Book Tag

My friend, classmate, fellow pastor, and brother in the Society of St. Polycarp, Rev. Dave Juhl has "tagged" me on his blog.

It's taken me a long time to reply, as I'm on vacation and very, very busy (y'all know how that goes...). Anyway, here goes. His "tag" is a list of questions about books.


1. One Book that changed your life:
The Augsburg Confession. This little booklet is what drew me in to Lutheran Christianity and made an Evangelical Catholic of me.


2. One book you've read more than once:
The Hammer of God by Bo Giertz. This is a novel that every Lutheran pastor ought to read at least once a year, and I would recommend the same to laymen (of both sexes) as well. It is a series of three novellas set in a rural parish in Sweden from the early 1800s to the WW2 ear. Bumbling Lutheran pastors struggle with the major enemies of the Christian faith from each era, and in the process, they themselves learn the grace of God in giving pastoral care to their flocks.


3. One book you'd want on a desert island:
The Holy Bible. Of course, that's cheating, in a way, as it is a collection of books. If I had to pick one and only one, I suppose I would choose the Psalms.


4. One book that made you laugh:
Several of the Jeeves books by P.G. Wodehouse (I know the question says "one book," but I don't have a favorite). They are especially great in their Recorded Books versions - guaranteed to make long driving trips pleasurable. Wodehouse is a brillaint storyteller with a gift for farce and characterization.


5. One book that made you cry:
Though I can't honestly say the book made me cry (I guess I was raised in a more masculine era...), I found The Long Surrender by Burke Davis to be incredibly moving. This is a well-written narrative of the last days of the Confederate States government, as well as the case of President Jefferson Davis' two years as a POW after the war in which he was imprisoned without charges, and never tried. His personal physician, a Union veteran, was so appalled by the systematic torture of Davis, that he wrote a book exposing what the U.S. government was doing. A shocked public demanded Davis' release - including the abolitionist Horace Greely, who signed Davis' bond at his parole. Though he insisted on his day in court, he was never tried for treason (as the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court feared Davis would be exonerated by an impartial court, and the Confederate cause of secession would have been constitutionally vindicated!). Davis' wife, children (including an adopted black child who was taken away by federal authorities and never heard from again), and even former slaves suffered along with President Davis. In the end, the President's funeral dwarfed even Lincoln's. President Jefferson Finis Davis is one of my greatest heroes - in no small measure because of this book.


6. One book that you wish had been written:
I can't say. I'm working on it. ;-)


7. One book that you wish had never been written:
The DaVinci Code by Dan Brown. This nouveau-riche pulp author and pseudo-historian calls our mother a whore and then is shocked that Christians aren't thanking him for the favor. He asserts his ridiculous tale as fact, while cloaking it in fiction - all the while people around the world who are ignorant of history (ecclesiatical and secular) are lapping it up.


8. One book you're currently reading:
I just started a new book called Overthrow: America's Century of Regine Change from Hawaii to Iraq by Steven Kinzer. It's a history of American foreign policy since the 1890s to the present. This isn't a topic that is well covered in school, and even less so among the political talking heads on TV - whether left-wing or right-wing.


9. One book you've been meaning to read:
St, Augustine's City of God. I believe it is germaine to the times in which we live.


10. Now tag eight people.
Oh, boy. Everyone I know who has a blog has already been "tagged." So, I'm going to list some names, and invite them to post their lists right here as comments on this post.

Mrs. Grace Beane
Mr. Michael Green
Mr. Lee Honeycutt
Mrs. Syler Womack
Rev. Dr. John Stephenson
Mr. Aaron Wolf
Rev. Dr. Peter J. Scaer
Mr. Martin Fonda

Any other readers are invited to volunteer as well!