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Even at his most irate, Jimmy Carter projects cool, communicating with a poise that commands attention while gently signaling to opponents that they better do their homework before mounting any sort of debate. Perhaps that's why the former president, Nobel Peace Prize-winner, and bestselling author ranks as one of the planet's most respected voices in the areas of human rights, diplomacy, and good government. And when a clearly agitated Carter suggests America is on a slippery slope, globally speaking, as he does throughout Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis, it's wise to pay heed even if the book's overriding Christian perspective may trip cautionary bells in secular readers.
More a set of loosely connected essays than a single, precise argument, Our Endangered Values outlines Carter's worldview while pondering what he posits are key problems looming in the 21st century. Thematic touchstones such as the war, environmental negligence, civil liberties, the rich-poor divide, and the separation of church and state form the book's backbone, with Carter filtering each through the prism of his own vast experience. He doesn't much like what he sees. Though much of the data Carter presents to support his arguments is familiar, it's worth repeating that "the rate of firearm homicides in the United States is nineteen times higher than that of 35 other high-income countries combined." That "In addition to imprisonment, the United States of America stands almost alone in the world in our fascination with the death penalty, and our few remaining companions are regimes with a lack of respect for basic human rights." That when it comes to sharing the wealth with poor nations "Americans are the stingiest of all industrialized nations. We allow about one-thirtieth as much as is commonly believed [or] sixteen cents out of each $100 of the gross national income." America: land of the free, home of the brave? Try global bully with a bad attitude and reckless sense of entitlement.
Carter spends significant time contextualizing his own spirituality, as if to underscore the urgency of his message that fundamentalism in any form is bad, especially when it encroaches on government. Indeed, Carter persuasively links fundamentalism to harmful policy, the subjugation of women, general xenophobia, and a host of other ills occurring all around him. And while George W. Bush in particular and the current administration in general take fewer clips on the chin than might be expected, Carter's arguments for common-sense change are deeply resonant nonetheless. --Kim Hughes
Book Description
President Jimmy Carter offers a passionate defense of separation of church and state. He warns that fundamentalists are deliberately blurring the lines between politics and religion.
As a believing Christian, Carter takes on issues that are under fierce debate -- women's rights, terrorism, homosexuality, civil liberties, abortion, the death penalty, science and religion, environmental degradation, nuclear arsenals, preemptive war, and America's global image.
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"President Carter has written importantly about his spiritual life and faith. In Living Faith, a huge bestseller, he recounted the values and experiences that shaped his personal and political life. In his companion book Sources of Strength, also a bestseller, he meditated on fifty-two of the favorite Bible lessons he has taught. In Our Endangered Values, Carter offers a personal consideration of ""moral values"" as they relate to the important issues of the day. He puts forward a passionate defense of separation of church and state, and a strong warning of where the country is heading as the lines between politics and rigid religious fundamentalism are blurred. Now, he describes his own involvement and reactions to some disturbing societal trends that have taken place during the last few years. These changes involve both the religious and the political worlds as they have increasingly become intertwined, and include some of the most crucial and controversial issues of the day -- frequently encapsulated under ""moral values."" Many of these matters are under fierce debate. They include preemptive war, women's rights, terrorism, civil liberties, homosexuality, abortion, the death penalty, science and religion, environmental degradation, nuclear arsenals, America's global image, fundamentalism, and the melding of religion and politics. Sustained by his lifelong faith, Jimmy Carter assesses these issues in a forceful and unequivocal but balanced and courageous way. Our Endangered Values is a book that his millions of readers have eagerly awaited. "
Customer Reviews:
Rescue us from fundamentalism.......2007-09-13
This book is warning against fundamentalism and the in-human lack of compassion that seems so deeply rooted in the American sub-culture that holds sway over Bush's White House. Are you a Christian who is concerned about poverty? The USA's policy of pre-emptive war? Gleeful disregard for nuclear proliferation? Torture? The environment? Carter lays out a passionate case that those concerns are in line with Christian values. Carter does not cede the definition of `Christian' to the pro war, pro death penalty, pro torture, anti ecumenical crowd who insist that they alone can articulate what it means to be a Christian. This is a courageous book by a very thoughtful man
CARTER: SUPER HUMANITARIAN/HUMAN BEING!.......2007-08-03
Another refreshing and great book by former President Carter. Carter gives one a true feeling of hope, especially now, in this strange time in our country. It's as though President Carter is looking out for us. God bless you Mr. Carter, and please, keep on writing, writing and writing!!!
We truly need more Jimmy Carters in this world.
Wonderful!.......2007-07-04
Great book. It is terribly refreshing to read a book that treats logic and common sense as important values in our personal, public, and political lives. Shows very clearly that religious views and opinions can be separated from the political arena simply by deciding to do so. The parts dealing with the politics of dealing with the rest of the world are especially good. The world would be a far better place if we could just follow the live and let live philosophy.
