on our shelves – Page 2 – The Cathedral Bookstore

Yes, Jesus Loves Me. Now What?

This little handbook shows us how to live in ways that seek the good of God and the well-being of others.

From the time most Episcopalians are little bitty, we’re taught songs like “God is Love,” and “Jesus Loves Me.” As we get older, the hope is that we’ll internalize these concepts and go out into the world and share the love of God with others. But for many of us, there’s a gap there: knowing how to live as spiritual grown-ups can be challenging. Just what does this love look like in practice? How do we move beyond singing kum-ba-ya and learn just how to walk in love?

Several years ago, Presiding Bishop Michael Curry gathered a team to create a blueprint for a way of life that would help Episcopalians live God’s love. They patterned it after the lives of Jesus’ followers in the first century, a community committed to living “the way of God’s unconditional, unselfish, sacrificial, and redemptive love.” Bishop Curry took these ideas and developed The Way of Love, seven steps to order and inform our lives: Turn – Learn – Pray – Worship – Bless – Go – Rest.

Scott Gunn, a priest and author who is the executive director of Forward Movement, was part of that team which helped develop The Way of Love. Now Gunn has published The Way of Love: A Practical Guide to following Jesus, a small handbook that provides an introduction to The Way of Love and helpful steps for creating a personal rule of life based on it.

In the introduction, Gunn explains that the type of love we really want to practice is “not a mere sentiment but a real commitment to a way of life that is sacrificial and redemptive, a way that seeks the good of God and the well-being of others. This Way of Love is a game changer.” He proceeds to explain why each step matters, how it relates to the other steps, and how to do it.

In an easy, anecdotal voice, each of the initial chapters provides an explanation of the seven practices. Other Forward Movement team members and Episcopalians from around the country also share their experience with each practice, and these chapters end with reflection questions and journaling and prayer prompts.

Once we’ve spent time getting to know the practices and exploring what they might look like in our own lives, the last chapter is “Developing a Rule of Life.” Gunn explains the concept of a rule of life, an ancient practice that helps monks and nuns organize their daily prayer, work, and service. Not just for monasteries, however, a rule of life can also help us to create patterns in our own lives to help us grow in faith. Gunn suggests starting by reviewing the notes we have taken in the previous chapters and choosing three practices to commit to for a month.

The book includes an appendix of scripture quotes that are used in the main text and resources for further study, both organized by the seven Way of Love practices.

While there is a great deal of information readily available online and in other books about The Way of Love, this book is a good entry point. It provides a balance of explanation and how-to, and it prepares readers to go deeper into the Way of Love.

Like the song says: God is love. No matter how far we may have come in our understanding of the Church since our introduction to it, this little book and the resources it contains can help us to further develop our faith practice and know just how to live that love, every day.

To purchase the book, click here.

The Way of Love: A Practical Guide to following Jesus
Scott Gunn
Forward Movement
ISBN: 978-0-88028-486-8
$15.00

A path is a prior interpretation of the best way to traverse a landscape.
― Rebecca Solnit

Owen, We Hardly Knew Ye

I’m already missing Owen Meany and my Cathedral Reads group, but the Dean’s Book Club has a line up that promises to provide the next great read.

If Owen Meany is the reason that John Wheelright believes in God, I have to say that Owen is also the reason I got through the pandemic summer. My Cathedral Reads small group was a delightful collection of women, great readers all, who generously shared their insights and wisdom about A Prayer for Owen Meany, and life in general, each week. Some had read the book several times, and others were experiencing its richness chapter by chapter. We talked over an hour about each chapter, and I always came away thinking that many hours more would be necessary to really grasp all the details Irving packed into this dark, funny, moving and layered novel.

No matter what was happening in the news or at my house, I could count on this group and their perspective. I discovered many more layers of the book and of myself because of their conversation. Religion, sex, politics—we covered the waterfront in our discussions as Owen led us there with his full-frontal capitals. It was refreshing, sustaining, and enlightening conversation, providing just what a book club should.

Now it’s over, and I’m sad. I will miss my group and our routine. I will miss talking about Owen, and John, and Harriet and Hester. All summer I’ve been looking for armadillos, and I wonder if I’ll see them as frequently now. And there is the question of what to read next.

