified, though, so I had to pay shipping. Still it was cheaper than the other two--even counting my Member's discount at B&N.

Periodically Speaking

I enjoy periodicals. Rarely do I read them all the way through. But I'll usually spend five minutes flipping through one when it comes in, and mark for the later the articles I want to read more in depth (or sometimes tear them out and send them to others).

One of the perks of the VP job has been lots of periodicals that are either sent my way for free or paid for out of some mysterious account. As I transition out of the job and lose the mysterious account, I'm going to have to decide which ones I'll pony up for. Here's the current line-up that comes across my desk (in no particular order):

Christianity Today
The Christian Century
Touchstone
Books and Culture
First Things
Chronicle of Higher Education
Historically Speaking
New York Review of Books

Any feedback on which one you think should be the keepers?

Buddhism on the Brain

In today's New York Times there is an editorial by David Brooks (whom I know nothing about) called, "The Neural Buddhists." It discusses the move beyond materialism among the brain theorists (what we like to call "philosophers of mind") to the acceptance of the transcendent: "The mind seems to have the ability to transcend itself and merge with a larger presence that feels more real." He calls this "Neural Buddhism."

Brooks reads this shift as part of the culture war between a Christian worldview and a scientific worldview. But this one is not so much about atheism as it is about orthodoxy. He says, "The cognitive revolution is not going to end up undermining faith in God, it's going [to] end up challenging faith in the Bible."

A couple of (undeveloped thoughts):
1. The vast majority of scientists are not going about actively attempting to undermine Christianity or religion in general. There are only a few loud-mouthed ones with big book deals that are doing that. The rest go about their business trying to advance within their guilds by discovering new things.
2. There are two extremes we would do well to avoid: a) reading the Bible as a scientific textbook; b) thinking that revelation has no import for the larger worldview in which science operates.

Symphony

So the reincarnation of my blog seems to be a lot more just newsy stuff about the family than it is deep reflections on life. And by the comments and readership stats, it appears that the blogging public preferred the old format...

Nevertheless, I'm going keep the new way going for at least another entry. Our middle son, Trevor, plays on a xylophone team at his fifth grade. The coach for the team is the principal tympanist for the South Bend Symphony. Last weekend the team got to play at a fancy reception and then in the lobby prior to the symphony.

Also notable is the fact that the symphony performance was the special 75 year Gala celebration for the SBSO. And for the occasion, they brought symphonic superstar, Hillary Hahn to town. Here is a picture of her with Bethel math professor Rob Myers (and his wife Michelle)--no slouch himself at the violin.

Good times had by all.

Another running blog

I ran at lunchtime today at the Bethel track. When I got back to my office afterwards, I had this email message waiting for me from a Bethel employee:


Jim,

I’d appreciate it if you’d kindly refrain from running around the track while I’m sitting in my car near the fence trying to eat my Cheesy Gordita Crunch and Caramel Apple Empanada. I feel like I’m being preached at. This shameless display of “wellness evangelism” is interfering with my enjoyment of hybrid pseudo-Mexican food and undermines the college’s focus toward diversity. Perhaps you could just go down to the other end of the track and run in place behind the fence. I’ll honk when I’m finished.


I ain’t heavy – I’m your overstuffed brother.

tim

Today IS that day...

So I have these three boys--here posing at a Wal-Mart in Wisconsin during a recent vacation (yes, we vacation at Wal-Marts). Like most boys, they're pretty competitive and there is some Oedipal thing where they'd like to beat their dad. I talk a lot of smack with them, trying to demonstrate that their dad is tough and manly. One of my favorite lines is to paraphrase Aragon in Return of the King when he is rallying the troops before the black gate. We'll get wrestling together and I'll announce: "The day will come when you boys will be able to take your father. But that day is not this day!"

Truth be told, there are several events at which I can't keep up with my boys any more. I've given up trying in video games. The controllers have just become too complicated (my video game neuro-circuitry was formed on the Atari joystick). And in board games we play pretty straight-up with each other (Connor won Monopoly last night). I've held on to physical dominance, though. In wrestling, I can still take all three at once--but now it hurts my body pretty bad. Basketball in the driveway is getting closer, but the advantage still goes to the old guy.

Today, Casey (age 14.5) asked to go to the track and race me in a mile. He's in track right now and works very hard and diligently at running. But I've been running too. He broke 6 minutes for the first time this past week. I haven't run a mile all-out in quite some time, but have done some speed work as part of my runs. So I figured it was time to give him a shot. Well, it turns out that today is the day that junior beats senior. It was very windy at the track, and I kept pace for a six minute mile for the first two laps, but on the third, turning into the wind coming down the home stretch... I died (I thought literally so for a bit). He pulled ahead and stretched it out on the last lap to a 12 second victory.

Oh well, at least I still have chess.