Wonderful.......2007-07-03
I'm an absolute fan of President Carter on a multitude of levels - and this book further supports my endearment of him. He accurate and thoughtfully discusses the crises occuring in the U.S. - particularly because of the current administration and educationally analyzes how to solve/correct these problems. He is my hero...
(P.S. for anyone with any doubts as to Carter's greatness, they need to read some history and see his Presidential Library to gain some insight as to what he actually did and accomplished while President for both the U.S. and the world as a whole.)
A moral challenge to Americans.......2007-06-27
In this book, Nobelist and former President Jimmy Carter asserts that Christian fundamentalists have taken control of the American government. Although he is a devout Christian himself, he outlines charges against fundamentalists and neoconservatives that reiterate many oft-aired criticisms of the current administration. He also decries fundamentalist control of the Southern Baptist denomination, which may be of less interest to business readers. However, one need not agree with Carter to be drawn by his political philosophy and sincerity, nor disagree to be bruised by his self-righteous tone. This is more sermon than essay, for it has a pronounced religious focus, but we find that it provides a heartfelt portrait of the value judgments of a historic figure who never hesitated to provoke debate. Readers seeking a liberal focus on issues about which conservatives and liberals disagree will find this to be a passionate touchstone, as will those alarmed by what they perceive as manifestations of fundamentalism in U.S. public policy.
Book Description
Written by Joseph Ratzinger shortly before he became Pope Benedict XVI, Christianity and the Crisis of Cultures looks at the growing conflict of cultures evident in the Western world.
The West faces a deadly contradiction of its own making, he contends. Terrorism is on the rise. Technological advances of the West, employed by people who have cut themselves off from the moral wisdom of the past, threaten to abolish man (as C.S. Lewis put it)—whether through genetic manipulation or physical annihilation.
In short, the West is at war—with itself. Its scientific outlook has brought material progress. The Enlightenment's appeal to reason has achieved a measure of freedom. But contrary to what many people suppose, both of these accomplishments depend on Judeo-Christian foundations, including the moral worldview that created Western culture.
More than anything else, argues Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, the important contributions of the West are threatened today by an exaggerated scientific outlook and by moral relativism—what Benedict XVI calls "the dictatorship of relativism"—in the name of freedom.
Christianity and the Crisis of Cultures is no mere tirade against the moral decline of the West. Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI challenges the West to return to its roots by finding a place for God in modern culture. He argues that both Christian culture and the Enlightenment formed the West, and that both hold the keys to human life and freedom as well as to domination and destruction.
Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI challenges non-believer and believer alike. "Both parties," he writes, "must reflect on their own selves and be ready to accept correction." He challenges secularized, unbelieving people to open themselves to God as the ground of true rationality and freedom. He calls on believers to "make God credible in this world by means of the enlightened faith they live."
Topics include:
• Reflections on the Cultures in Conflict Today
• The Significance and Limits of Today's Rationalistic Culture
• The Permanent Significance of the Christian Faith
• Why We Must Not Give Up the Fight
• The Law of the Jungle, the Rule of Law
• We Must Use Our Eyes!
• Faith and Everyday Life
• Can Agnosticism Be a Solution?
• The Natural Knowledge of God
• "Supernatural" Faith and Its Origins
Customer Reviews:
Quite important in these days of relativism.......2007-08-04
A must read if you are interested in the recent and ongoing decline of western civilization. The causative factors are clearly delineated from many points of view, but always from the starting point of the pope's awesome faith and love for God and His Creation.
-Jeremy
Adressing the current situations with a keen and clear understanding.......2007-04-15
In this book Cardinal Ratzinger studies the tension that arises when a split occurs between the state and religion. He tackles modern secularist notions, discusses abortion, and also addresses the notion that if not atheism, then perhaps agnosticism is the best position that man can hope for. The discussion he provides is well thought out and easy to grasp. You may not agree with everything he says, but the beauty and brilliance of the arguments put forth are undeniable.
Succinct.......2006-11-08
Non-Catholics and those of nominal faith might be more comfortable reading
"Without Roots: The West, Relativism, Christianity, Islam"
by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger and Marcello Pera first. The analysis is much the same but correctives, in the form of a return to a pan-European shared faith (by Pena--the head of the Italian Senate) and/or individual action (Benedict)will find a wider audience.
Either book is a must read for anyone commenting upon or interested in the current geopolitical scene. At the end of the 19th century, Dostoyevsky in "Notes from the Underground" and Pope Leo XIII in "On Socialism" (Quod Apostolici Muneris) warned where conflicts within Western Civilization were headed. 1917 and the horrors of communist and fascist totalitarianism were not adverted. Pera and Benedict are raising the same warning flags today. Is the problem as critical as they believe? Can a tragedy be averted? No one knows of course. But that there is a problem is irrefutable and these two book should not be ignored.