Yes, I have groaning stacks of books at home, and many more at the Bookstore should I ever run out. I’ve already started some of them, and they are commendable. But reading with others—others with different experiences and ideas and perspectives—seems so much more important now than just reading alone. Zooming for pleasure with the loose agenda of a great book is so different than a Zoom meeting. Anticipating a stimulating hour of good fellowship and conversation held back the dread of the sameness of the days all summer long.

Thank goodness the Dean’s Book Club is starting up again for Fall. If you, too, are looking for your next great read and a group to share it, look no further. September will provide a last deep dive into Owen Meany. October’s choice is S.C. Gwynne’s Hymns of the Republic: The Story of the Final Year of the American Civil War; November, the Cathedral’s own Kate Murphy’s You’re Not Listening: What You’re Missing and Why It Matters; and December the venerable Catherine Meeks’ Living Into God’s Dream: Dismantling Racism in America. All this non-fiction will be particularly interesting after having been steeped in Irving’s perspective on America all summer. I’m looking forward not only to gleaning new insights from these books, but also to sharing them with good readers.

To encourage you to support the Cathedral with your book-buying habits, The Cathedral Bookstore is offering a 10% discount on all the Dean’s Book Club titles from now until the meeting when the book is featured. However you choose to procure these titles, I hope we’ll get the chance to discuss them at some point this fall. As Owen so wisely told John “READING IS A GIFT,” and reading with friends is an even sweeter pleasure.

Love of books is the best of all.
~Jacqueline Kennedy

In Praise of Summer Reading

The shared experience of reading books in the cool of the air-conditioning will help us to understand ourselves—individually and as a group—a little better.

On the first day of summer when I was a little girl, my next-door neighbor would gather all the kids from our block and take us to the library. She’d sign us up for the summer reading program—charts and suggestions and prizes, and mostly all the wonder of books. For the rest of the summer, she would take us back once a week to get new books and check in with the librarian about our progress. The dusty cool shelves provided respite from the hot Houston humidity, and the new friends we met between the book covers became permanent additions to the language of our neighborhood group—Max from Where the Wild Things Are, Harold with his purple crayon, Alexander with his terrible horrible no good very bad day, and so many other memorable characters.

Last summer, many decades later, when the Cathedral began Cathedral Reads, it brought back all that summer reading joy. Our dean, Barkley Thompson, chose Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird as the book for kids and adults. We set dates at the end of the summer for a congregation-wide conversation, a movie night, and a deeper dive into the book with the dean.

On a hot August morning, well-over two-hundred people gathered between services to discuss the book. The dean gave an overview, and then at tables of ten with a facilitator and five questions, over coffee and cake, we brought our widely different perspectives on the book to the table. The following week, we ate popcorn and pizza as we watched Gregory Peck’s 1962 Academy Award-winning version of the movie. Afterward, the dean lead popcorn theology, and we compared the messages of the book and the film. The program wrapped up at a special version of the Dean’s Book Club.

The shared experience of the book created new friends, engaged old friends, and gave everyone an entry to conversation. Differing viewpoints were presented and heard respectfully, and we all came away understanding ourselves—individually and as a group—a little better.

Throughout this past year, people kept coming into the bookstore asking what the next Cathedral Reads book would be. The dean took suggestions, considered many titles, and finally chose two books: A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving for adults, and Wonder, by R.J. Palacio for kids, youth and adults who may not have read it yet. The books are linked by the concept “What Does Brave Look Like” and the discussions will focus on identity, courage, and faith. Both books will have Zoom reading groups throughout the summer to discuss questions regarding the reading to date, and the Dean will facilitate two larger Zoom conversations on Owen Meany. Then, circumstances permitting, we’ll meet up for a larger discussion and to watch the movie Wonder together, before the program wraps up again with the Dean’s Book Club.

We’re none of us sure when we’ll be able to gather, but we are finding creative ways to connect. And having the shared experience of books to read in the cool of the air-conditioning will introduce us to people different than ourselves, and show us their hearts. It will help us to understand ourselves—individually and as a group—a little better. It will give us new friends and make us more thoughtful people. Just like the library’s summer reading program used to do way back when.

Many stories matter. Stories have been used to dispossess and to malign. But stories can also be used to empower, and to humanize. Stories can break the dignity of a people. But stories can also repair that broken dignity.
~ Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

The Cathedral Reads: To Kill A Mockingbird

Experience a world much different than our modern, urban home, but in many ways the same—roiled by racial tension, peppered with a few good people trying to make a difference, and inhabited by kids watching and trying to make sense of the grownups’ words and actions.

