tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-306967562024-03-14T17:19:33.464-04:00J.L. NeyhartWriting about Books, The Bible, Theology, and C. S. Lewis since 2001.J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.comBlogger355125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-55199325200852144052024-01-01T15:22:00.005-05:002024-01-01T19:48:08.144-05:002023 Movies Ranked<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEbbr9GoSEWU59QY0eIOedLwnVEtd2e4QsFXVrfgT64RJx6yoFnOV47UjPEPRWqIiTxiOxjZkxl0RqOJ8DoDBUHnecWr2prlH6DkjpuOzDuxXtTk-rOsR19UktQVzIn44Y-kt5ZWAsYAqAzz-rtzByd9IYucpoJmi0N0ccukir7EiRfJak3BHz/s775/2023%20movies.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="673" data-original-width="775" height="557" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEbbr9GoSEWU59QY0eIOedLwnVEtd2e4QsFXVrfgT64RJx6yoFnOV47UjPEPRWqIiTxiOxjZkxl0RqOJ8DoDBUHnecWr2prlH6DkjpuOzDuxXtTk-rOsR19UktQVzIn44Y-kt5ZWAsYAqAzz-rtzByd9IYucpoJmi0N0ccukir7EiRfJak3BHz/w640-h557/2023%20movies.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><b><u>Favorite Movies of 2023 (definitely want to re-watch)</u></b><p></p><div><div><div><div>1. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse </div><div>2. The Marvels </div><div>3. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 </div><div>4. The Flash </div><div>5. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania </div><div>6. Red, White & Royal Blue </div><div>7. NYAD </div><div>8. The Velveteen Rabbit </div><div>9. Barbie </div></div><div><br /></div></div><div><div><b><u>Good Movies (would be willing to re-watch):</u></b></div><div><div>10. The Burial </div><div>11. Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves </div><div>12. Elemental </div><div>13. Tetris </div><div>14. BlackBerry </div><div>15. 80 for Brady </div><div>16. Book Club: The Next Chapter </div><div>17. Blue Beetle</div><div>18. Shazam! Fury of the Gods </div><div>19. The Little Mermaid </div></div><div><br /><b><u>Decent Movies (less likely to re-watch):</u></b></div><div><div>20. Ghosted </div><div>21. EXmas </div><div>22. The Super Mario Bros. Movie </div><div>23. Murder Mystery 2</div></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><b><u>2023 Movies I still want to watch:</u></b></div><div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li></li><li>A Holiday I Do</li><li>Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom</li><li>Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret.</li><li>Asteroid City</li><li>Friends & Family Christmas</li><li>Nimona</li><li>Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire</li><li>The Boy and the Heron</li><li>The Color Purple</li><li>The Holdovers</li><li>Wonka</li></ul></div><div><b><u><br /></u></b></div><div><div><a href="https://www.JLneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-movies-ranked.html">2021 movie rankings</a></div></div><div><div><a href="https://www.JLneyhart.com/2021/08/2020-movies-ranked.html" target="_blank">2020 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="https://www.JLneyhart.com/2020/01/2019-movies.html" target="_blank">2019 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2018/06/2018-movies.html" target="_blank">2018 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2018/01/2017-movies.html" target="_blank">2017 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2016-movies.html" target="_blank">2016 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2015-movies.html" target="_blank">2015 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2014-movies.html" target="_blank">2014 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2013-movies.html" target="_blank">2013 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2012-movies.html" target="_blank">2012 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2011-movies.html" target="_blank">2011 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2010-movies.html" target="_blank">2010 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2009-movies.html" target="_blank">2009 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2008-movies.html" target="_blank">2008 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2007-movies.html" target="_blank">2007 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2006-movies.html" target="_blank">2006 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2005-movies.html" target="_blank">2005 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2004-movies.html" target="_blank">2004 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2003-movies.html" target="_blank">2003 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2002-movies.html" target="_blank">2002 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2001-movies.html" target="_blank">2001 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2000-movies.html" target="_blank">2000 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1999-movies.html" target="_blank">1999 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1998-movies.html" target="_blank">1998 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1997-movies.html" target="_blank">1997 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1996-movies.html" target="_blank">1996 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1995-movies.html" target="_blank">1995 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1994-movies.html" target="_blank">1994 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1993-movies.html" target="_blank">1993 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1992-movies.html" target="_blank">1992 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1990-1991-movies.html" target="_blank">1991-1990 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1989-movies.html" target="_blank">1989 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1987-1988-movies.html" target="_blank">1988-1987 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/1985-1986-movies.html" target="_blank">1986-1985 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/1983-1984-movies.html" target="_blank">1984-1983 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/1980-1981-and-1982-movies.html" target="_blank">1982, 1981, 1980 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/movies-from-1970s.html" target="_blank">1970s movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/movies-from-1950s-and-1960s.html" target="_blank">1960s-1950s movie rankings</a></div></div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-36448871650569714942023-11-11T15:53:00.006-05:002023-11-11T15:57:56.527-05:00Book Review: Grace Can Lead Us Home: A Christian Call to End Homelessness by Kevin Nye<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPKNQBxpa2nNgiDVhI1Vw0MRsARnNiEv_BH8TM7ctevEqmN5GbtmxkM2myCAcX3o2D8SnMDrmYuFCVppobT1aAqeoYsxgcDUa3602tl2WYA7Ot8_hRzdE-Hff20rKdTftolcHWihk0HFBmxH_fMuJo1mtcwr2RdT3Ng5rGsKtMeLmb6A3rl4mZ/s2133/grace-can-lead-us-home-book.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2133" data-original-width="1400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjPKNQBxpa2nNgiDVhI1Vw0MRsARnNiEv_BH8TM7ctevEqmN5GbtmxkM2myCAcX3o2D8SnMDrmYuFCVppobT1aAqeoYsxgcDUa3602tl2WYA7Ot8_hRzdE-Hff20rKdTftolcHWihk0HFBmxH_fMuJo1mtcwr2RdT3Ng5rGsKtMeLmb6A3rl4mZ/s320/grace-can-lead-us-home-book.jpg" width="210" /></a></div><i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/60310867-grace-can-lead-us-home">Grace Can Lead Us Home: A Christian Call to End Homelessness</a> </i>by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4624992.Kevin_Nye">Kevin Nye</a><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">207 pages</span><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">Published August 9th, 2022 by Herald Press</span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">My rating: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/4707889765">5 of 5 stars</a></span><br /><br />
<i>Grace Can Lead Us Home</i> is a must-read that will challenge your assumptions about homelessness, its causes, and potential solutions. Author Kevin Nye is the assistant director of programs at The Center in Hollywood, a non-religious non-profit providing services and advocacy for people experiencing homelessness in Los Angeles. <br /><br />Nye argues that homelessness is a problem of unaffordable housing, and no matter how they end up homeless, all people deserve the resources they need, including housing. He explores the complex and interconnected issues that contribute to homelessness, such as affordable housing, mental illness, addiction, trauma, and systemic injustice. Nye does not shy away from the hard questions or the messy realities, but he also offers hope and grace to both the unhoused and the housed. He writes, "By drawing readers back to the biblical vision of justice, Kevin Nye gives readers a new lens for seeing their unhoused neighbors." <br /><br />In chapter four Nye talks about the disproportionate number of LGBTQ youth who are unhoused, in large part due to being kicked out of their homes. Sadly, even if they go to shelters, they aren’t always safe, especially trans women. Many faith-based shelters are explicitly non-affirming and trans women are forced to sleep in rooms with cisgender men “puts them at direct risk for targeted violence.”<br /><blockquote>“As the battles over LGBTQ+ affirmation rage on in Christian institutions, we cannot lose sight of the physical and psychological harm we are inflicting on people whom God loves. Our limited theological imaginations, which prioritize how we think and feel about sexuality and gender identity over how we value the actual lives of fellow bearers of the divine image, is driving LGBTQ+ people to homelessness and all its subsequent harms.”</blockquote>I also appreciate the emphasis on harm reduction in chapter five. “Harm reduction” generally is about minimizing harm to people instead of demanding perfection. When it comes to substance abuse, Nye writes: “Harm reduction” is a set of beliefs for approaching substance use and addiction that highlights users’ choice, autonomy, and safety.” Therefore, the response to substance abuse shouldn’t be about punishment, but first about reducing the harm to people and communities impacted. <br /><br />This book is not only informative but also transformative. It will challenge you to rethink your theology, your politics, and your relationships. It will also inspire you to join God's work of restoring dignity, healing, and community to those who are often overlooked and ignored. <i>Grace Can Lead Us Home</i> is a timely and prophetic call for Christians to end homelessness in our world.<br /><br />Table of Contents<br />-A Note On Language <br />-Introduction<br />1. Seeing And Being Seen <br />2. Housing <br />3. Isolation And Connection<br />4. Community And Solidarity<br />5. Mental Health<br />6. Substance Use and Overdose<br />7. Addiction And Recovery<br />8. Abundance, Beauty, and Celebration<br />-Conclusion <br /><br /><i>“We must push for solutions that actually end homelessness, rather than ones that simply push it out of sight and out of mind.”</i>