Recently purchased "America Alone: The End of the World as We Know It" by Mark Steyn. Rated it three stars and that was being charitable as Steyn not only provides little hope but the witty prose his newspaper columns are, rightly, admired for is flat and tendentious when spead out over 256 pages.
Benedict and Pera, in contrast, explain why the west is unable to condemn evil and what can be done to ameloriate that failing.
An essential read for understanding the crisis that we are in.......2006-09-12
Pope Benedict has been a keen and precise critic of the cultural clashes that have been shaking the West over the last half a century. He doesn't kowtow to the latest politically correct fad, nor does he mince words to state the truth. In this book he clearly outlines the what the greatest threats are to the Christian culture and the civilization which is based upon it. This is a must read for anyone who wants to understand better the position of the Catholic Church in the ongoing global culture wars.
An essential read.......2006-06-01
Along with such classics as 'clash of civilizations' and 'rage and the pride' this book is a must read for anyone interested in the least bit in preserving their culture and faith in the face of the assault on the west by various non-western and supra-western cultures. For those who are pro partial-birth abortions, probably this book will be offensive because the Pope takes the Catholic church's view that abortion is immoral.
The central theme of this book is that the West is threatened by the new immorality of western moral relativism and that it is additioanlly partially threatened by the non-western immigrants who invade the west, however the greater danger is internal, the abandonment of religion and faith, and the denial of the fact that Christian roots are indigenous to Europe.
Many wont be able to stumach this book, and even some protestants will find the catholic overtones problematic. However it is an essential and important work.
Seth J. Frantzman
Book Description
The battle lines have been drawn. Many Christians have fallen into the trap of proclaiming "Peace! Peace!" when there is no peace. Hiding their eyes from the pressing issues of the day, they believe that resistance to the prevailing culture is useless. At the same time, other Christians have been too quick to declare war, mistaking battlefield casualties as enemies rather than victims. In How to Win the Culture War Peter Kreeft issues a rousing call to arms. Christians must understand the true nature of the culture war--a war between the culture of life and the culture of death. Kreeft identifies the real enemies facing the church today and maps out key battlefields. He then issues a strategy for engagement and equips Christians with the weapons needed for a successful campaign.Above all, Kreeft assures us that the war can be won--in fact, it will be won. For those who hope in Christ, victory is assured, because good triumphs over evil and life conquers death. Love never gives up. Neither must we.
Customer Reviews:
Accept the truth!!.......2007-09-12
This is a powerful book, a weapon in this spiritual battle that we fight constantly twenty four hours a day and I recommend it to all mankind without hesitation as one of the best weapons we have. Kreeft is a master of description and catholic metaphor in spelling out, using simple language, the reality of life.
He pulls no punches and neither should he as we are indeed fighting a war. As I type this review I am fighting this war, as I look around at this room and walk the streets of a city, as I sit in a coffee shop or ride the bus. Whenever, wherever I am or any of us are we are fighting a war. The war is not against human beings. No human is our enemy. Our enemy is the devil and his demons and they do exist - for to deny their existence is the greatest mistake. To deny that we are in a war is a great mistake. To believe that we can relax and that everything is fine because it appears fine is ridiculous. Spiritual war is not visible, it is invisible and very real. We must not ignore it. We must constantly remind ourselves that we are in a war and that every second is a battle which needs to be won.
This is the essence of Kreefts book and it is a greatly needed message for the world to hear and yet so few are listening. Pick up your rosaries, go to confession, receive the Holy Eucharist, fast, pray, love and never, never give up. These are the weapons we must use. We must become saints and spend our lives striving to become saints. We must never become lazy in thinking we will try tomorrow. We must try now!! Our sainthood is available now. Our thrones at the right hand of Jesus are available to sit on now. Jesus has promised that whoever takes his throne he will make their enemies their footstool.
We have nothing to fear. The enemy has nothing but his big mouth. He cannot harm us. All he can do is suggest to us lies. He is the Father of lies and he uses his mouthful of lies to deceive us and lead us away from the truth. If we trust in God then our enemies are powerless. Call on God, call on Jesus, he is our refuge, our rock. As John Paul II said "Be not afraid". We have nothing to fear as we have the greatest, most powerful weapon of all, We have Jesus!!
This is Kreefts book summed up but read it. I can't do justice to the words of this great thinker.
Enough rope.......2007-03-16
As a person on the "other side" of the so called culture war, I applaud books like this. It makes the argument of those striving for reason over faith so much easier to demonstrate, especially when directed at those in the middle. It's this type of rhetoric that makes it so much easier for authors such as Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins and the late Carl Sagan to get their points across. The main point being that those who still subscribe to the fairy tales and delusions of revealed religious faith are a dangerous anachronism.