Our lives are fragmented. We all watch different TV shows, and discussing Johnny Carson or Saturday Night live around the water cooler or the church coffee table are no longer widely-shared experiences. Some of us play bridge together, or attend regular bible study with a group, but others are bowling alone. But this summer, whether we venture to distant lands, enjoy a relaxing stay-cation, or just continue our routine with the AC cranked down, we have the opportunity to take a journey together.

Join the entire Cathedral community on a trip back in time to the Deep South of the 1930s. We’ll experience a world much different than our modern, urban home, but in many ways the same—roiled by racial tension, peppered with a few good people trying to make a difference, and inhabited by kids watching and trying to make sense of the grownups’ words and actions.

We’ll get there by reading Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. Many of you have read it, of course, but like the gospel, a good story can be revisited many times and never fail to provide new insights. Read it for the first time and discover why the name Atticus Finch became synonymous with morality and reason, re-read it to discover aspects of Boo Radley’s heart you never considered. Take it further and research Truman Capote’s relationship to the novel or the legal history of the South. We’ll all read it, but how deep you go with it is up to you. There will not be a quiz.

Rather, we’ll have a celebration of story. As summer winds down, we’ll gather to talk about what we discovered in this classic novel. Kids and grownups will have the opportunity to share their insights and learn more. Then, in one of the rare cases where the movie is as good as the book, we’ll enjoy the 1962 Oscar-winning Gregory Peck film together with a little Popcorn Theology. Readers who want to go further will delve into the story with Dean Thompson in book club.

If you can’t make one of the events, don’t worry: just relax knowing you’ll be able to walk up to anyone at the Cathedral this summer, grownup or kid, and say, “How’s that summer reading?” or “What do you think about Scout?” “Do you think Harper Lee wanted to release the earlier version, Go Set a Watchman, or was she pressured into it?” There is much for us to consider in both versions of this story.

Sharing our experiences will be better than retelling Johnny’s jokes or reenacting Roseanne Roseannadanna, and it will leave us with deeper perspective and a little more enlightenment. For those still in school, it’s a good opportunity to get some actual summer reading done with lots of support.

Whatever your motivation, join the Cathedral community this summer on a journey into a Southern literary classic that has as much to offer us today as it did when it hit the scene in 1933. Harper Lee’s messages, now more than ever, are important for us to consider as a group. In to Kill a Mockingbird, Atticus says. “You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view… Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.” While that depth of empathy is not physically possible, exploring an important novel and a writer’s evolving perspective on the world together is a good way to start understanding each other and our own world a little better.

Sunday, August 4, 10 a.m., Intergenerational small group book discussions of the novel To Kill a Mockingbird in Reynolds Hall

Friday, August 16, 6:30 p.m., Popcorn theology (dinner, movie, discussion) of the film To Kill a Mockingbird

Wednesday, Sept. 4, 6:30 p.m., Dean’s Book Club deeper dive into the novel To Kill a Mockingbird

Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.
—Harper Lee

A Wrinkle in Time: Was the Book Better?

Will the new light this movie sheds on L’Engle’s tale of good and evil amplify the message for you, or will your ink-on-paper experience–or your devotion to the specifics of the original story–prevail?

As director Ava DuVernay brings Madeleine L’Engle’s classic A Wrinkle in Time to life, moviegoers have begun the eternal debate: Was the book better? L’Engle herself maintained great skepticism towards a film adaptation of A Wrinkle in Time, but the story’s richness lends itself to further exploration of religion, creativity, and inclusivity.

A quick recap (sans spoiler) for those of you who have not read the book since middle school: Meg Murry, an awkward teenager, must travel through time and space to rescue her little brother from the clutches of evil. The method she uses is called “tessering,” a phenomenon her scientist father studied until he disappeared several years earlier. Meg learns of her mission from other-worldly beings; and the journey demanded of her takes her to the most dangerous landscape imaginable, that of her own heart.

Despite the difficulties of categorizing the quirky story published in 1962, it quickly became an international bestseller. Because of L’Engle’s treatment of religious themes, it soon became as controversial as it was beloved. The American Library Association Office of Intellectual Freedom lists it in the top 100 frequently banned books.

L’Engle, who served as librarian and writer in residence at the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in New York City for over thirty years, included many biblical references in the novel, and the ecumenical world view she put for went so far as to suggest a “happy religious pluralism” described by The New Yorker as one in which “Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, and even scientists can live together in peace.” Her intimation that love was more powerful than doctrine upset some conservative Christians, who claimed it offered an inaccurate portrayal of God and nurtured an unholy belief in myth and fantasy.