<br /><br /><i>Grace Can Lead Us Home</i> Affiliate Purchase Links: <a href="https://bookshop.org/a/25777/9781513810515" target="_blank"><b>Bookshop.org (supports local bookstores)</b></a></div><div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">Amazon: <a href="https://amzn.to/47bScBQ" target="_blank">Paperback</a>, <a href="https://amzn.to/49y7P83" target="_blank">Kindle Edition</a>, <a href="https://amzn.to/49KJKez" target="_blank">Audible Audiobook</a></span></div></div><div><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;">I actually got to meet Kevin in person at Evolving Faith in October!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkXEI8LH-QQw6-28QBQSydod8HdWARJN3bwThFDffuzu5GJibhCpWTJWejAS3Y_72xEfEAJXudiXGCImDOq70EQwEfIrHgTWbPV_ime9sdU66NA9FcUm5GX8jrdLT0zzpUEAnH3YYvdo2AHXJXOu6WBy3j1cIi95a_8_l7Zb1N0qe_ii06-ORe/s2237/IMG_3771.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="Kevin and Neyhart pictured together at Evolving Faith 2023" border="0" data-original-height="2195" data-original-width="2237" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjkXEI8LH-QQw6-28QBQSydod8HdWARJN3bwThFDffuzu5GJibhCpWTJWejAS3Y_72xEfEAJXudiXGCImDOq70EQwEfIrHgTWbPV_ime9sdU66NA9FcUm5GX8jrdLT0zzpUEAnH3YYvdo2AHXJXOu6WBy3j1cIi95a_8_l7Zb1N0qe_ii06-ORe/w320-h314/IMG_3771.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjp1U7b38euwtmgv9-3rUNOemsrYMcOJZXEe2qM0Mkbc5CA3nEizqJqwL9DuB9S5Fg8bUvlCvxE_ThIAV7ipHw8iQ8NyT03fuei0oyJWQJlAzk6TbsuKhPyWMJnZII_p0ipYMOjPAH1P4ybvxtL6uPgv8hvIQ6p2ryeO6LeYGftb0qtixAcQThP/s600/Kevin06-1-scaled-pryb2zmx9tuuf9ht4iyk5q5e8d0k22eyzov5871cds.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="600" data-original-width="450" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjp1U7b38euwtmgv9-3rUNOemsrYMcOJZXEe2qM0Mkbc5CA3nEizqJqwL9DuB9S5Fg8bUvlCvxE_ThIAV7ipHw8iQ8NyT03fuei0oyJWQJlAzk6TbsuKhPyWMJnZII_p0ipYMOjPAH1P4ybvxtL6uPgv8hvIQ6p2ryeO6LeYGftb0qtixAcQThP/s320/Kevin06-1-scaled-pryb2zmx9tuuf9ht4iyk5q5e8d0k22eyzov5871cds.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><div>Kevin Nye is a writer and advocate working toward ending homelessness by engaging best practices. He has written on the intersections of homelessness and faith for Religion News Service, Sojourners, Red Letter Christians, and more. He has presented at national conferences on the topic of homelessness, including Housing First Partners Conference 2022.</div></div><div><br /></div><div>Kevin currently lives with his wife and son in Minneapolis, MN, where he works as Housing Director at an organization addressing youth homelessness.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Follow Kevin on the web: </i></div><div><i>Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/kevinmnye1" target="_blank">@</a><span style="color: #0000ee;"><u>kevinmnye1</u></span> </i></div><div><a href="https://kevinmnye.com/" target="_blank">https://kevinmnye.com/</a></div><div><br /></div><div>
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Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-28703894524687309542023-08-15T00:14:00.004-04:002024-01-01T15:06:42.460-05:002022 Movies Ranked<p> </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgSRFz1CB8QyitvNeNJZz-cAbmP7sdj0lwsVo20zFv8sCEZeFAyTX7rMMLR2v0p-R7wYHnzgfob3ir2QUzUueqF9r7nv4SJ2VCflrXev7ofnT0cUAxltQQMO0ySYmuCkyCW6Mfd0aNtiZ8TJabsG2l3sAn_aqskk-rYA0wL1LMx5loHb8bnHfMq" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="668" data-original-width="773" height="553" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgSRFz1CB8QyitvNeNJZz-cAbmP7sdj0lwsVo20zFv8sCEZeFAyTX7rMMLR2v0p-R7wYHnzgfob3ir2QUzUueqF9r7nv4SJ2VCflrXev7ofnT0cUAxltQQMO0ySYmuCkyCW6Mfd0aNtiZ8TJabsG2l3sAn_aqskk-rYA0wL1LMx5loHb8bnHfMq=w640-h553" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><br /><div><br /></div><div><b><u>Favorite Movies of 2022 (definitely want to re-watch)</u></b><br /><div><div><br /></div><div>1. Everything Everywhere All at Once </div><div>2. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever </div><div>3. Spirited </div><div>4. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness </div><div><div>5. Avatar: The Way of Water </div><div>6. Glass Onion </div></div></div><div>7. The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special </div><div>8. The Woman King <span style="font-size: xx-small;"><i>(this was a <b>great </b>film, but due to the level of violence I probably won't rewatch it)</i></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div><div><br /><b><u>Good Movies (would probably re-watch):</u></b><br /></div><div><div>8. Thor: Love and Thunder </div><div>9. Fire Island </div><div>10. The Adam Project</div></div><div>11. Turning Red </div><div><br /><b><u>Decent Movies (less likely to re-watch):</u></b><br /><div>12. Elvis </div><div>13. Uncharted </div><div>14. Disenchanted </div><div>15. Hocus Pocus 2 </div></div><div><br /><b><u>Meh (No desire to re-watch):</u></b><br /></div><div><div>16. Senior Year </div><div>17. Hustle </div><div>18. The Lost City </div><div>19. The Batman </div></div><div><ul></ul><div><a href="https://www.JLneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-movies-ranked.html">2021 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="https://www.JLneyhart.com/2021/08/2020-movies-ranked.html" target="_blank">2020 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="https://www.JLneyhart.com/2020/01/2019-movies.html" target="_blank">2019 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2018/06/2018-movies.html" target="_blank">2018 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2018/01/2017-movies.html" target="_blank">2017 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2016-movies.html" target="_blank">2016 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2015-movies.html" target="_blank">2015 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2014-movies.html" target="_blank">2014 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2013-movies.html" target="_blank">2013 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2012-movies.html" target="_blank">2012 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/07/2011-movies.html" target="_blank">2011 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2010-movies.html" target="_blank">2010 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2009-movies.html" target="_blank">2009 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2008-movies.html" target="_blank">2008 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2007-movies.html" target="_blank">2007 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2006-movies.html" target="_blank">2006 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2005-movies.html" target="_blank">2005 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2004-movies.html" target="_blank">2004 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2003-movies.html" target="_blank">2003 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2002-movies.html" target="_blank">2002 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2001-movies.html" target="_blank">2001 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/2000-movies.html" target="_blank">2000 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1999-movies.html" target="_blank">1999 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1998-movies.html" target="_blank">1998 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1997-movies.html" target="_blank">1997 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1996-movies.html" target="_blank">1996 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1995-movies.html" target="_blank">1995 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1994-movies.html" target="_blank">1994 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1993-movies.html" target="_blank">1993 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1992-movies.html" target="_blank">1992 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1990-1991-movies.html" target="_blank">1991-1990 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1989-movies.html" target="_blank">1989 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/08/1987-1988-movies.html" target="_blank">1988-1987 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/1985-1986-movies.html" target="_blank">1986-1985 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/1983-1984-movies.html" target="_blank">1984-1983 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/1980-1981-and-1982-movies.html" target="_blank">1982, 1981, 1980 movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/movies-from-1970s.html" target="_blank">1970s movie rankings</a><br /><a href="http://www.JLneyhart.com/2017/09/movies-from-1950s-and-1960s.html" target="_blank">1960s-1950s movie rankings</a></div></div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-18532695541145087652023-01-04T08:00:00.001-05:002023-01-04T08:00:00.166-05:00Favorite Non-Fiction Books Read in 2022<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwmP3OlcfRlVRjquqi7EIh2W74vMXy-3dYH6ismAEE3fQXkkqpHk-kmyNWzpaswFlMA5tSEgT_-Ag_Y--Q0ALMhi4n49_nT826yTLPSjNqbQumFGRQg8EUsUCGCmQmAyB2HPYMOlVrN7iLWyrYkNXAvfH-a6LOqSOvTnokLZ6T8UA1ulmvDQ/s851/Screenshot%202023-01-04%20021658.