The war rages on..........2007-02-22
This book is a necessity for all Christians, both Catholic and Protestant. Even though the author is Catholic (as am I) I feel that Evangelical Christians would find just as much use in it. We are not so different, after all, it seems, when put up against our common enemy, secularism.
It's a quick and easy read, but it packs a punch. Anyone who doubts that there is a culture war either seriously doesn't keep up with the news, or is living under a rock. The war is real, frightening at times, but we will win it.
I especially recommend this book for anyone who tends to think the outcome is hopeless. The author reminds us that we are doing God's work, and God doesn't fail. He lays out a battle plan for us, and gets us familiar with the enemy and his trickery.
I really think this is the time for all traditional Christians, and to expand on that, all traditional worshipers of the God of Abraham, to put aside our differences for a common goal. We shouldn't be fighting with each other, we should band together and fight those who want to destroy all that's dear to us.
A rally cry for Christians.......2007-01-03
This was the first Kreeft book I read and it had me going back to read more.
incredible book, incredible author.......2006-11-27
this book is a must for anyone seeking to understand more fully the importance of morality, and seeking the importance of living, and understanding what christians are called to in this world. An excellent read. yet another masterpiece by Peter Kreeft.
Book Description
What does the future hold for European Christianity? Is the Christian church doomed to collapse under the weight of globalization, Western secularism, and a flood of Muslim immigrants? Is Europe, in short, on the brink of becoming "Eurabia"? Though many pundits are loudly predicting just such a scenario, Philip Jenkins reveals the flaws in these arguments in God's Continent and offers a much more measured assessment of Europe's religious future. While frankly acknowledging current tensions, Jenkins shows, for instance, that the overheated rhetoric about a Muslim-dominated Europe is based on politically convenient myths: that Europe is being imperiled by floods of Muslim immigrants, exploding Muslim birth-rates, and the demise of European Christianity. He points out that by no means are Muslims the only new immigrants in Europe. Christians from Africa, Asia, and Eastern Europe are also pouring into the Western countries, and bringing with them a vibrant and enthusiastic faith that is helping to transform the face of European Christianity. Jenkins agrees that both Christianity and Islam face real difficulties in surviving within Europe's secular culture. But instead of fading away, both have adapted, and are adapting. Yes, the churches are in decline, but there are also clear indications that Christian loyalty and devotion survive, even as institutions crumble. Jenkins sees encouraging signs of continuing Christian devotion in Europe, especially in pilgrimages that attract millions--more in fact than in bygone "ages of faith." The third book in an acclaimed trilogy that includes The Next Christendom and The New Faces of Christianity, God's Continent offers a realistic and historically grounded appraisal of the future of Christianity in a rapidly changing Europe.
Customer Reviews:
Uneven, but still Excellent.......2007-06-29
The first half of the book, on the state of Christianity in Europe, is outstanding. It contains a great deal of important and significant information that I have not seen reported anywhere else, indicating that Christianity is not quite so moribund in Europe as is commonly reported.
The second half of the book, on Islam in Europe, is uneven. Jenkins begins with a number of generalizations to the effect that the common stories of the threat of Islam in Europe are overblown and unwarranted. But then he spends the rest of the book giving extensive detail and analysis to the effect that Islam is indeed a grave threat to European culture and Western security. It's an odd disconnect.
In all, an excellent book and well worth the read.
Average customer rating:
- Go behind the headlines
- Eye-Opening Book
- Just the Facts
- Excellent resource
- A Crisis of Man, not Faith
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Betrayal: The Crisis in the Catholic Church
The Investigative Staff of the Boston Globe ,
Matt Carroll ,
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Manufacturer: Little, Brown
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Sex, Priests, And Power: Anatomy Of A Crisis
ASIN: 0316075582 |
Book Description
With this groundbreaking expos, The Boston Globe has delivered the single, most comprehensive account of the cover-ups, hush money, and emotional manipulation used by the Catholic Church to keep its long history of sexual abuse secret. With the same incisive reportage that broke the scandal wide open, The Boston Globe's team of expert investigative reporters also provides important analysis of what's at stake and what this 'crisis of faith' means for Catholics everywhere.
