Tag: reading

Why does my third child, my little son whom I mention above, need me to be in physical contact with him while he reads? Because it helps him feel warm and safe, I imagine, and so he is not as afraid of making mistakes. Alternative educators recognized this in the classroom decades ago: that children read better with an adult’s arm around them, or while piled onto soft pillows with a couple of friends.

Hooten Wilson draws on theological as well as literary works to demonstrate various approaches to a text, leading to the contemplative mode, which she asserts should be “the end of all our reading.”

Lying on a bed at 2:00 AM idly flipping through a book while texting a friend isn’t likely to be a transformative experience. Treating education as a hoop to jump through to secure a job, make money, and consume leads to practices serving that end. The authors in this book will challenge our perceptions about what learning is for.

I hope pastors read this book. But more than that, I hope it finds its way into the hands of examining chaplains and board elders, of district superintendents and seminary principals. They can do much to shape a culture where pastor-readers become more common.

Christians, then, have the proper perspective from which to read literature. We can see the profound truths of literature, be they ancient or modern, “pagan” or Christian. Furthermore, we can also rebut those scholars and interpreters who would rather praise the rage of Achilles and the false love of Heathcliff and Catherine instead of accepting the plainer truth that peace and new life come through acts of reconciliatory forgiveness, however hard it is to live by that standard ourselves.

Alan Jacobs is right that if we would receive a blessing from the dead, we will have to wrestle with them.

Christian monastic pioneers saw that books left on the windowsill are more likely to make an impression on those outside than on those within.

The day after Thanksgiving yields a joy of three parts. The first joy is that of an introvert newly restored to peace and quiet...

Beautifully and substantially-made books suggest something that deserve to be pored over at length, just as one lingers with friends after a wonderful meal.