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="851" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwmP3OlcfRlVRjquqi7EIh2W74vMXy-3dYH6ismAEE3fQXkkqpHk-kmyNWzpaswFlMA5tSEgT_-Ag_Y--Q0ALMhi4n49_nT826yTLPSjNqbQumFGRQg8EUsUCGCmQmAyB2HPYMOlVrN7iLWyrYkNXAvfH-a6LOqSOvTnokLZ6T8UA1ulmvDQ/w640-h360/Screenshot%202023-01-04%20021658.png" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">These were my top ten favorite non-fiction books that I read for the first time in 2022 (simply alphabetized by author's last name):</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><i>Queer Hands of God </i>edited by Crystal Cheatham</li><li><b><i>Baptized in Tear Gas: From White Moderate to Abolitionist</i> by Elle Dowd </b></li><li><i>Pedagogy of the Oppressed</i> by Paulo Freire</li><li><b><i>The God Who Riots: Taking Back the Radical Jesus</i> by Damon Garcia</b></li><li><i>Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom</i> by bell hooks</li><li><b><i>The World's Poorest President Speaks Out</i> by Yoshimi Kusaba</b></li><li><i>Bright Evening Star: Mystery of the Incarnation</i> by Madeleine L'Engle</li><li><i>Miracle on 10th Street and Other Christmas Writings</i> by Madeleine L'Engle</li><li><b><i>Mother God </i>by Teresa Kim Pecinovsky</b></li><li><i>Beyond Shame: Creating a Healthy Sex Life on Your Own Terms</i> by Matthias Roberts </li></ul><div>I highly recommend all of these but most especially the titles in bold.</div></div></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="js-dataTooltip" data-use-wtr-tooltip="true" style="background-color: white; color: #181818; font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px;"><div border="0" class="covers stacked" id="books" style="margin-bottom: 10px;"></div></div><div class="clear" style="background-color: white; clear: both; color: #181818; font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 1px; height: 0px; line-height: 0; margin: 0px;"></div><div class="clear" style="background-color: white; clear: both; color: #181818; font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 1px; height: 0px; line-height: 0; margin: 0px;"></div><div class="infiniteFooter" id="pagestuff" style="background-color: white; bottom: 0px; color: #181818; font-family: Lato, "Helvetica Neue", Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; position: fixed; right: 0px; width: 1519.2px;"></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-89742136985626758622023-01-03T19:40:00.006-05:002023-01-03T19:44:25.833-05:00Favorite Fiction Books Read in 2022<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhyPIz2KOHlES3n2Ck1nwRNRrxTCYIfYg60yWMzuZOd-hScU1NVBYDbxxKjAm-uvjal3uP7KuyDXxqvgV84_lsnJ2Zx0LJjdIRpovi3k3X7FajWiGWKpqCUMSCKIdylzyqa_J7M0iTxMknq4lEZzWJt-8Gph0xsgjl6gjQmyfOtwf5oJ--RbQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="462" data-original-width="837" height="354" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhyPIz2KOHlES3n2Ck1nwRNRrxTCYIfYg60yWMzuZOd-hScU1NVBYDbxxKjAm-uvjal3uP7KuyDXxqvgV84_lsnJ2Zx0LJjdIRpovi3k3X7FajWiGWKpqCUMSCKIdylzyqa_J7M0iTxMknq4lEZzWJt-8Gph0xsgjl6gjQmyfOtwf5oJ--RbQ=w640-h354" width="640" /></a></div><br />These were my top ten favorite fiction books that I read for the first time in 2022 (simply alphabetized by author's last name):<p></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Jane, Unlimited by Kristin Cashore</li><li>A Psalm for the Wild-Built (Monk & Robot, #1) by Becky Chambers</li><li>A Prayer for the Crown-Shy (Monk & Robot, #2)<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>by Becky Chambers</li><li>The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet (Wayfarers, #1) by Becky Chambers</li><li>A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers, #2) by Becky Chambers</li><li>To Be Taught, If Fortunate by Becky Chambers</li><li>X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills by Chris Claremont</li><li>Upgrade by Blake Crouch</li><li>The Resisters by Gish Jen</li><li>Superman: Son of Kal-El, Vol. 1: The Truth by Tom Taylor</li></ul><div>Yes, I realize that five of those are all by Becky Chambers. <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/03/i-have-new-favorite-author-becky.html" target="_blank">I said I had found a new favorite author</a>! All ten of these are also in the science fiction genre. =) What can I say? I like what I like!</div><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/neyharts-nerdy-reading-recap-2022-book.html" target="_blank">Be sure to check out my 2022 Reading Recap if you missed it!</a></div><p></p>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-39998868637889816372022-12-31T04:55:00.005-05:002023-11-17T01:34:02.019-05:00Neyhart's Nerdy Reading Recap 2022: Book stats, Graphs, and Charts!<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/user/year_in_books/2022/433928" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img alt="" data-original-height="582" data-original-width="757" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjFgFHxJVIjYbOdiQ1v_WQCyvrY0-PbwXRimRgaUyOwFvtn9-_yT5amzku8QRIBI19_mhnEyKbk2GxJruzZZCveyUeW-sduT1kewD-jzQTAXObDVNXpdOF6GIijIRiXmWbfmuqWbsKcdSZNhfCDkyyit_wKnaTfQkHJqnMBYceBozTABAJSUQ" width="312" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgS7sOM84CmoPKyRRxfbGzoa8mhIvZJYDqgOJR2F6p_pf0JDWzCY-jRFCJudu72NgsDGbKz8p9OkEESz0VY-SDOxIwBhyxjOflt8qED51sqddGu-S0M2QsPoYiw5VEptuc23So3dZJCd3CqwbRcYZtEnbonvrVJhiI-x9i-Ne0qSmObrEtAlg" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img data-original-height="222" data-original-width="833" height="171" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgS7sOM84CmoPKyRRxfbGzoa8mhIvZJYDqgOJR2F6p_pf0JDWzCY-jRFCJudu72NgsDGbKz8p9OkEESz0VY-SDOxIwBhyxjOflt8qED51sqddGu-S0M2QsPoYiw5VEptuc23So3dZJCd3CqwbRcYZtEnbonvrVJhiI-x9i-Ne0qSmObrEtAlg=w640-h171" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">I like that Goodreads tells me I'm really good at reading, and probably a lot of other things too!</span></i><br /><br /></td></tr></tbody></table><br /><br /></div><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">2022 was the 11th year I tracked every book I read! The first year I did this I set my reading goal at a modest (for me) <a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/books-read-in-2012.html" target="_blank">52 books for the year</a> because one book a week sounded pretty manageable. And the reason I decided to start tracking my reading was to help motivate me to read more than I already did.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">2014 was the first year I started using a spreadsheet to help me collect and analyze more data than Goodreads allows. In 2019, I discovered that bookriot.com had a spreadsheet template with some built-in charts and graphs, beyond what I was already tracking. So I have used it for the past three years while modifying it to my liking. Here is a link where you can get their <a href="https://bookriot.com/2023-reading-log/" target="_blank">2023 reading log template</a>.</div></div><h1 style="clear: both;"><b>Now on to the nerd stats:</b></h1><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Number of books read:</b> 200<br /><b>Number of pages read:</b> 37,753<br /><b>Average book length: </b>188 pages</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiqbPrG6kSCjxevZtWZSGoN2qURxN-sjWD_3aZXKf1mXNkSDO6RUwSbPnxpa0QPI7lkC67VuaeE3jzcrtvj7odQVXmP1uqb4szhfh-9q6D8J4evPjwdJS4riSA2CuTtfOzNx4sJz_5LisMbLudJdVOVNNAYmjktdIIQTjQPqx1zQSomKgfe7A" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="420" data-original-width="761" height="354" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiqbPrG6kSCjxevZtWZSGoN2qURxN-sjWD_3aZXKf1mXNkSDO6RUwSbPnxpa0QPI7lkC67VuaeE3jzcrtvj7odQVXmP1uqb4szhfh-9q6D8J4evPjwdJS4riSA2CuTtfOzNx4sJz_5LisMbLudJdVOVNNAYmjktdIIQTjQPqx1zQSomKgfe7A=w640-h354" width="640" /></a></div><br />Mode of reading:</b><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Audiobook: 67 (33.5%)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Ebook: 104 (52%) </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Print: 29 (14.5%)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i>(This breakdown is very similar to <a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-reading-recap-book-stats-graphs.html" target="_blank">last year</a>.)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Book Genres:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEikMNbitaMC9rDjXaZLF8jUWTptaBNdJTJPmqnhxe3VX6q5crY0dGEExHSpsxcj17wTKMwwo8LGS-Xe4aBaRTs7by9RH6Jf8yBx5rMZsZKwG1HEjgUzpzcpRq5-57Bx1tUEVLLLuhwuAuqicdw3uMqSj9Hnm0wU-zZBqGAUGE2o_ZUSgCqq2w" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="476" data-original-width="762" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEikMNbitaMC9rDjXaZLF8jUWTptaBNdJTJPmqnhxe3VX6q5crY0dGEExHSpsxcj17wTKMwwo8LGS-Xe4aBaRTs7by9RH6Jf8yBx5rMZsZKwG1HEjgUzpzcpRq5-57Bx1tUEVLLLuhwuAuqicdw3uMqSj9Hnm0wU-zZBqGAUGE2o_ZUSgCqq2w=w640-h400" width="640" /></a></div></b><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Similar to the past two years, I read more nonfiction than fiction (60/40 split), whereas in previous years this was more of a 50-50 split.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhIA2sFF_FnuQIrtfJIemNyd3c2ARQ2RgVdlxEN3L3g8znig0exvgH4imJ0G1my8SeOY8ryKflTgJBwjfcUuPcn2w4I1NSJFLKyOXMCin2Dc0VrnCkWo9znczNraFHkdU-WLAL4Rs8kIJipOlK2nGmsGNOV2yZ3dCIinUNngDRfKSlhns7n5Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="495" data-original-width="800" height="396" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhIA2sFF_FnuQIrtfJIemNyd3c2ARQ2RgVdlxEN3L3g8znig0exvgH4imJ0G1my8SeOY8ryKflTgJBwjfcUuPcn2w4I1NSJFLKyOXMCin2Dc0VrnCkWo9znczNraFHkdU-WLAL4Rs8kIJipOlK2nGmsGNOV2yZ3dCIinUNngDRfKSlhns7n5Q=w640-h396" width="640" /></a></div><br /></div><br /><b><u>More specific genres and categories I tracked:</u></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">LGBTQ Studies: 15 books <i><span style="font-size: x-small;">(some of these overlap with memoir/Bio and other genres)</span></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Seminary: 75 books - 37.5% of the books I read were for my seminary studies</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"> <i><span style="font-size: x-small;">(these overlap with Bible & Theology, obviously)</span></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgzUVRaoIYZNMDL4VRTfsCdpEKLGGJRbDHmYEiB2bN7cqkttF_Cn2w8iiFemkg0ddhyQh4hiXqbk9ptId_Ek--zgEvzxc2HuAo9jN6cW65ygH9PWGBfl1tzW_mzD7hRLVW-hxuquox8ipFX7CBaPOr9X0gvK3OzXAs-LslhBtmzkfpsHxHMyw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img alt="" data-original-height="432" data-original-width="765" height="362" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgzUVRaoIYZNMDL4VRTfsCdpEKLGGJRbDHmYEiB2bN7cqkttF_Cn2w8iiFemkg0ddhyQh4hiXqbk9ptId_Ek--zgEvzxc2HuAo9jN6cW65ygH9PWGBfl1tzW_mzD7hRLVW-hxuquox8ipFX7CBaPOr9X0gvK3OzXAs-LslhBtmzkfpsHxHMyw=w640-h362" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Bible</b>: 52</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Theology</b>: 39</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Fantasy</b>: 39</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Science Fiction</b>: 39 (interesting that my sci-fi/fantasy was split 50-50 this year!)