Customer Reviews:
Go behind the headlines.......2007-03-29
This very well-researched and well-written book takes the reader behind all of the headlines and media bytes from the revelations in the early Aughts about the widespread problem of pedophile priests. Though the focus is on priests from the Boston area, seeing as how Boston is one of the largest Catholic cities in America and that this book was put together by the Boston Globe, before long it had become obvious that this wasn't just a problem in Boston, but a problem in America as well, and even in the world. The book examines so many issues and questions, such as the nature of faith, Catholic culture, the push for change by a majority of American Catholics even though the higher-ups still insist on remaining the same, what it is that caused so many priests to molest children (but more often teenage boys), the history and nature of celibacy (it wasn't made law till the 11th century, and then only for political reasons), how former Cardinal Bernard Law could have condoned the actions of priests like John Geoghan by just shuttling them from parish to parish, and most of all the profound betrayal felt by so many Catholics who loved the Church dearly and who had trusted these priests to take care of their children instead of violating their bodies and souls.
While there have been instances of clergy of other faiths abusing children they were supposed to be mentoring or looking after, there have never been such scandals attached to those cases because they are usually isolated incidences. Rabbis, Protestant ministers, and Eastern Orthodox priests are allowed to get married, after all, and generally don't live in communities detached from the outside world and the common people. Many people have pointed to this being a uniquely Catholic problem because of the celibacy of priests, and feel that if celibacy were made optional, perhaps they wouldn't seek sexual gratification through minors. When many of these abusers were ordained, the screening process they have today was not in place. This was a time when seminaries were overflowing, but almost anyone was admitted, even if not all of those candidates were truly qualified. This was also an era when the average seminarian was much younger than he is today; many priests first went to a junior seminary at all of 13 or 14 years old, and if they didn't, then they would usually enter the seminary proper fresh out of highschool, with no time to test their calling, to live in the real world, to develop and mature at a normal rate instead of being stuck at the level of a sexually immature inexperienced young teenager who never got any information or advice about dealing with the normal natural sexual feelings that the majority of people have. Had they gotten counseling on how to deal with these urges instead of being trained as though they weren't sexual beings, they might not have gone to these young boys who were at the same stunted level as they were.
Because of the trust these faithful Catholics placed in their priests and bishops, they just reported the abuse to them instead of going to the police like one would expect a concerned angry parent to do. They expected the Church to handle the problem. The Church in turn stressed things like respect for canon law, the importance of the hierarchy, and protecting the "good names" of these abusive priests, not about the young victims whose lives would never be the same again. They were more concerned about protecting and covering up for predators like Geoghan than with counseling the children and putting the abusers in jail or at least serious counseling (many of the so-called rehabilitation centers described sounded more like vacation resorts or slaps on the wrist than places for actual psychological counseling and attempted rehabilitation, though the studies show that most child abusers will offend again). They would excommunicate the 72 year old nun Jeannette Normandin (who has since passed away) for having baptised two boys (only men are allowed to baptise people in Catholicism), for putting her hands on their foreheads and annointing them with holy water, yet would coddle and sympathise with a predator like John Geoghan after he touched the genitals of young boys and performed sex acts on them. They would tell people that things like divorce, birth control, premarital sex, and eating meat on Fridays were sins, some of which were Hell-worthy, yet never treated real sins like child abuse as being serious of condemnation, excommunication, and being shunned by the community. Above all, we get a picture of a hierarchy sorely out of touch with what the majority of American Catholics believe in, an insistence on this black and white authoritarian conformist world that might have worked beautifully 50 or 60 years ago, but which just isn't possible anymore because of how much society has evolved.
In spite of this crisis and betrayal, however, the Catholic Church is still going strong. Though there were many people who left it after how they were treated or who stopped donating money to it after these revelations, there are still many faithful believing Catholics out there who dearly love the Church and are willing to stick by it through thick and thin, to work through this crisis together, to fight for change (such as the new screening process used by seminaries to weed out potential troublemakers and pedophiles) and modernisation (such as the ordination of women, optional priestly celibacy, and acceptance of gay parishioners). Something of this magnitude probably will not be able to occur again because of all of the knowledge gained during this crisis and because the need for some fundamental changes seems so great and overdue that the voice of the majority can't be ignored forever.
Eye-Opening Book.......2006-10-31
I was raised Catholic and am stunned by this book. The research was thorough and complete. My hope is that this book is the final chapter in a dark era for the Church.
Just the Facts.......2003-08-08
[Let my put my conflicts of interests right up front. I am a Catholic who converted from Methodist six years ago. Since that time I have worked actively in my parish in Fort Worth, Texas and now am the director of the RCIA program (the program for adults who want to join the church) in my parish. In addition, althouth I am not aware of any abuse by priests in my parish or diocese, the liturgy director at my parish, a lay person, was convicted this year of sexual conduct with a minor that occured about ten years ago.]
In my opinion, the most fascinating person in a true crime story is not the person who is obviously sick and evil, but the one who aids and abbets in the crime. For instance, several years ago in Chicago there was a young woman who was desparate to have a child. She hatched a plan to steal a child by cutting the child out of another woman's womb. If the story ended there, it would only be one of an obviously sick woman who needed alot of help, but it didn't. She convinced a man she new to actually carry out this plan. How does that happen? How does the man listen to the ravings of this deranged woman and say, "Yeah. That sounds like a good idea. I'll do it."?
