An Appeal for the Physical Book

Stained Glass Mirrors and Windows: Reading Literature Through a Lens of Faith "A story is a way to say something that can't be said any other way… You tell a story because a statement would be inadequate." ~ Flannery O'Connor "In plot itself, we find many strong fingerprints of an Author… they are signs of what used to be called Divine Providence… To read a story, you need more than logic… You need intuition and appreciation; you need the art of reading a good story." ~ Peter Kreeft "Literature thus has to do, in one way or another, with our deepest desires in this life, for on a profound level literature engages our concrete existence, with its innate tensions, desires and meaningful experiences… The uniqueness of literature lies in the fact that it conveys the richness of experience… by expressing and interpreting its deeper meaning… [through] the mysterious and indissoluble sacramental union between the divine Word and our human words." ~ Pope Francis, Letter on the Role of Literature in Formation, August 6, 2024 In his letter "On the Role of Literature in Formation" published on August 4, 2024, Pope Francis underscored the importance of reading literature for the formation of the heart and mind of all Christians. Reading novels, he noted, can help readers find serenity, know others, face the challenges of life, and understand the world. This stance comes at a pertinent time, as much young adult literature (literature aimed at adolescent readership) tends to explore "the trappings" of faith or sees religion as an impediment to personal growth and identity formation, rather than a means by which growth and identity are fostered (Campbell, 2015; Boerman-Cornell et al., 2023). As a result, scholars and educators are hungry for an approach that positively and productively combines aspects and depictions of religion with literary study and analysis. To this need, we are searching for contributions for chapter proposals that detail fresh perspectives of literary analysis and interpretation through a method that grounds some aspect of religiona lens of faith, spirituality, virtues, moral or religious imagination, Gospel values, Catholic Social Teaching, and/or the transcendental values of Truth, Beauty, and Goodnessas a guiding framework to read, study, and interpret literature. Examples of such frameworks, along with sample chapter ideas, are included at the end of this document. We are especially interested in proposals dealing with contemporary and young adult literature, but we are open to all contributions. We hope that this edited collection will offer innovative ways for integrating literary study with themes and topics connected to faith, spirituality, and religion to broad audiences of educators, professors, graduate students in English, education, religion, and philosophy studies. Final chapters will run approximately 3-6,000 words long, including references, tables, figures, and citations. Chapters geared toward practices that can implemented in middle school, high school, or university classrooms should aim for 3-4,000 words, while research-based or theory-driven chapters may aim for 5-6,000 words.

Dialog, 2010

Theological Librarianship, 2017

Sometimes the collected essays in a Festschrift, to borrow a line from the movie Forrest Gump, resemble a box of chocolates-you never know what you are going to get. In the case of Reading for Faith and Learning, which was edited by librarians John B. Weaver and Douglas L. Gragg, one finds a rich and varied assortment of nineteen essays. The contributors include colleagues and friends of our esteemed associate M. Patrick (Pat) Graham, Director of the Pitts Theological Library at Emory University, whose career is honored with this volume. These authors represent a variety of disciplines including library and information science, preaching, church history, Hebrew Bible, religious education, and others.

An education isn't how much you have committed to memory, or even how much you know. It's being able to differentiate between what you do know and what you don't. It's knowing where to go to find out what you need to know; and it's knowing how to use the information you get. ~~William Feather (1889-1981) Hacker, Diana and Barbara Fister. Research and Documentation in the Electronic Age. Boston: Bedford St. Martins, 2010.

Leaven, 2012

HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies

The introduction of the Bible in Africa operated on two major frontiers, firstly, the oral tradition of the missionary who possessed both the Gospel message by word and in the written text (gadget). Conversion occurred through oral ‘manipulation’ that includes an oral negation of the native’s history and worldviews. Secondly, the rise of missionary schools opened the door to the reading of the Bible. However, the black experience has revealed that the reading of the Bible by blacks, slaves and the oppressed gave rise to a new world of interpretation and, in some respects, quietened the oral, historical, political and spiritual disturbance of the missionary voice as the vanguard of the colonial master. It is not the gadget or the written word that is in dispute, even in the digital era, but what the Bible says about oppression, poverty, injustice, dehumanisation, equitable distribution of wealth and politics. Through the paradigms of liberative thought, namely, the hermeneutics of th...

this course as indicative of reverence-this plea in bar of effort-"thus far and no farther." "There is often a great deal of intellectual sin concealed under this old aphorism," remarks Henry Drummond. "When men do not really wish to go farther they find it an honorable convenience sometimes to sit down on the outmost edge of the 'holy ground' on the pretext of taking off their shoes." "Yet," he continues, "we must be certain that, making a virtue of reverence, we are not merely excusing ignorance; or under the plea of 'mystery' evading a truth which has been stated in the New Testament a hundred times, in the most literal form, and with all but monotonous repetition." (Spiritual Law, pp. 89, 90.) This sort of "reverence" is easily simulated, and is of such flattering unction, and so pleasant to follow-"soul take thine ease"-that without question it is very often simulated; and falls into the same category as the simulated humility couched in "I don't know," which so often really means "I don't care, and do not intend to trouble myself to find out." V. THE PRAISE OF SIMPLE FAITH. I maintain that "simple faith"-which is so often ignorant and simpering acquiescence, and not faith at all-but simple faith taken at its highest value, which is faith without understanding of the thing believed, is not equal to intelligent faith, the faith that is the gift of God, supplemented by earnest endeavor to find through prayerful thought and research a rational ground for faith-for acceptance of truth; and hence the duty of striving for a rational faith in which the intellect as well as the heart-the feeling-has a place and is a factor. But, to resume: This plea in bar of effort to find out the things that are, is as convenient for the priest as it is for the people. The people of "simple faith," who never question, are so much easier led, and so much more pleasant every way-they give their teachers so little trouble. People who question because they want to know, and who ask adult questions that call for adult answers, disturb the ease of the priests. The people who question are usually the people who think-barring chronic questioners and cranks, of courseand thinkers are troublesome, unless the instructors who lead them are thinkers also; and thought, eternal, restless thought, that keeps out upon the frontiers of discovery, is as much a weariness to the slothful, as it is a joy to the alert and active and noble minded. Therefore one must not be surprised if now and again he finds those among religious teachers who give encouragement to mental laziness under the pretense of "reverence;" praise "simple faith" because they themselves, forsooth, would avoid the stress of thought and investigation that would be necessary in order to hold their place as leaders of a thinking people. VI. THE INCENTIVES TO, AND THE GLORY OF, KNOWLEDGE IN THE NEW DISPENSATION. Against all the shams of simulated humility and false reverence which are but pleas to promote and justify mental laziness, I launch the mighty exhortations and rebukes of the New Dispensations of the Gospel of the Christ-the Dispensation of the Fulness of Times, in which God has promised "to gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth; even in him." They are as follows: "The glory of God is Intelligence." (Doc. and Cov. Sec. 93.) "It is impossible for a man to be saved in Ignorance." (Doc. and Cov. Sec. 131.) "Whatever principles of intelligence we attain unto in this life, it will rise with us in the resurrection." (Doc. and Cov. Sec. 130.) "If a person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through his diligence and obedience than another, he will have so much the advantage in the world to come." (Doc. and Cov. Sec. 130.) "A man is saved no faster than he gets knowledge, for if he does not get knowledge, he will be brought into captivity by some evil power in the other world, as evil spirits will have more knowledge, and consequently more power, than many men who are on the earth."