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"> <i>Almost 40% of the books I read were either Fantasy or Sci-Fi</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Memoir/Bio</b>: 12 (not as many as last year which was 19)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Children's</b>: 9</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>General Nonfiction</b>: 8</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>General Fiction</b>: 2</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Gender of Author:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgNJq0LKGtojw3Z3XHo0Q-dGicr1_dvP8_5k80wCkSQYezuQMK-0j2JsyBwGRW6AzpEPRYspgS2V9xpwLi_RJ0FLL7bbB_HbVQef5b9DjWPXoND7msWuUT3P5Ok5JkKYouhc3atdyj0ef6JxUA25w1TqKmk9KMVYFAw_-pmzbrmBtvuQ5Yo3Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="438" data-original-width="757" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgNJq0LKGtojw3Z3XHo0Q-dGicr1_dvP8_5k80wCkSQYezuQMK-0j2JsyBwGRW6AzpEPRYspgS2V9xpwLi_RJ0FLL7bbB_HbVQef5b9DjWPXoND7msWuUT3P5Ok5JkKYouhc3atdyj0ef6JxUA25w1TqKmk9KMVYFAw_-pmzbrmBtvuQ5Yo3Q=w640-h370" width="640" /></a></div>Last year I was finally able to read slightly more women than men but this year it's back to 62% male, 36% female, and 2% non-binary. I'm going to have to try harder in 2023 to even this out! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Books Read Per Month 2022:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-weight: bold; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhDd0kIXvChIXukGJZUw1gKdHrFfMSnbVaJWwlpNGqyOIUMkbPXW9lcnPGcJ0cDaAodRvNZ5P2ClMgozDahgCdG7Uypq2WKCmWHQ7rp0XEJb4ViRJxR6qASC3w8N7yDK9AU35hThx6UlggaCxNS0-iGiaHBTXlXs74vbzJb8kA9OkMSLThpqw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="452" data-original-width="753" height="384" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhDd0kIXvChIXukGJZUw1gKdHrFfMSnbVaJWwlpNGqyOIUMkbPXW9lcnPGcJ0cDaAodRvNZ5P2ClMgozDahgCdG7Uypq2WKCmWHQ7rp0XEJb4ViRJxR6qASC3w8N7yDK9AU35hThx6UlggaCxNS0-iGiaHBTXlXs74vbzJb8kA9OkMSLThpqw=w640-h384" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">This chart looks about like I would expect it to with me reading the most books between May and August when I have more time to read for fun, along with December and January because I'm also on break from classes half of December and all of January (other than auditing a J-term, which I will also be reading for).</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Read vs. Re-reads:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjUZwY5mMgES8ui7E-pV3Q9zy_XlrUNA6Ahav0oWVRnc6svWPDixWsEkpMUG2YsiGgOR4ikRtj0Vs8WRkmv4PQAvcUsixVm_42Y0g859ujE-ohXaIm2J71nat6rNBIk0gyJUpyLhBO9IazvqaTThpcMkPjtSPjB7WPpbJUiQmEABZr6ztlrAQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="546" data-original-width="906" height="386" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjUZwY5mMgES8ui7E-pV3Q9zy_XlrUNA6Ahav0oWVRnc6svWPDixWsEkpMUG2YsiGgOR4ikRtj0Vs8WRkmv4PQAvcUsixVm_42Y0g859ujE-ohXaIm2J71nat6rNBIk0gyJUpyLhBO9IazvqaTThpcMkPjtSPjB7WPpbJUiQmEABZr6ztlrAQ=w640-h386" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">First-time read: 132 books (66%)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Re-read: 68 books (34%)<span> </span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span>Here is an image of the 35 books I have labeled as my favorite books I read for the first time in 2022:</span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg22vIG9C-N5MvURjPdsP22ePjAv-kRy14hGRVpRcDXaWwesTuaVEf_baEL8iQwB5HAHXIfWI7VHLS_0YQNvlDB_r3JNpkr9z80Tfbc1QVW6rROijs-4ia6cverO8m3gV91i3a1OPTASuX45WnfkeH8PuvmtvzQE_O5--l_0tIN8ApIABpTog" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="815" data-original-width="616" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg22vIG9C-N5MvURjPdsP22ePjAv-kRy14hGRVpRcDXaWwesTuaVEf_baEL8iQwB5HAHXIfWI7VHLS_0YQNvlDB_r3JNpkr9z80Tfbc1QVW6rROijs-4ia6cverO8m3gV91i3a1OPTASuX45WnfkeH8PuvmtvzQE_O5--l_0tIN8ApIABpTog=s16000" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/433928-neyhart?shelf=2022-favorites&view=table" target="_blank">If you click this link it should take you to the list on Goodreads</a></i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><span><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjVquL9HGoC3Z5UljTq2cbrRvd4kbSYKPPqWRkGjR3Wf8LudsDYcPSl4PYZ20BDGc10YFW6BssDmU_TqYZEaGPkDNphhcGQqiRR7N7RLuwfdjDX5LKhKKBKQ42QUuR-FtUR5lWNdRRPglFlFSodz0ekHFuwELjJc7zARFqeUPgGgRKGl3P6ig" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="566" data-original-width="1726" height="210" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjVquL9HGoC3Z5UljTq2cbrRvd4kbSYKPPqWRkGjR3Wf8LudsDYcPSl4PYZ20BDGc10YFW6BssDmU_TqYZEaGPkDNphhcGQqiRR7N7RLuwfdjDX5LKhKKBKQ42QUuR-FtUR5lWNdRRPglFlFSodz0ekHFuwELjJc7zARFqeUPgGgRKGl3P6ig=w640-h210" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>screenshot of part of my spreadsheet</i></td></tr></tbody></table><br /></span>Feel free to tell me about your reading year in the comments or in an email back to me! </div></div></div></div></div></div></div><p>If you are interested in reading progressive-type theology books and discussing them with me and other people, <a href="http://www.jlneyhart.com/p/theology-book-club.html" target="_blank">click on over to this page</a> where you can find out more about that and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProgressiveTheologyBookClub" target="_blank">join the fun</a>! </p><p><a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/search/label/book%20review" target="_blank">Link to my book reviews</a></p>
<p><b>Previous reading recaps and book lists:</b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2022/12/neyharts-nerdy-reading-recap-2022-book.html" target="_blank">2022 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-reading-recap-book-stats-graphs.html" target="_blank">2021 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2020/12/2020-reading-recap-with-charts-and.html" target="_blank">2020 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jlneyhart.com/2020/01/2019-reading-recap-one-with-charts-and.html">2019 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2019/01/2018-reading-recap-book-stats-and.html" target="_blank">2018 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jlneyhart.com/2017/12/my-year-in-books-2017-book-stats-and.html" target="_blank">2017 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2016/12/2016-book-breakdown.html" target="_blank">2016 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2016/01/2015-book-breakdown.html" target="_blank">2015 Reading Recap</a><br /><br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2022-books.html"" target="_blank">What I read in 2022</a>(200 books!)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2021-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2021</a>(202 books!)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/2020/12/2020-reading-recap-with-charts-and.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2020</a>(151 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2019-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2019</a> (203 books!)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2018</a> (130 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2017-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2017</a> (83 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2016-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2016</a> (141 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2015-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2015</a> (120 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/books-read-in-2014.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2014</a> (111 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/2013-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2013</a> (100 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/books-read-in-2012.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2012</a> (56 books)<br />
<a href="https://www.jlneyhart.com/p/frankenstein-by-mary-shelley-2007.html" target="_blank">What I read 2007-2011</a><br /></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-7478634555070113712022-12-12T02:32:00.002-05:002022-12-16T05:36:29.065-05:00What is Liberation Theology?<p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWrIanqMMOw2lnJB3BYHGc839o_zCZYDhRBaDsTXbX2k93qd1_9HJeFZPeeVzSvKSaxUdKSUYsFM6smovupK3EIV1CeYVjt9n_itBcwh6gKWGUWkFham6QfHpxb2EKvWuUwhkovzmAqyrVhBskn3fZUo6Tm2uGPyYQny50jmSTx732jlyvPw/s673/Liberation%20Theology.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Liberation theology is a collective term for a group of related theologies, which rose to prominence in the last three decades of the twentieth century. Latin American liberation theology is probably the best known of these, and it originated, along with BLACK THEOLOGY, in the USA in the late 1960s and early 1970s. In subsequent years contextual theologies in Africa and Asia, along with other contextual theologies in the USA (e.g., LATINO/A THEOLOGY), also sought to articulate liberationist themes. While the public prominence of some of these theologies peaked in the 1970s and 1980s, the impact of the movement is likely to be long-standing. Liberation theology’s impact on theological method and Christian thinking on social-justice issues have been especially profound.” (The Cambridge Dictionary of Christian Theology, 279)" border="0" data-original-height="672" data-original-width="673" height="399" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhWrIanqMMOw2lnJB3BYHGc839o_zCZYDhRBaDsTXbX2k93qd1_9HJeFZPeeVzSvKSaxUdKSUYsFM6smovupK3EIV1CeYVjt9n_itBcwh6gKWGUWkFham6QfHpxb2EKvWuUwhkovzmAqyrVhBskn3fZUo6Tm2uGPyYQny50jmSTx732jlyvPw/w400-h399/Liberation%20Theology.png" title="The Cambridge Dictionary of Christian Theology on "Liberation Theology"" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">excerpt from <i>The Cambridge Dictionary of Christian Theology</i></span></td></tr></tbody></table><br />When I was growing up in Evangelicalism, the only thing I heard about Liberation Theology was that it was “not the real gospel” and that it was somehow “watering down” the “real” gospel by making it only into some kind of “social gospel.” The message I received was that the “social gospel” was no gospel at all. <i>(Spoiler alert: I don't agree with any part of that assessment.)