I have the same questions about the crisis in the Catholic Church. I have no problem with understanding that the likes of John Geoghan, Joseph Birmingham, Paul Shanley, and Robert Trupia are sick and evil men. They each have molested scores of young boys and seem to have no comprehension of the impact of their actions. What I don't understand is why did the bishops they worked for and knew of accusations of molestation against them think it was a good idea to move them to a new set of victims? Why do some men of God become complicit in evil?
Unfortunately this book has no answer for those questions. It is written by the group of reporters from the Boston Globe who pried the story from the secretive Boston diocese. As such, it primarialy answers who, what, when, and where, but not why. The gory details of the molestors' activities are given and the pain and anger of many of the victims, too. But in one unforgetable story, the Christlike actions of one victim is told. A victim of Birmingham confronted him after many years of pain and suffering and said, "I've come here to ask you to forgive me for the hatred and resentment that I heve felt toward you for the last twenty-five years."
Much of the book is devoted to the problems in and around Boston, as may be expected. However, the reporters do touch on similar cases in other areas. Although the full extent of the crisis is not known, and may not be known without many more reporters in other dioceses investigating their local church, these reporters note that almost 200 sitting priests have been removed around the country and many more have been removed around the world. The problem of failing to respond to evil in the midst of the Catholic Church is definately not specific to Cardinal Law or even to the United States.
Excellent resource.......2003-05-29
The authors have a done a fine job compiling the facts about the sexual abuse crisis that is rocking the Catholic Church. Although the authors present the facts in a balanced way, you will be morally outraged by what "responsible" people of the church are capable of. A must read for anyone who has any doubt about the authoritarian, anti-intellectual, and medieval nature of the Catholic Church.
A Crisis of Man, not Faith.......2003-02-12
Ripped from headlines that have been contemporary for more than a year, "Betrayal ..." is the Boston Globe newspaper's investigative staff product of the problem of pedophiles and molesters (and there's a significant distinction between the two) in the Catholic priesthood. What may sound like editorializing seems to be verified by supporting documentation of priests who victimize boys of all from adolesence to young adulthood, and the book reads more like an elongated newspaper article, not that that's bad. But, at its heart, "Betrayal ..." maps out what a convincing argument that an inordinate number of child molesters seem to be in the clergy. If you can get past the sheer devastation of divine trust shattered and totally destroyed and the childhoods literally decimated, "Betrayal ..." also posits the question of why the child abuse crisis exists. One plausible theory, though certainly not justification for sex with children, is that the celibate nature of the priesthood perverts sexual desire to the expression of child molesting. That one sounds, and one would hope, more plausible than the terrifying other possibility that the priesthood attracts what "Betrayal ..." classifies as homosexuals. With that theory, however, the unfair and inaccurate implication that homosexuals are also child molesters isn't satisfactorily explored and dismissed. On this count, "Betrayal ..." might be serving the hopefully unintended fears that fuel homophobia. More fully, though, the book states clearly what is indeed a crisis by any standard. The non-Catholic whose church is not under fire may not be as moved by the sense of betrayal that the Catholic faithful may inevitably suffer. However, "Betrayal ..." and the priests who offer their commentary are barely spared from coming off as a crisis of faith and, instead, must be read as a crisis of man and not the God of worship. In the end, the Catholics among us cannot help but feel betrayed by the men in whom we have entrusted our children. And by remembering the crisis is man-made, we don't have to lose our faith in the God of our worship. In the end, those of us who are Catholic may conclude that our church's heirarchy has to be dismantled, accountability institutionally implemented and the demons of our children prosecuted along with being treated.
Customer Reviews:
An Interesting examination of the evolving American society.......2002-10-27
Walter Rauschenbusch, a devout Protestant minister, was horrified by what he described as the "social crisis" that permeated American society and politics in the early 1900s. Yet he did not despair or advocate "more government" as a solution. Rather, he argued compelling that the church must play a central role in restoring social order. Indeed, Rauschenbusch alleged that Christianity's future depended on its capacity to restore social harmony and to persuade businesses to feed the masses, not just cater to elites. Rauschenbusch extolled the value of community, "gemeinschaft, " and excoriated "gesellschaft, " an atomized, anonymous, individualistic society in which people are consumed by materialism and personal gain.
Rauschenbusch envisioned a Christian ethic that pervaded the social and economic lives of Americans. He blended ancient Christian thought with the new tools of social science, in order to identify and solve the "social crisis," arguing that "communism" (as he used the term) was fully consistent with Christianity. Rauschenbusch's burden was to show the people where, how, and why Christianity could help them.