L’Engle suggests that the powerful messages of Christianity are not just for Christians. As Meg’s father tells her, “We were sent here for something. And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” The author appreciated the tension created by opposites and understood that tolerance and love could bridge seemingly irreconcilable differences. In community, she explains, we draw closer to God not through sameness but through our shared life. Love, L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time says, conquers all, and we do not have to be privileged, pretty or perfect to experience the power of this world-bending connection.

Several dozen Cathedral members recently ventured to the theater together to watch DuVernay’s new movie, discuss a little Popcorn Theology, and decide book or movie? A little background, ICYMI: Nominated for the Academy Award and winner of four EMMYs, DuVernay has received critical acclaim for her work across film genres. In 2017, she was named one of Fortune magazine’s 50 Greatest World Leaders and TIME magazine’s 100 Most Influential People. She is the founder of ARRAY, a grassroots distribution and advocacy collective dedicated to the amplification of films by people of color and women which was named one of Fast Company’s Most Innovative Companies. She gathered an all-star cast including Oprah Winfrey, Reese Witherspoon, Chris Pine, Mindy Kaling, and Zach Galifianakis, and A Wrinkle in Time is the first film directed by a woman of color to have a budget of over $100 million.

And our reaction? With its presentation of the full breadth and accessibility of God’s kingdom, Ava DuVernay’s film version matches L’Engle’s creative fire, although some viewers in our group criticized it for combining and deleting characters and for deleting Christian references. The question was also raised: Would children understand the meaning of the story, or would they just be mesmerized by the special effects? But whether or not an individual approved or disapproved of DuVernay’s interpretation of the story, watching the movie together led to thoughtful discussion.

And that division might please L’Engle, who believed that our seemingly insurmountable differences can, in fact, be bridged—through that amazing tesseract we know as love. It’s not surprising that our group would have differing opinions about a movie based on this story. Three generations of readers have loved, questioned, or banned A Wrinkle in Time, and its longevity proves its power to withstand disapproval. More than half a century after the book’s original publication, DuVernay’s newest film opens the story’s arms even more widely and brings its mid-century perspective into the future.

Book or movie? Strict adherence to the original or a more liberal interpretation? You’ll have to decide for yourself. But whichever medium you prefer, you’ll be reminded that one of the great strengths of the underlying message of A Wrinkle in Time is its ability to carry us beyond the perceived boundaries of our understanding.

Read or reread the book. Watch the movie. Or come by the Bookstore and pick up one of the many books we have by and about Madeleine L’Engle. Whether your path to understanding takes you through fiction, non-fiction, books, movies, or all of the above, we’d love to examine her fascinating world with you.

A book, too, can be a star, “explosive material, capable of stirring up fresh life endlessly,” a living fire to lighten the darkness, leading out into the expanding universe.
― Madeleine L’Engle, A Wrinkle in Time

The Peace Builders’ Poems

Taking more time for stories won’t solve our problems, but it provides an understanding that is the first step.

The Jerusalem Peace Builders, Israeli young adults from the each of the Abrahamic faiths–Christianity, Islam, and Judaism–spent the week at the Cathedral. On Sunday, before reading the lessons in the service in Hebrew and Arabic, they explained themselves to us by reading poems they had written.

Each poem began, “I am from…” And each list-format poem included sweet, mundane ingredients that made up these young men and women: my mother’s hummus, my sister’s tabbouleh, roses and olive trees. But going beyond the sugar-and-spice-and-everything-nice aspects of their character, they also shared darker ingredients: trouble, chaos and death, and the ways love had softened hearts of stone.

As they had opened up to each other through the course of the week, they opened themselves for the coffee-hour crowd. They shared their inside jokes and their respect and love for one another. They will never be able to look at a person from another religion as other, because by sharing their stories, their “I am,” they created connection and empathy.

At the Cathedral, the Dean has a book club. The titles are varied, selected by the group, and we carry them here in the bookstore. The title for September’s meeting is My Promised Land: The Triumph and Tragedy of Israel, by Ari Shavit. Called a “must-read book” by Thomas L. Friedman in The New York Times, Shavit doesn’t try to tell us what to think about Israel, instead, he shares its story, intimately intertwined with his own.