</i></p><p>If you google “what is liberation theology?” the top results, including britannica.com will tell you that liberation theology developed in Latin America in the 1960s and that it arose in the context of Catholicism out of a reaction by the local priests and laity to the poverty and social injustice in the area. Gustavo Gutiérrez was the first to use the phrase, “liberation theology” in his 1971 book: <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3PzgddT" target="_blank">A Theology of Liberation</a></i>. And this is one of the best-known forms of this theology. This book caught the attention of the Roman Catholic Church and criticized Gutiérrez for making Christianity too political. But Gutiérrez said all readings of the Bible are political.</p><p>And these ideas were not brand new. As Miguel A. De La Torre points out, this cry of resistance against oppression echoes throughout our history, from some of the early Christian writers who claimed solidarity with the poor and said wealth was a hindrance to salvation, insisting that those who were rich “had a moral obligation toward the poor,” which if ignored “bordered on idolatry” (13). Of course, they were really only pointing back to the words of Jesus in <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+19%3A24&version=NRSVUE" target="_blank">Matthew 19:24</a>: <i>“Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for someone who is rich to enter the kingdom of God.”</i> </p><p>I will give more background on the Liberation Theology that came out of Latin America in a future post. For now, I just want to emphasize that it is more accurate to talk about different liberation theologies instead of just one version of liberation theology. </p><p>In the seminary course that I took on this subject, we spent time reading about not only Latin American liberation theology, but also Black liberation theology, womanist theology, queer theology, and disability theology. We can learn so much from all of these different perspectives, and we find areas of overlap and solidarity as well. In my notes from my Systematic Theology class, I wrote down:</p><p><i></i></p><blockquote><i>"Theology is like a bowl of fishhooks because you try to pull out one and it’s linked to a bunch of others."</i> - Shannon Craigo-Snell* </blockquote><p></p><p><br /></p><div style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">*I'm pretty sure Shannon is the professor who said that but I'm not sure if she was quoting someone else or not.</span></i></div><p><br /></p><p style="text-align: center;"><u>Works Cited and Recommended Resources</u></p><p></p><ul><li>De La Torre, Miguel A. <i>Liberation Theology for Armchair Theologians</i>. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. 2013.</li><li>Gutiérrez, Gustavo. <i>A Theology of Liberation</i>. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 1988.</li></ul><div><br /></div><div>Previous posts in this series:</div><div>1. <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/what-is-theology-and-why-does-it-matter.html" target="_blank">What is theology and why does it matter?</a></div><div>2. <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/introduction-to-hermeneutics.html" target="_blank">Introduction to Hermeneutics</a></div><div><br /></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-41827731453433323442022-12-03T23:30:00.003-05:002022-12-16T05:52:48.142-05:00Introduction to Hermeneutics<p><b></b></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiupiG4TZO0bI_lMpdq7szoE9P4SllPM6_qt4p84nyefic2sbBBYNz1nc9jxdZaFzIfUYZvcPVO26NpuM9Ky_26A3as-2fi4XyESwT5aviErF60w4Q1AMKYjZCAUwfxTsEQUpnHFcNrTDXmodQOD5WG76R-XkY42yxDVizRHxT-KIGZx87KAw/s1200/9-5rrg8cze-egbvjbr4qyw.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="628" data-original-width="1200" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiupiG4TZO0bI_lMpdq7szoE9P4SllPM6_qt4p84nyefic2sbBBYNz1nc9jxdZaFzIfUYZvcPVO26NpuM9Ky_26A3as-2fi4XyESwT5aviErF60w4Q1AMKYjZCAUwfxTsEQUpnHFcNrTDXmodQOD5WG76R-XkY42yxDVizRHxT-KIGZx87KAw/w640-h334/9-5rrg8cze-egbvjbr4qyw.jpg" width="640" /></a></b></div><b><br />Hermeneutics</b>: the study of interpretation, in my context, the study of Biblical interpretation, encompassing the theories and methodologies of Biblical interpretation<p></p><p><b>Interpretation</b>: <i>what </i>we understand a text to mean. </p><p><b>Hermeneutic</b>: <i>how </i>we establish what we say a text means; <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/hermeneutic" target="_blank">a method or principle of interpretation</a>. Your hermeneutic includes how you evaluate if an interpretation is good or bad.</p><p>Why do we need to care about hermeneutics? Because textual meaning is not fixed: "Meaning is not something contained within the text, as if it were waiting to be unlocked and released from literary confinement. Meaning, rather, emerges from one’s encounter with the text. It is evoked within the interactive space between reader and text" (Brown 3). </p><p>As Dale B. Martin says, “Texts don’t mean. People mean with texts” (38). In other words, texts are not self-interpreting; they have to be interpreted by people. When a biblical literalist says they are accepting the “plain meaning of the text” they are still picking and choosing what applies to their lives today. No one in the U.S. in 2022 is stoning their child for being disobedient, for example (Deut. 21:18-21)! </p><p>Even the early Christian writers talked about different ways of interpreting Scripture:</p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Literal: looking for the facts</li><li>Allegorical: the symbolic or typological meaning that you could believe</li><li>Moral (Tropological): what one should do as a result of reading the text </li><li>Eschatological (Anagogical): how the text discloses something about the end times</li></ul><p></p><p>Another word that comes up when talking about biblical interpretations is "<b>exegesis</b>." The Greek word comes from the verb exēgeisthai, which means “to lead out.” So you can say that exegesis is about drawing meaning out from the text. But in practice, it is more complex. As William P. Brown describes it, exegesis is not solely a science or an art, though it requires tools of analysis and the imagination and creativity of the interpreter: </p><p></p><blockquote>"[Exegesis] is a craft, a learned discipline cultivated over time through practice and gained from considering the practice of others. Exegesis is a lifelong venture that carries the reader from the details of translation and analysis to the creative work of communication. Decisions—both judicious and speculative, careful and creative—must be made at every step along the way. Even the tedious work of translation requires imaginative effort as much as the creative work of communication requires focus and precision" (Brown 4).</blockquote><p></p><p>Did you catch that? <a href="https://www.1946themovie.com/" target="_blank">Interpretation happens at the translation level</a>. <br /> (<a href="https://youtu.be/ruuJfpeyEzM" target="_blank">Here's a 5-minute video of two of my Bible professors talking a little bit about this</a>.)</p><p>So how can we be responsible interpreters of the Bible?</p><p>Paul Ricoeur was a French philosopher who wrote a lot about hermeneutics, and the "Three Worlds" approach to biblical interpretation builds off of his work:</p><div style="text-align: left;">1. The world behind the text (Historical)<br />2. The world within the text (Literary)<br />3. The world in front of the text (Theological)</div><p><b>The world behind the text </b>refers to the historical context of the text’s origin. What led to the existence of this text? This is where one might employ Text Criticism, Redaction Criticism, Source Criticism, Tradition Criticism, Historical Analysis, Archeology, and studying the broader culture, history, and literature of neighboring peoples in order to get a better picture of the ancient context. For a little more on some of those types of criticism you can read this short article: <a href="https://www.bibleodyssey.org/tools/bible-basics/how-do-biblical-scholars-read-the-hebrew-bible" target="_blank">How Do Biblical Scholars Read the Hebrew Bible?</a> by Sarah Shectman</p><p><b>The world within the text</b> refers to the imaginary world created within the text (the world created by the text) and what we learn as we do close readings of the text. What is the genre of this text? What details does the text tell us about the characters, plot, and setting? Is there a narrator? Is the narrator reliable? What other literary elements do you see? Repetition? Recurring themes? Poetics vs. Rhetoric? </p><p><b>The world in front of the text </b>includes the contexts where the text is interpreted, its history of interpretation (or the consequences of interpretation), including the world of the reader (Brown 7).</p><p>The meanings we construct have consequences. The hermeneutic we use in order to interpret the Biblical text has consequences. If you don't believe me, read <a href="https://amzn.to/3gVZqVt" target="_blank">The Civil War as a Theological Crisis </a>by Mark Noll. </p><p></p><blockquote>“For over thirty years Americans battled each other exegetically on the issue, with the more orthodox and the ones who took most seriously the authority of Scripture being also the ones most likely to conclude that the Bible sanctioned slavery.” (Noll, 115)</blockquote><p></p><p>The Americans who defended slavery, arguing that the Bible fully supported it, they had the same hermeneutical lenses that the people trying to defend Christian Nationalism have. The slavery apologists had the same hermeneutical lens as those who hold to harmful "non-affirming" theology towards LGTBQ+ people. </p><p>So it is when talking about the world in front of the text that we often find different ideological criticism groups asking questions about who has the power and who is on the margins? Who is the oppressor and who is being oppressed? How have certain interpretations harmed different groups? Is there a better way of interpreting these texts that does not perpetuate harm but brings life and liberation? </p><p><b>My core hermeneutical value starts with “do no harm” and is guided by a hermeneutic of love and liberation. This means I begin with the non-negotiable affirmation of the full humanity of all people, therefore I will not interpret the text in a way that brings harm by diminishing the humanity and dignity of any person or group of people.