Rauschenbusch was a seventh generation Lutheran minister, whose father emigrated to American from Germany in the 1850s. Rauschenbusch, the scholar, was a theologian at the Rochester Theological Seminary, where he taught for forty years. He also served the Second Baptist Church in New York City. Rauschenbusch, the theologian, historian, and sociologist published Christianity and the Social Crisis in 1907 and Christianizing the Social Order in 1912.
Book Description
More than twenty years into the global AIDS pandemic, the efforts of Christian congregations and denominations have been less than minimal. This book is aimed to awaken Christian compassion in the coming years to this fathomless tragedy.
The worst health crisis in the world in 700 years, global HIV/AIDS epidemic is overwhelming in scale: 40 million people are infected worldwide (75% of them in Africa); 7000 people die daily; each day 1600 persons are infected. Some 26 million people have already died.
''At this unprecedented kairos moment in human history,'' says Messer, ''God is calling the church to a new mission and ministry.'' Drawing on his own involvement in global AIDS education in Asia, Latin America, and Africa, Messer uses stories, basic factual information, and theological insights to motivate lay and clerical Christians to assume leadership and form partnerships with Christians around the world in this struggle. Just as individuals must change their behavior to prevent and eliminate AIDS, so must congregations and church leaders. Compassion, not condemnation, is desperately needed, says Messer. But financial resources for education and prevention programs are also urgently required from churches. Messer shows how churches can partner with ecumenical organizations, relief agencies, volunteer mission programs, healthcare programs, and other agencies to engage global AIDS directly and effectively.
Customer Reviews:
Breaking the Conspiracy of Silence: Christian CHurches and the Global AIDS Crisis.......2007-08-16
Are Christian Churches really "Christian" when they exclude certain groups of people from worship and other aspects of "church" life because this group does not meet certain 'qualities' or 'qualifications'?
HIV-AIDS and the Gospel.......2007-01-18
"It is required of a person," wrote Oliver Wendell Holmes, "that he should share the passion and action of his time at peril of being judged not to have lived" (p. 69). Using Holmes' metric, and the statistics that continue to emerge about the magnitude of the global AIDS crisis, one would think that most people, and especially Christians, would be involved. But such is not the case, according to Donald Messer. True, 22 million people have died of AIDS, 40 million now live with HIV (95% of whom are in the two-thirds world), and 14 million orphans have lost parents to the disease. True, the disease is still in its infancy and by some estimates will not peak until the year 2050. True, although 95% of HIV infected people live in the two-thirds world, only about 10% of the global HIV/AIDS budget is spent there (p. 118). Even so, Messer argues, most Christians have responded with apathy, indifference, denial, denunciation and discrimination. His book wants to move us forward.
In the Greek New Testament the word kairos (= "time") has a special connotation, which Robert McAfee Brown once defined as "a time of opportunity demanding a response: God offers us a new set of possibilities and we have to accept or decline" (p. xiii). The Scottish theologian George McLeod (1895-1991) may have said it best when he wrote, "I simply argue that the Cross be raised again at the center of the market place as well as on the steeple of the church. I am recovering the claim that Jesus was not crucified in a Cathedral between two candles, but on a Cross between two thieves; on the town garbage heap; on a crossroads so cosmopolitan that they had to write his title in Hebrew and in Latin and in Greek; at the kind of place where cynics talk smut and thieves curse, and soldiers gamble. Because that is where he died and that is what he died about. And that is where churchmen should be and what churchmen should be about" (p. 20).
Book Description
An intensive, Bible-based treatment for those who suffer from gender identity problems.
Customer Reviews:
A vital book for our generation.......2006-06-25
Leanne Payne's book is a vital message for our confused generation. She tells the story of several men whose lives have been affected by their lack of a strong inner sense of masculine identity. By listening to God and coming into His healing presence, each of them was freed to recognise their own manhood, and to accept it.
We live in an age where divergent sexual "identities" are promulgated as solutions to people's inner crises. Yet the truth each of us needs is that God is our Father. Everyone of us is feminine in comparison with the strong masculinity of God. Yet also, each man among us derives his identity as a man from God and each woman also derives her sense of femininity from the Father. When God created Adam, he was both male and female, and God drew Eve from within Adam. So God is "the One from whom all Fatherhood derives its name".
Homosexuality and lesbianism are conditions men and women find themselves in, but they are not the will of God. They are, like all of us, in urgent need of the healing presence of God. There is no room for judgment of one by another. All of us shrink in one degree or another from healing, and need it so much. I am refreshed by the courage and honesty of Ms Payne in stating, against the potential wrath of the current world system, that heterosexuality is God's true pattern for humanity. To relinquish the fight for truth and to fail to offer a healing alternative to people struggling for freedom is - as Ms Payne writes elsewhere - to abandon people to "the dark demons in the blood".