“The Israel question cannot be answered with polemics,” he writes. “As complex as it is, it will not submit itself to arguments and counter arguments. The only way to wrestle with it is to tell the Israel story. That is what I have tried to do in this book.”

Taking more time for stories–for sharing our own openly and listening to and reading those of others intently–won’t solve our problems, but it provides an understanding that is the first step.

The heartfelt group hug after the Jerusalem Peace Builders’ reading testified to what an important start knowing and understanding one another is on the path to peace.

The shortest distance between truth and a human being is a story.
–Anthony de Mello

These little lights of mine

There is no denying the pleasure of a thoughtful gift.

In this day of online shopping, flash sales, and instant gratification, finding a gift for a dear one can be a daunting task. Nothing seems special, or worthy of conveying the fondness we have for the recipient. Or we feel guilty about the material blessings–or collections, piles, or hordes– that threaten to encroach on our serenity, and we don’t want to burden anyone else with more stuff.

But there is no denying the pleasure of a thoughtful gift. Knowing that a friend or family member took the time to select something to delight us, wrap it carefully and brave traffic or the lines of the post office to get it to us warms the cockles of our hearts.

At our bookstore, we carry beautiful beeswax candles that have burned under twelve inches on our altar. Made by the same family since 1869, they smell divine, and they last longer than paraffin candles. Most importantly, they have been part of the beautiful services here, and perhaps some of the peaceful energy that is present in those services might have somehow rubbed off on them. At least, it’s lovely to think so.

Next time you’re wondering what to share with that friend who has everything, or you need special candles to adorn your family dinner table or cast a soft glow on a gathering of friends, remember that we have beeswax candles that can add a touch of the Cathedral to daily life. Proceeds from the sale of the candles go to the Altar Guild, so when your candlesticks shine, you’re helping the Cathedral shine, too!

There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it.
–Edith Wharton

Tree-Part Harmony

Have you listened to the songs of trees?

Have you been forest bathing recently? Did you know that spending two or more leisure hours under a canopy of trees provides a variety of health benefits so potent that the Japanese government has designated forest therapy paths? Have you listened to the songs of trees?

After publishing Pulitzer Prize finalist The Forest Unseen, Sewanee professor David George Haskell repeatedly visited a dozen trees around the world. His keen–and infinitely patient–powers of observation and fluent prose convey a deep and specific understanding of the connectedness of all species and describe the audible evidence of health or disease that really listening to trees provides.

The Songs of Trees: Stories From Nature’s Great Connectors will leave you with a new appreciation of the relationship of the arboreal world to the future of our planet, as well as fascinating insight on the many ways the biology of trees affects our daily lives.

Next time you’re forest bathing, take along Haskell’s contemplative study of the natural world. We have much to learn from trees, and there’s no better place to read than a leafy room lit with dappled sunshine.

For some of us, books are as important as almost anything else on earth. What a miracle it is that out of these small, flat, rigid squares of paper unfolds world after world after world, worlds that sing to you, comfort and quiet or excite you. Books help us understand who we are and how we are to behave. They show us what community and friendship mean; they show us how to live and die. –Anne Lamott

Our Bookstore

As the back cover proclaims, “There’s a Story Inside Every Bookstore!”

Conventional wisdom says that when a browser picks up a book, the path to purchase is as follows: 1. Look at front. 2. Read back cover. 3. Read some or all of flap. 4. Check out table of contents. 5. Open at random and sample. At any point in this process, the book may be abandoned or may find a home.

With some 700,000 books published each year, many deserving titles don’t even get this much contact with readers. So, how are we to determine which books we want to add to our shelves? Enter bookstores. Brick-and-mortar bookstores, to be precise.

Any book lover knows that browsing the shelves of a carefully curated bookstore provides peace and pleasure. The great bookstores of the world hold a well-deserved place on any bucket list, and even the smallest nook selling good books offers untold hours of enjoyment and enlightenment.

And who better to tell us about wonderful bookstores than authors? In My Bookstore: Writers Celebrate Their Favorite Places to Browse, Read, and Shop, renowned writers such as Isabel Allende, Douglas Brinkley, Terry Tempest Williams and dozens of others share their experiences with their most beloved bookstores. As the back cover proclaims, “There’s a Story Inside Every Bookstore!”

There is a story inside the doors of The Cathedral Bookstore. We invite you to get to know us better and make our little shop part of your story.

Ah, how good it is to be among people who are reading!—Rainer Maria Rilke