</b></p><p>Questions I ask of interpretations and theologies are: is this ethical? responsible? helpful or harmful? Is it liberating or oppressive for those who have traditionally been marginalized? Is it life-giving or life-limiting or even deadly? Therefore I am inspired by womanist Bible scholars and theologians like <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/dr-renita-weems-re-reading-for.html" target="_blank">Dr. Renita Weems</a>, who asks her students to look at the stories of rape and violence in the Bible and asks them “what kind of world would our world be if stories like these were normative, if we duplicated, reproduced, or transmitted them to the next generation without warning and comment?” (56). I am informed by <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/rev-dr-mitzi-j-smith-womanist-sass-and.html" target="_blank">Rev. Dr. Mitzi J Smith</a> who emphasizes our need to “talk back” to the text and reminds us that Biblical interpretation is "a political act" and it can be one of social justice or injustice (3).</p><p>Next up: <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/what-is-liberation-theology.html" target="_blank">What is Liberation Theology?</a></p><p style="text-align: center;"><u>Works Cited and Recommended Resources</u></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Alter, Robert. <i>The Art of Biblical Narrative.</i> New York: Basic Books, 2011.</li><li>Brown, William P. <i>A Handbook to Old Testament Exegesis</i>. Westminster John Knox Press, 2017.</li><li>Davis, Ellen F., and Richard B. Hayes, eds. 2003. <i>The Art of Reading Scripture</i>. Eerdmans.</li><li>De La Torre, Miguel A. <i>Reading the Bible From the Margins</i>, 2002</li><li>Martin, Dale. 2008. <i>Pedagogy of the Bible.</i> Westminster John Knox Press.</li><li>Mayfield, Tyler D. <i>A Guide to Bible Basics</i>. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2018.</li><li>Ricoeur, Paul.<i> Interpretation Theory: Discourse and the Surplus of Meaning</i>. 1976.</li><li>Smith, Mitzi J. <i>Insights from African American Interpretation. Reading the Bible in the 21st Century</i>. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2017.</li><li>Smith, Mitzi J. <i>Womanist Sass and Talk Back </i>(Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2018), 3.</li><li>Weems, Renita, “Re-reading for liberation: African American women and the Bible,” in <i>I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader,</i> edited by Mitzi J. Smith (Cascade Books. 2015), 56.</li></ul><div style="text-align: center;">Recommended Videos</div><ul style="text-align: left;"><li><a href="https://youtu.be/sATPE1yuM-w" target="_blank">Reading the Bible in Context</a> - A short video where two of my Bible professors explore how interpreting the Bible with attention to historical and literary contexts can help us to make meaning of scripture.</li><li><a href="https://youtu.be/KBe1CyVufJ8" target="_blank">Making the Bible Meaning-Full </a>- Another short video from those two professors, talking about how we decide what makes a good interpretation? </li><li><a href="https://youtu.be/oMkB_aFqBoE" target="_blank">The Consequences of Biblical Interpretation: An Interview with Justin Reed </a>(one of my fantastic Bible professors!)</li></ul><p></p>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-13811313945169466992022-12-02T19:59:00.017-05:002022-12-16T05:53:03.604-05:00What is theology and why does it matter?<p>You may have learned at some point that “logy” basically means " the study of" and “theo” comes from the Greek word "<i>theos</i>," which means “God.”</p><p>Webster’s dictionary defines theology as “ the study of religious faith, practice, and experience; especially: the study of God and of God's relation to the world."</p><p>Put simply, theology is our ideas about God and how God relates to us. But how we think about God also impacts how we see ourselves and our fellow humans. </p><p>A lot of people don’t actively think about their theology but most people do hold different theological beliefs, so it’s important to examine what they are.</p><p>Our theology impacts everything because what we believe about God impacts everything: <br /></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>How we think about ourselves and other people (value, worth, human dignity) </li><li>Our politics. (“Politics is the single largest systemic tool that we have at our disposal with which we can love our neighbor. Simply put, politics for the Christian should be institutional neighborliness.” - <a href="https://twitter.com/jeffchu/status/1056194148078927873?s=20&t=UrAoZ2744aHBkJTULI3imQ" target="_blank">Nish Weiseth</a>)</li><li>Who do we care about?</li><li>How do we care about them?</li></ul><p></p><p>Theology matters because our beliefs influence our actions, having real-life, real-world implications for how we live and love people or fail to do so. And if our theology is not making us more loving, we are missing the entire point. (Remember the greatest commandment? Love God with all of your heart, soul, mind, and strength. And the second greatest? Love your neighbor as yourself. - <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew%2022%3A36-40&version=NRSVUE" target="_blank">Matthew 22:36-40</a>)</p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqQ4W_zGdY9WXR_aZcRt-XNNKTe6F67H23OSjByhVzZHhJQaCkaYEzZg7roN-imOfEbW4aHZWkndSwaBKH2s5VWliiZeMtxzadT_5BzG9W9Z8Xgzh0ipt_SDMyxTL3iUd3V0wfQK3XfGB-oujV-ukFS0sbCBQxWzZiNjRXD4qixaNPh9XujA/s1200/64395-fig-tree-thinkstock-valentynvolkov.1200w.tn.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="627" data-original-width="1200" height="167" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqQ4W_zGdY9WXR_aZcRt-XNNKTe6F67H23OSjByhVzZHhJQaCkaYEzZg7roN-imOfEbW4aHZWkndSwaBKH2s5VWliiZeMtxzadT_5BzG9W9Z8Xgzh0ipt_SDMyxTL3iUd3V0wfQK3XfGB-oujV-ukFS0sbCBQxWzZiNjRXD4qixaNPh9XujA/s320/64395-fig-tree-thinkstock-valentynvolkov.1200w.tn.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>So how do we know what is good theology and what is bad theology? In <a href="https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+7%3A15-17&version=NRSVCE" target="_blank">Matthew 7:15-17</a> Jesus says <i>"You will know them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit."</i> The fruit of good theology is life, love, healing, liberation, and flourishing for all people, especially those who have been oppressed.<p></p><p>On the other hand, we see the fruit of bad theology that leads to the exclusion, marginalization, and oppression of people, bringing various levels of harm to people, including suffering and even death.</p><p>Here are some more specific examples:</p><p>Theology matters regarding mental health: Bad theology kills when it tells folks dealing with depression or other mental illnesses that all they need is God and to just pray more/read their Bible more/repent of sin and then they won’t be depressed anymore - that is terrible theology that can directly lead to people dying by suicide if they don’t get real help.</p><p>Theology matters for LGBTQ+ people: Bad theology kills when it says it’s a sin to be gay or queer or trans, and directly leads to parents throwing kids out of the house or cutting off relationships. This toxic theology has led far too many LGBTQIA+ folks to die by suicide or be murdered by other people.</p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/ClMUug9uyz4/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" data-original-height="722" data-original-width="697" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2-BJR_ZysL5lsdh7W_w0h4KSyjMDNrQyOMnuyrIhfqc_LaylT2lsJ1APmHRqhQhdS2ZdsK2ZATGlbALz1pbpwTigySvApgHdjqVemlNeHz9wJPK4o6_AbDfXoB7PzOSHmNWYnGgg0KgLiQoLrkf1pAydmUHFXOCwikobCEt8gfcWEjAtGJw/s320/Screenshot%202022-12-03%20164404.png" width="309" /></a></div><p>Theology matters for women: Not just women’s ordination and equal rights, which is important, but again, bad theology kills when it tells women to always submit to their husbands and never ever divorce them, even if their husband is abusing them.</p><p>Theology matters because of the way it either works to tear down or is complicit in propping up white supremacy and racism. We've seen this blatantly over the past several years as Christian Nationalism has taken more center stage. And so many white Christians seem to think Jesus was white. Spoiler alert: Jesus was not white!</p><p>So why do I care about theology? I care about theology because I care about people. I have seen the pain and trauma inflicted on others by bad theology and I have also experienced a lot of the bad theology I talked about here and it has impacted me personally as I struggled with depression, with women's roles in the church, and eventually, finally being able to come out to myself as a gay/queer person. Like <a href="https://twitter.com/jeffchu/status/685300650071044096" target="_blank">Broderick Greer</a> and <a href="https://jamesalison.com/theology-as-survival/" target="_blank">James Alison</a> have said, theology for so many of us has been a form of survival. </p><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://twitter.com/jeffchu/status/685300650071044096" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;" target="_blank"><img border="0" data-original-height="260" data-original-width="692" height="120" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRcP396oTc82v0sUtwM8FppEIic86tjVu4ES1wWxXAxf6K3L_KEmQzqvWcPu5o8Nag2n0ewYqh5deBdzN63o_hzNJLNtkEZBCaDUb9jqcj0h8eLgTJvCfyNDSAJ3h_ZPwJcOtY0GJm4ktGHa3JzFXXXYqYVi0wAcGbgkPK_nP6v3s66Xd3JA/s320/Screenshot%202022-12-03%20181820.png" width="320" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p>C. S. Lewis said, “Good philosophy must exist, if for no other reason because bad philosophy needs to be answered.” The same is true for theology. That is why I will be sharing brief introductions to the life-giving, liberating theologies I have been learning about in seminary.</p><p><b><u>THEOLOGY MATTERS Table of Contents: </u></b></p><p>1. What is theology and why does it matter?<br />2. <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/introduction-to-hermeneutics.html" target="_blank">Introduction to </a><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/introduction-to-hermeneutics.html" target="_blank">Hermeneutics</a>.
