The Return

Review: The Great Spiritual Migration: How the World’s Largest Religion Is Seeking a Better Way to Be Christian Brian McLaren Convergent Publishing 2016 I hadn’t read anything from this author in quite a while and when I saw this book I decided to see what he had to say now.   McLaren communicates well and can be very convincing.   He hasn’t lost the touch over the years.   This book is engaging, thought provoking, and will make some folks unhappy.   That’s his style or at least what I have read it is.   This book is not just for those that identify as Christian.   And it’s my opinion that even an atheist might find this a good read.    Each chapter can be read as a standalone, so start where you want after the preface.   Being a bit of a traditionalist I read front to back.   Most of the central thrust addresses what McLaren see as a religion bound by the rigid form of its own belief systems and unable or unwilling...

Review: Greek for Everyone: Introductory Greek for Bible Study and Application A. Chadwick Thornhill Baker Books 2016 Wow! This book is much more thorough than I had expected.   I had studied beginner Biblical Greek and thought this would be a good refresher book.   It is that and more.   It also contains some good information on interpretation and exegesis.   Nearly hermeneutics in scope, I think.   That too is good.   But, you knew that was coming, this is no lightweight read.   As such I will need much more time to read through it. What I would like to do is to comment briefly on what I have covered so far. The author wants to present an overview of the Biblical Greek language that presents not only grammar, but some of the important points to consider for proper interpretation.   His explanations are accessible and complete.   I believe that this would have been helpful to me when I originally studied the language. ...

Review: The Blue Guitar John Banville Vintage Books 2015 It’s pretty brazen of me to write any sort of review for an accomplished author, but I had to because some of the reviews for this book confuse me.   For me this author portrayed so many of the people I know right this minute, young and old.   They live the good life until it craters and then wonder how they ended up in the mess they find themselves.   Maybe the objections to the protagonist have something to do with looking into the mirror?   Others think another of his books has a better plot.   That may be the case for that other book, but is this book designed to have anything like the other?   It doesn’t seem that way to me.    Whatever the case may be I liked this book for a number of reasons, not the least of which is Banville’s writing itself.   I found it a joy to read and intend to re-read it in the near future.   Yes, Orme drifts into painterly type la...