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 the Sunday service. Here is their list for the Sunday, May 24, 2026 at 11 a.m. service on “Liberating Love in the Midst of Hate”, featuring Janet Pivnick. All are welcome in Hewett Centre after the Sunday service to check out some books, and to have coffee and conversation.
VanU library books related to this Sunday’s sermon:
1. Embracing Israel/Palestine: A Strategy to Heal and Transform the Middle East by Michael Lerner, 2011, 956.05 LER
From the publisher, in LibraryThing: “… continuing attempt to explain the current struggles between Israel and Palestine in a way that is sympathetic to both sides and provides a strategy to building a lasting peace based on acceptance, generosity, and open-hearted reconciliation”.
2. We Can Have Peace in the Holy Land: A Plan That Will Work by Jimmy Carter, 2009, 956.05 CAR
From LibraryThing: “… For the last three decades, as President of the United States and as founder of The Carter Center, Carter has studied the complex and interrelated issues of the region’s conflicts and has been actively involved in reconciling them. He knows the leaders of all factions who will need to play key roles, and he sees encouraging signs. Carter describes the history of previous peace efforts and why they fell short. He argues persuasively that the road to a peace agreement is now open and that it has broad international and regional support. …”.
3. Enough Blood Shed: 101 Solutions to Violence, Terror and War by Mary-Wynne Ashford with Guy Dauncey, 2006, 303.69 ASH
Signed by a co-author. From Amazon: “… confronts the reality of a world awash in weapons and the belief that war is inevitable, with people powerless to change the system. It provides an alternative perspective based on solutions known to be successful because they have been used already.
The first part of the book describes the culture of violence that has led the world to this precipice of hopelessness, and then points to signs of hope that a different future is possible. It outlines the steps being made to build a culture of peace, including the phenomenal power of civil society: the second superpower-or the conscience of society. Part Two then focuses on the solutions that are possible for all sectors of society: …
Focusing on the power of ordinary people to make a difference and packed with effective nonviolent success stories – often in a setting of hate and provocation – the book provides guidance, inspiration, hope and empowerment that peace is not only possible, but can be fun along the way.”.
4. I Shall Not Hate: A Gaza Doctor’s Journey by Izzeldin Abuelaish, 2010, 956.94 ABU
From LibraryThing: “Harvard-trained Palestinian doctor Izzeldin Abuelaish’s recounts his extraordinary life of devotion to medicine and reconciliation between Israelis and Palestinians.”.
5. The Power of Nonviolence: Writings by Advocates of Peace by Howard Zinn, 2002, 327.17 WEI
Beacon Press publication. From the book jacket, at LibraryThing: “… presents the most salient and persuasive arguments for peace in the last 2,500 years of human history. Arranged chronologically, covering the major conflagrations in the world. The Power of Nonviolence is a compelling step forward in the study of pacifism, a timely anthology that fills a void for people looking for responses to crisis that are not based on guns or bombs.”.
6. Nonviolence: The History of a Dangerous Idea by Mark Kurlansky, foreword by the Dalai Lama, 2008, 303.61 KUR
From LibraryThing: “… discusses nonviolence as a distinct entity, a course of action, rather than a mere state of mind. Nonviolence can and should be a technique for overcoming social injustice and ending wars, he asserts, which is why it is the preferred method of those who speak truth to power. Nonviolence is a sweeping yet concise history that moves from ancient Hindu times to present-day conflicts raging in the Middle East and elsewhere. Kurlansky also brings into focus just why nonviolence is a “dangerous” idea, and asks such provocative questions as: Is there such a thing as a “just war”? Could nonviolence have worked against even the most evil regimes in history? Kurlansky draws from history twenty-five provocative lessons on the subject that we can use to effect change today. He shows how, time and again, violence is used to suppress nonviolence and its practitioners-Gandhi and Martin Luther King, for example; that the stated deterrence value of standing national armies and huge weapons arsenals is, at best, negligible; and, encouragingly, that much of the hard work necessary to begin a movement to end war is already complete. It simply needs to be embraced and accelerated. …”.
7. Stones into Schools: Promoting Peace with Books, Not Bombs, in Afghanistan and Pakistan by Greg Mortenson, 2009, 371.82 MOR
From LibraryThing: “… recounting his relentless, ongoing efforts to establish schools for girls in Afghanistan; his extensive work in Azad Kashmir and Pakistan after a massive earthquake hit the region in 2005; and the unique ways he has built relationships with Islamic clerics, militia commanders, and tribal leaders even as he was dodging shootouts with feuding Afghan warlords and surviving an eight-day armed abduction by the Taliban.”.
8. Freedom from War: Nonsectarian Pacifism, 1814-1914 by Peter Brock, 1991, 327.1 BRO
Makes reference to Unitarian pacifists. Autographed by the author. From LibraryThing: “… presents peace activism as historically including two groups: those who reject war on grounds of conscience, and the internationalists who, without the same commitment of conscience, nonetheless strive to accomplish a warless world. He discusses the early Anglo-American peace movement and the dispute between its two principle groups, the 1838 pacifist radical abolitionists, pacifism during the Civil War, and Tolstoyism. …”.
9. The Battle for God by Karen Armstrong, 2001, 273 ARM
From the book jacket, in LibraryThing: “”… shows us how and why fundamentalist groups came into existence and what they yearn to accomplish.” … “Armstrong characterizes fundamentalism as one of these new ways of being religious that have emerged in every major faith tradition. …” “Armstrong sees fundamentalist groups as complex, innovative, and modern – rather than as throwbacks to the past – but contends that they have failed in religious terms. Maintaining that fundamentalism often exists in symbiotic relationship with an aggressive modernity, each impelling the other on to greater excess, she suggests compassion as a way to defuse what is now an intensifying conflict.””.