3. </span><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/12/what-is-liberation-theology.html" target="_blank">What is Liberation Theology?</a></p><p><br /></p><p><span style="font-size: 12pt; white-space: pre-wrap;"><i>Previous posts that may be of interest:</i></span></p><p></p><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>A series on <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/womanist-interpretation-of-hebrew-bible.html" target="_blank">Womanist interpretation of the Hebrew Bible</a>. </li><li><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/book-review-black-theology-of.html" target="_blank">Summary of <i>A Black Theology of Liberation</i> by James H. Cone</a></li><li><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/03/book-review-disabled-god-toward.html" target="_blank">Book Review/Summary of <i>The Disabled God: Toward a Liberatory Theology of Disability</i> by Nancy L. Eiesland</a></li></ul><p></p>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-74405593348871931372022-03-09T23:21:00.001-05:002022-03-09T23:21:14.251-05:00I have a new favorite author! (Becky Chambers)<div style="text-align: left;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiEC5tlNZ2VAtgNTGFFSXC1ygs_a0VkPprWEycp7zlfHcsp2cJtIJ7CdIoGn9oqiVGUa50eob_HEOezBxIDfRmkybfgxkq4G5GD9FBn6zwT-xCwMK1P19yuPk1w97o6QsOIgS_Dr_W0r_CHVAvaQ88skW4NKHEiE9-t9rU9sQfkWE42zG7q_A=s750" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="author photo of Becky Chambers" border="0" data-original-height="750" data-original-width="500" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiEC5tlNZ2VAtgNTGFFSXC1ygs_a0VkPprWEycp7zlfHcsp2cJtIJ7CdIoGn9oqiVGUa50eob_HEOezBxIDfRmkybfgxkq4G5GD9FBn6zwT-xCwMK1P19yuPk1w97o6QsOIgS_Dr_W0r_CHVAvaQ88skW4NKHEiE9-t9rU9sQfkWE42zG7q_A=w266-h400" title="Becky Chambers" width="266" /></a></div><br />I love science fiction. I love sci-fi movies, tv shows, and books: Star Wars, Star Trek (I am an equal opportunity nerd!), Doctor Who. I love time travel stories and space exploration, robots, A.I, and more!<div><br /></div><div>So after hearing lots of people talk about loving the novella, <i>A Psalm for the Wild Built</i>, and reading the description**, I listened to it through my library recently and loved it! Then I decided I wanted to read more from this author. </div><div><br /></div><div>I have now finished reading the first two books in her Wayfarer's series and have determined that <a href="https://www.otherscribbles.com/about" target="_blank">Becky Chambers</a> is my new favorite author! (I have many favorite authors, it's allowed!) </div><div><br /></div><div>Here are my very short reviews Goodreads:</div><div><div><br />
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40864002-a-psalm-for-the-wild-built" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="A Psalm for the Wild-Built (Monk & Robot, #1)" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1600789291l/40864002._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/40864002-a-psalm-for-the-wild-built">A Psalm for the Wild-Built</a> by Becky Chambers<br />
My rating: 5 of 5 stars<br /><i>Finished reading on 2/2/2022</i></div><div><i><br /></i>**Official book blurb description** </div><div><i>"Centuries before, robots of Panga gained self-awareness, laid down their tools, wandered, en masse into the wilderness, never to be seen again. They faded into myth and urban legend. </i><i>Now the life of the tea monk who tells this story is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honor the old promise of checking in. The robot cannot go back until the question of "what do people need?" is answered. But the answer to that question depends on who you ask, and how. They will need to ask it a lot. Chambers' series asks: in a world where people have what they want, does having more matter?" </i></div><div><br /></div><div>This book felt like a hug! The definition of a cozy, comfort read! I only wish it were longer and I can't wait for the sequels! <br /><br />I also did not expect this sci-fi fiction novella to be so relevant to pastoral ministry!<br /><br />Dex wants to be a tea monk and help people. On their first day of trying to actually do this, a woman comes to him crying because her beloved cat just died. If this passage doesn't speak directly to those entering some kind of pastoral ministry after seminary then I don't know what does:<br /><br /><i><b>"Dex realized with a stomach-souring thud that they were standing on the wrong side of the vast gulf between having read about doing a thing and doing the thing.</b> They’d been a garden monk until the day before, and in that context, their expressions of comfort to the monastery’s visitors came in the form of a healthy foxpaw crawling up a trellis or a carefully pruned rose in bloom. It was an exchange expressed through environment, not through words. Dex was not actually a tea monk yet. They were just a person sitting at a table with a bunch of mugs. The wagon, the kettle, the red and brown, the fact that they were clearly well past apprentice age—all of it communicated that they knew what they were doing. They did not.<br /><br />Dex did their best to look sympathetic, which is what they wanted to be, rather than lost, which is what they were. “I’m sorry,” they said. They scrambled to recall the written advice they’d spent hours consuming, but not only had the specifics evaporated, their basic vocabulary had as well. <b>It was one thing to know people would tell you their troubles. It was another to have an actual flesh-and-blood stranger standing in front of you, weeping profusely as means of introduction, and to know that you—you—were responsible for making this better.</b></i><br />
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22733729-the-long-way-to-a-small-angry-planet" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet (Wayfarers, #1)" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1405532474l/22733729._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22733729-the-long-way-to-a-small-angry-planet">The Long Way to a Small, Angry Planet</a> by Becky Chambers<br />
My rating: 5 of 5 stars<br /><i>Finished reading on 3/1/2022</i></div><div><i><br /></i>
I have a new favorite author in Becky Chambers! I loved this story so much! There's this whole found family/chosen family thing going on which was lovely! I can't wait to read everything else she has written!</div><div><br /></div><div>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29475447-a-closed-and-common-orbit" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="A Closed and Common Orbit (Wayfarers, #2)" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1457598923l/29475447._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/29475447-a-closed-and-common-orbit">A Closed and Common Orbit</a> by Becky Chambers<br />
My rating: 5 of 5 stars<br /><i>Finished reading on 3/9/2022</i></div><div><i><br /></i>
I wasn't sure about this one at first. It took a little bit for me to get into it because even though it picks up right after the first book ended, we are now following two characters we didn't get to know much in the first book, and leaving the rest of the crew behind. But before too long I was hooked and I was constantly looking forward to when I had time to listen to the audiobook. I can't wait to read the other two books in this series!
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</div></div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-82296932612847041582022-01-18T09:30:00.001-05:002022-01-18T09:30:00.172-05:00Top Ten 2021 Releases I Was Excited to Read But Didn’t Get To (yet!)<p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjwEd9bIOCC5em0XJiLWFPzE10Tj5QtFO14__bUyxU9AfvCRo16bww6iZSzLdyhUhUGKhZD4qjfYukog6ghFO47IR_qd7DIlumwg_1iHN8X1WiRkd0qdgaQWrqZDHtZUenEoXT36zkGQmZieQd54w08ZpZlXiozRkPoOSxQYQJNUguSMLR7EQ=s762" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="412" data-original-width="762" height="346" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjwEd9bIOCC5em0XJiLWFPzE10Tj5QtFO14__bUyxU9AfvCRo16bww6iZSzLdyhUhUGKhZD4qjfYukog6ghFO47IR_qd7DIlumwg_1iHN8X1WiRkd0qdgaQWrqZDHtZUenEoXT36zkGQmZieQd54w08ZpZlXiozRkPoOSxQYQJNUguSMLR7EQ=w640-h346" width="640" /></a></div><br />Top Ten 2021 Releases I Was Excited to Read But Didn’t Get To (yet!)<p></p><div><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>The Making of C. S. Lewis: From Atheist to Apologist (1918-1945) by Harry Lee Poe</li><li><a href="http://www.shannondingle.com/book" target="_blank">Living Brave</a> by Shannon Dingle<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></li><li><a href="https://hillarylmcbride.com/the-wisdom-of-your-body/" target="_blank">The Wisdom of Your Body</a> by Hillary l. McBride</li><li><a href="https://www.dantecstewart.com/book" target="_blank">Shoutin' in the Fire: An American Epistle</a> by Danté Stewart</li><li><a href="https://www.ourbibleapp.com/merch/thedpb" target="_blank">The Deconstructionists Playbook: An Anthology</a> edited by Crystal Cheatham and Theresa Ta </li><li><a href="https://www.indiebound.org/book/9781506464817" target="_blank">#ChurchToo: How Purity Culture Upholds Abuse and How to Find Healing</a> by Emily Joy Allison<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></li><li><a href="https://dianabutlerbass.com/books/" target="_blank">Freeing Jesus: Rediscovering Jesus as Friend, Teacher, Savior, Lord, Way, and Presence</a> by Diana Butler Bass</li><li><a href="https://johnpavlovitz.com/if-god-is-love-dont-be-a-jerk/" target="_blank">If God Is Love, Don't Be a Jerk: Finding a Faith That Makes Us Better Humans</a><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>by John Pavlovitz</li><li>Five Things Biblical Scholars Wish Theologians Knew by Scot McKnight</li><li>Five Things Theologians Wish Biblical Scholars Knew by Hans Boersma</li></ol></div><div><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></div><div>
