Our library in Hewett Centre is open every Sunday after service during Coffee Hour in Hewett Centre, and our Library Team offers related reading lists based on the topic of Sunday service. Here is their list for the upcoming service featuring Rev. Shawn Gauthier and Vivian Davidson on Sunday, Dec. 8, 2024 at 11 a.m. All welcome in Hewett Centre after Sunday service to check out some books and to have coffee and conversation.
VanU library books related to this Sunday’s sermon:
1. Womanguides: Readings Toward a Feminist Theology, by Rosemary Radford Ruether, 1986, 305.4 RUE [Published by Beacon Press. From LibraryThing, a statement from GoogleBooks of “A fascinating collection of ancient and contemporary readings from the cultural matrix that has shaped Western Christianity, Womanguides is a resource for understanding ideas about gender in Christian tradition and for building alternative patterns that can transform and heal.”].
2. Image As Insight: Visual Understanding In Western Christianity and Secular Culture, by Margaret R. Miles, 1987, 246 MIL [Published by Beacon Press. From LibraryThing: “Miles’s pathbreaking work shows how art and architecture have shaped religious understanding throughout the history of Christianity.”].
3. Her Voice, Her Faith: Women Speak on world Religions, by Katherine K. Young, 2003, 200.82 SHA [Edited by Arvind Sharma. From LibraryThing: “They say religion is a personal and private affair. But when a woman believes in a tradition, she has a relationship to that faith beyond her sacred space. Religious traditions’ historically poor treatment of women has lead many to question why they believe. How has their tradition either embraced and enlightened, or excluded and confined women throughout history? Her Voice, Her Faith presents the personal and historical perspectives of women who not only live their faith day to day, but who also know their religion’s history with women in general.”].
4. Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women’s Rights in Nineteenth-Century America, by Ann Braude, 1991, 133.90 BRA [Published by Beacon Press. From LibraryThing: “… Ann Braude contends that the early women’s rights movement and Spiritualism went hand in hand. Her book makes a convincing argument for the importance of religion in the study of American women’s history. In this new edition, Braude discusses the impact of the book on the scholarship of the last decade and assesses the place of religion in interpretations of women’s history in general and the women’s rights movement in particular. A review of current scholarship and suggestions for further reading make it even more useful for contemporary teachers and students.”].
5. Goddesses, Witches and the Paradigm Shift (Dramatic Readings on Feminist Issues), edited by Meg Bowman, 1994, 305.4 BOW [From Amazon: “Meg Bowman’s paperback book contains dramatic readings on feminist issues. Includes “Finding Our Foremothers”, “Celebrating Ourselves”, “Four Famous UU Women”. With plays, songs, short stories, and bios of strong women in our country’s history, Goddesses, Witches and the Paradigm Shift is an excellent companion for any open minded woman wishing to change societal perceptions.”].
6. A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence, and Power, by Jimmy Carter, 2014, 323.34 CAR [From LibraryThing: “The world’s discrimination and violence against women and girls is the most serious, pervasive, and ignored violation of basic human rights: This is President Jimmy Carter’s call to action. President Carter was encouraged to write this book by a wide coalition of leaders of all faiths. His urgent report covers a system of discrimination that extends to every nation. Women are deprived of equal opportunity in wealthier nations and “owned” by men in others, forced to suffer servitude, child marriage, and genital cutting. The most vulnerable, along with their children, are trapped in war and violence. A Call to Action addresses the suffering inflicted upon women by a false interpretation of carefully selected religious texts and a growing tolerance of violence and warfare. Key verses are often omitted or quoted out of context by male religious leaders to exalt the status of men and exclude women. And in nations that accept or even glorify violence, this perceived inequality becomes the basis for abuse. President Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, have visited 145 countries, and The Carter Center has had active projects in more than half of them. Around the world, they have seen inequality rising rapidly with each passing decade. This is true in both rich and poor countries, and among the citizens within them. Carter draws upon his own experiences and the testimony of courageous women from all regions and all major religions to demonstrate that women around the world, more than half of all human beings, are being denied equal rights. This is an informed and passionate charge about a devastating effect on economic prosperity and unconscionable human suffering. It affects us all”].
7. Dreaming the Dark: Magic, Sex and Politics, by Starhawk, 1989, 299 STA [Gift of Sheilah Thompson. [From LibraryThing: “Featuring narrative, chants, songs, and rituals, Dreaming the Dark has helped many thousands of women use magic, spirituality, and community to bring about political and social change. This anniversary edition of the best-selling classic includes a new preface reflecting on the fifteen years since the book’s original publication.”].
8. Myth and Ritual in Christianity, by Alan W. Watts, 1971, 230 WA [Published by Beacon Press. From LibraryThing, in the Prologue: “Our main object will be to describe one of the most incomparably beautiful myths that has ever flowered from the mind of man, or from the unconscious processes which shape it and which are in some sense more than man…. This is, furthermore, to be a description and not a history of Christian Mythology…. After description, we shall attempt an interpretation of the myth along the general lines of the philosophia perennis, in order to bring out the truly catholic or universal character of the symbols, and to share the delight of discovering a fountain of wisdom in a realm where so many have long ceased to expect anything but a desert of platitudes.”].
9. The Jesus Puzzle: Did Christianity Begin with a Mythical Christ?: Challenging the Existence of an Historical Jesus, by Earl Doherty, 1999, 232.9 DOH [Gift of Arthur Hughes and signed by the author. From LibraryThing: “A new presentation of the argument that no historical Jesus existed. A full and comprehensive survey of the question through an examination of the early Christian record, canonical and non-canonical, from Q to the Gospels, from the earliest Pauline epistles to the second century apologists, along with Jewish, Gnostic, and Greco-Roman documents of the time. The philosophy of the era, its religious expression in the pagan mystery cults, fascinating glimpses into the historical background of the period, an in-depth consideration of the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, are only some of the additional topics covered in the book. A richly-detailed, highly lucid and entertaining account of how Christianity began without an historical Jesus of Nazareth, who came to life only on the pages of the Gospels. The book has been styled for the general reader, though the scholarly community will find it of value as well.”].
10. Who Wrote the New Testament?: The Making of the Christian Myth, by Burton L. Mack, 1995, 226 MAC [Gift of Clare Buckland. From LibraryThing: “… In this groundbreaking and controversial book, Burton Mack brilliantly exposes how the Gospels are fictional mythologies created by different communities for various purposes and are only distantly related to the actual historical Jesus. Mack’s innovative scholarship which boldly challenges traditional Christian understanding’ will change the way you approach the New Testament and think about how Christianity arose. … Mack’s investigation of the various groups and strands of the early Christian community out of which were generated the texts of Christianity’s first anthology of religious literature and makes sense of a topic that has been confusing.”].