The above is my personal reading of, and reaction to, Crisis in Masculinity.
Affirmation of the male role model.......2004-03-15
I found this very interesting and got a whole new insight on homosexuality. The male role models were not there during the time that the male children needed to be affirmed by their human father.
Crisis In Psychology.......2004-03-11
Read this book if you are seeking to solidify an unhealthy perspective on homosexuality. This book IS NOT FOR ME! Reading this takes me back to a time in my life when Catholic guilt had me caged in.
Leanne Payne mixes up her theories with religious passive aggressive judgment as much as possible. As a gay person, repressive interpretations of the Bible have never worked for me. Repression and calling gay sexuality a sin (or coming from "darkness" as she puts it) causes people to feel less than and to be hard on themselves and make decisions about their lives from that place. Acceptance is the healthiest solution towards a healthy lifestyle, which is what we all want.
Someone needs to come up with another book that studies the world's "crisis in masculinity", I do believe that it is an important subject to study, especially with how many gay/bisexual people there are these days. Something is happening that we definitely need to pay attention to. But, Leanne Payne is all over the place and her arguments are very simple minded and slanted in a Biblical manor. I think that her book should better be called "Crisis in Psychology", because it is obvious that is what she is experiencing as she straddles the tracks between vast human psychology and that of strict religious belief.
Incidentally, for all your gay people out there who are struggling with religious upbringings, you have got to realize that there is more to life than your religion you have been brought up with. A lot of the ideas that you have learned are not exactly correct. God doesn't necessarily want you to go to hell. Anyway, not to go off about it, but, there is an entire world of religion/spiritual methods out there; they are all talking about and trying to translate the same idea of God and spirituality and our place in the world.
So, if you don't fit into your Christian/Catholic guilt-oriented religion, try another one (buddhism is really awesome!) You aren't going to go to hell for studying about another religious belief, what do you think Priests do when they are studying at the seminary?
After years of growth, my spirituality doesn't relate or agree with Leanne Payne's and I'm a pretty spiritual person (believe it or not, I was an alter boy for the Pope in 1987 in Carmel, CA.) Find your spirituality from a place of no guilt, learn to purely love yourself as a child of the light of God. Don't pay attention to any attempts to hold you down in a cage of interpretation and punishment. Interpret your own spiritual being, but let yourself be free to be who you are, God loves you just as you are, BELIEVE ME.
If you question your sexuality, then question it, but don't question because someone told you that God has a problem with it. Homosexuality is as natural as heterosexuality, and don't let anyone tell you differently. Take a step right now towards the freedom to be yourself and to create your own relationship between God and your sexuality. Be real, this book is repressive and unauthentic.
Could we achieve the same with NLP?.......2003-08-06
(Some qualifiers/context: I am male, not gay, ambivalent about religion and otherwise reasonably "normal").
I read the book trying to discount the strong Christian slant. What interested me most about the book is that the author effectively uses (currently) established NLP techniques during her sessions. Note that at the time of writing (1985) NLP was still in its infancy.
The methods described use Jesus Christ as the primary resource in resolving issues about self-concept. This should be quite effective with Christians.
The question is whether much the same could be achieved by the direct use of the appropriate NLP techniques. This will probably be much more acceptable to people who are less religious.
No thank you........2003-04-06
While Ms. Payne is an icon in the ex-gay community, I have a real problem with the idea of a woman writing about masculinity. The very fact that she is a woman makes her uniquely unqualified to write on this subject just as men are uniquely unqualified to write a similar book about femininity. Instead of this book, there are several books written by men that I could recommend, such as Alan Medinger's Growth Into Manhood and Gene Getz's The Measure of a Man.
Customer Reviews:
THUMBS UP TO JAMES L. PARIS.......1999-10-26
Finally someone "steps up to the plate." James Paris tells it like it is! He is true in getting out his message to help fellow Christians. He offers practical advice and even a plan to turn your finances around in 10 days!
Books:
- Our Father Abraham: Jewish Roots of the Christian Faith
- Positive Coaching: Building Character and Self-Esteem Through Sports
- Principles and Practice of Infectious Diseases: 2-Volume Set
- Reader in Comparative Religion: An Anthropological Approach (4th Edition)
- Reiki The Ultimate Guide Learn Sacred Symbols & Attunements plus Reiki Secrets You Should Know
- Reinventing Development?: Translating Rights-Based Approaches from Theory into Practice
- Remembering Wholeness: A Personal Handbook for Thriving in the 21st Century
- Reverberations of Faith: A Theological Handbook of Old Testament Themes
- Roots of Wisdom (with InfoTrac )
- Shepherd Looks at Psalm 23, A
Books Index
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