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</div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-50554706263597722692022-01-09T14:00:00.002-05:002022-01-09T14:00:00.171-05:00Favorite Memoir-ish Books I read in 2021<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhXFqMJICJfj9QWI6d5uWzofTDTPXlayh-FjL0MMkjLAuscMb1tjqgohG8PbXYBpiIRUvlql07DIjm5csyF2ZR5YHjJj-2ZG13aDNtnTG1jzeaaaGKtNDSj9082q4EdwLDD86_Cv_PesNVC8OWwDflATNveXUkIIp0FfM0TR9BOSzn3Hbk_IQ=s762" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="440" data-original-width="762" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhXFqMJICJfj9QWI6d5uWzofTDTPXlayh-FjL0MMkjLAuscMb1tjqgohG8PbXYBpiIRUvlql07DIjm5csyF2ZR5YHjJj-2ZG13aDNtnTG1jzeaaaGKtNDSj9082q4EdwLDD86_Cv_PesNVC8OWwDflATNveXUkIIp0FfM0TR9BOSzn3Hbk_IQ=w640-h370" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div>Out of the 202 books I read in 2021, 20 were in the Memoir/Biography category. </div><div>Here are 10 of my favorites: <div><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li><i>Wholehearted Faith</i> by Rachel Held Evans with Jeff Chu <i><span style="font-size: x-small;">(the first part of this is more of her theological memoir style, the second part is less memoir from what I remember.)</span></i></li><li><i>The Dance of the Dissident Daughter </i>by Sue Monk Kidd ["The truth may set you free, but first it will shatter the safe, sweet way you live." <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/notes/40265482-the-dance-of-the-dissident-daughter/433928-jennifer?ref=bsop" target="_blank">See more quotes I loved here.</a>]</li><li><i>Outlove: A Queer Christian Survival Story</i> by Julie Rodgers</li><li><i>Broken Horses </i>by Brandi Carlile</li><li>As a Woman: What I Learned about Power, Sex, and the Patriarchy after I Transitioned by Paula Stone Williams</li><li><i>One Life </i>by Megan Rapinoe</li><li><i>Save Yourself </i>by Cameron Esposito</li><li><i>Leather & Lace: A Gay Man, Lost Love, and a Road Trip With His Dead Sister </i>by Matt Bays</li><li><i>Affirming: A Memoir of Faith, Sexuality, and Staying in the Church </i>by Sally Gary</li><li><i>Where the Light Fell</i> by Philip Yancey</li></ol><div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEggBIN_6nYRMeyHSFFA2arOj8ZmHrnIpAm3nyrNzRNzpWfex--V4ltQ7o-vifndXsWPP420hfymBeU6tBcQ17-P7GwZslDJree78XewER7R4VAo1YdqOqyp4ZS-FeS6oO50N9Y30oTiHQwCM7PwMXMydKO_DzwugDE2qXVkUkLcCC89Vcn8dA=s475" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="316" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEggBIN_6nYRMeyHSFFA2arOj8ZmHrnIpAm3nyrNzRNzpWfex--V4ltQ7o-vifndXsWPP420hfymBeU6tBcQ17-P7GwZslDJree78XewER7R4VAo1YdqOqyp4ZS-FeS6oO50N9Y30oTiHQwCM7PwMXMydKO_DzwugDE2qXVkUkLcCC89Vcn8dA=w133-h200" width="133" /></a></div><br />I pre-ordered <i>Wholehearted Faith</i> on audiobook and ebook because it is the last book (for adults) by the late Rachel Held Evans. The audiobook dropped into my audible app sometime after midnight on November 2 and I listened to the Foreward, the Introduction, and the Prologue before I fell asleep that night. I listened to chapter one on the way to my church internship that morning. (Which, by the way, if it wasn't for Rachel's earlier writings, I'm not sure I would even be pursuing my MDiv right now and working as a pastoral intern right now.)</div><div><br /></div><div>I listened to chapter 2 on my way to my preaching class that night where I was preaching my very first sermon!</div><div><br /></div><div>I listened to chapter 3 on my way home. Then between that night and throughout the day on November 3, I finished listening to the audiobook and highlighting so many passages in the ebook. I wanted to savor and devour this book at the same time. I wanted to cry, a lot.</div><div><br /></div><div>Rachel's words continue to inspire me and resonate so deeply with me. Her heart for the marginalized is God's heart for the marginalized. I follow Rachel as she followed Jesus, with her whole heart. And my heart still hurts that she is no longer with us on this earth in physical form. Reading this book brings up my grief and my thankfulness for her life and work, for what God has done and continues to do through her words.</div></div><div><i></i><blockquote><i>"For better or for worse, there are seasons when we hold our faith, and then there are seasons when our faith holds us. In those latter instances, I am more thankful than ever for all the saints, past and present, who said yes and whose faith sustains mine. They believe for me when I’m not sure I believe. They hold on to hope for me when I’ve run out of hope." - Rachel Held Evans</i></blockquote><p></p><blockquote><i>"My desire is that you face all your questions, all your conundrums, all your contradictions, boldly. I cannot guarantee you will retain the faith you inherited—I know that mine is not exactly the faith that my parents helped to instill in me—and honestly, a static faith or an unchanging one isn’t and shouldn’t be my prayer for you, because as we learn and as we grow, faith should evolve." - Rachel Held Evans</i></blockquote><p></p></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">*****</div></div><div><br /></div><div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjRwgG_NbeJAHde-oR8afUTaCH1Avolz72aQO9B3-CPIVyMfbW-vYwxibk4VQ39H3Rq9uhjdEKJ8r9-oSkN5hMem13TLAyu0FtuMyTedg0_aS3uU-E954Bwzdi64pcno-wnDzjdBMwI_GJ_QSFrHw94pvH6holR3aVmxNshuKXDc662fMMiGA=s475" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="317" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjRwgG_NbeJAHde-oR8afUTaCH1Avolz72aQO9B3-CPIVyMfbW-vYwxibk4VQ39H3Rq9uhjdEKJ8r9-oSkN5hMem13TLAyu0FtuMyTedg0_aS3uU-E954Bwzdi64pcno-wnDzjdBMwI_GJ_QSFrHw94pvH6holR3aVmxNshuKXDc662fMMiGA=w134-h200" width="134" /></a></div>This is what I wrote right after I read <i>Leather and Lace </i>by Matt Bays:</div><div><br />I see some of my own story in Matt's. It's not the same exact story, obviously. I am a gay woman, for starters. But there were some things that resonated deeply. Like this quote: "hiding from yourself makes things all the more difficult to find. Nearly impossible. [...] Looking back, it's easy to see the truth. But when you are in an all-out war to be straight, you’ll forage for any clue that points in that direction. [...] I spent years complicating what would’ve been easy to know. But I didn’t have the tools to be honest with myself or others."</div><div><br /></div><div>And this:</div><div><br /></div><div>"My walk out of evangelicalism happened over a very long decade. At first, it was like coming out of a coma. Then once I was awake, there was sifting to do—fear to let go of, educating myself, new friends to find, and ultimately, the breaking away. When your entire life is defined by something this powerful, it becomes an amputation with ghost pains that can last a lifetime. Standing at the precipice, something was calling me forward. But leaving the place where I had lived for so long—that I was entirely familiar with—was a terrifying leap. Because there are some leavings we cannot get back to. While walking out on them, we are also abandoning a part of ourselves. And there is something sad about that. Because nothing in our lives is exclusively one thing or the other. In each segment, there is good and bad. Love and loss. And inhabiting the new places we’ve never been demands that we find out who we are there, what we will become, and how we will live." (Matt Bays)</div></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-reading-recap-book-stats-graphs.html" target="_blank">2021 Reading Recap (the one with the charts and graphs)</a></div><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/01/favorite-fiction-books-i-read-in-2021.html" target="_blank">10 of my favorite fiction reads in 2021</a></div></div><div style="text-align: center;">*****</div><div>So, what were your favorite memoirs you read this past year?</div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-20413038689267477812022-01-08T21:47:00.002-05:002022-01-08T21:58:14.393-05:002021 Reading Recap: Book stats, Graphs, and Charts!<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEinUwZh_sThKMzzeXaVBLLBYbEeuCKCouOmfK1tak6eYNKXO6fiEn0oT7_f65PFYb-f-GVw3i_i6dLuG7cvm_aQ4v0iM6eJ1CSFH9yFbQC2N7MIChreI_UMwSaFoJPHHU2s8m7HxVMRkjfHqn2qOz-kpuwz2-1fa3Y23p8p2Od7nfnm-WCTjQ=s637" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="556" data-original-width="637" height="349" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEinUwZh_sThKMzzeXaVBLLBYbEeuCKCouOmfK1tak6eYNKXO6fiEn0oT7_f65PFYb-f-GVw3i_i6dLuG7cvm_aQ4v0iM6eJ1CSFH9yFbQC2N7MIChreI_UMwSaFoJPHHU2s8m7HxVMRkjfHqn2qOz-kpuwz2-1fa3Y23p8p2Od7nfnm-WCTjQ=w400-h349" width="400" /></a></div><div style="text-align: left;"></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj6uQG19VEguIyMxORHdQcpT5x7m0F__rOMHhLrY-Iy7p5KiHUGPpKjO9oLpSAYZrlAV4WuRwt9VnO6mKms157xehy38hNYnmrhnZLmcWEOVRnY9sW7gzNC0Muvq0FNEn2Raudfgq5Of4R5G61CTGUJSri7OeuH0pNxGiBN5qMhg6rrW9cAsg=s861" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="247" data-original-width="861" height="184" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj6uQG19VEguIyMxORHdQcpT5x7m0F__rOMHhLrY-Iy7p5KiHUGPpKjO9oLpSAYZrlAV4WuRwt9VnO6mKms157xehy38hNYnmrhnZLmcWEOVRnY9sW7gzNC0Muvq0FNEn2Raudfgq5Of4R5G61CTGUJSri7OeuH0pNxGiBN5qMhg6rrW9cAsg=w640-h184" width="640" /></a></div><br />2021 marked the tenth year that I tracked every book I read. The first year I did this I set my reading goal at a modest (for me) <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/books-read-in-2012.html" target="_blank">52 books for the year</a> because one book a week sounded pretty manageable. And the reason I decided to start tracking my reading was to help motivate me to read more than I already did.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">2014 was the first year I started using a spreadsheet to help me collect and analyze more data than Goodreads allows. (Yes, I am an <a href="https://www.enneagraminstitute.com/type-3" target="_blank">Enneagram 3</a>, why do you ask?) Then, in 2019, I discovered that bookriot.com had a spreadsheet template with some built-in charts and graphs, beyond what I was already tracking. So I used theirs in 2020 and 2021 while modifying it to my liking. Here is a link where you can get their <a href="https://bookriot.com/2021-reading-log/" target="_blank">2022 reading log template</a>.</div>
<h1 style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Now on to the nerd stats:</b></h1>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Number of books read:</b> 202</div>
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<b>Number of pages read:</b> 43,364</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhbaWLidwO-AiWqudj9X7z05B__Kju4YCZaa6aBms_yyq60-LYoh_qVJQdxck9gJULUNvsklWivQXcDLmPEn7-Y91_u3NDXu4xTUx7pnRMSqWMekO-7WrPesEJinC5OtkNequrb-GYjLR6RsPJYoV7dofHJxtuK6sKVXgaAD_PaXK6UCKoHYA=s692" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="337" data-original-width="692" height="156" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhbaWLidwO-AiWqudj9X7z05B__Kju4YCZaa6aBms_yyq60-LYoh_qVJQdxck9gJULUNvsklWivQXcDLmPEn7-Y91_u3NDXu4xTUx7pnRMSqWMekO-7WrPesEJinC5OtkNequrb-GYjLR6RsPJYoV7dofHJxtuK6sKVXgaAD_PaXK6UCKoHYA=s320" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b style="text-align: left;">Mode of reading:</b>
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Audiobook (76), Ebook (104), Print (22)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">- Interestingly (to me, anyway), my audiobook format switched places with ebooks this year, (as compared to the last two years), probably due to an increase in ebooks read for seminary in 2020.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">2021:<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjgbZY82QSYxs-weZvAz5YWXcxIEdIx3QnFl7iGyeyJXzHwJzjGBMMFF-L0U4457fEtM2vb-dFkNkmWQkusw_JqoNv6aK-NAeEAuiezn3ZGOobZNrwfzA3SzruD8jiXM-C1yu-yOyiNF14nYBKJRVXMC0iVqLrE9NN_JdJxbddz9yCAWP52hQ=s613" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="358" data-original-width="613" height="374" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjgbZY82QSYxs-weZvAz5YWXcxIEdIx3QnFl7iGyeyJXzHwJzjGBMMFF-L0U4457fEtM2vb-dFkNkmWQkusw_JqoNv6aK-NAeEAuiezn3ZGOobZNrwfzA3SzruD8jiXM-C1yu-yOyiNF14nYBKJRVXMC0iVqLrE9NN_JdJxbddz9yCAWP52hQ=w640-h374" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">Compared to 2020:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgLX-JzKtpHaOK_KQ1cVDZh0ZKa9s1pCE-5LSoJKojCp0Wxupo3YhRSDGZS-nZTiGhcsbijScAnHu1W6N5atQAH6Z_GVD08h-9yQiXNgo7GJbkMIoOD74BrM2ppSs-jdGWm5VC6VTSxSXuUO1Lq96Oq_WKciMZPSI2F4HRvRvf5VKFrs6IyBA=s672" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="672" data-original-width="671" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgLX-JzKtpHaOK_KQ1cVDZh0ZKa9s1pCE-5LSoJKojCp0Wxupo3YhRSDGZS-nZTiGhcsbijScAnHu1W6N5atQAH6Z_GVD08h-9yQiXNgo7GJbkMIoOD74BrM2ppSs-jdGWm5VC6VTSxSXuUO1Lq96Oq_WKciMZPSI2F4HRvRvf5VKFrs6IyBA=s320" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><b>Book Genres:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhN63TVMo08FqunyOmIRgRQpFxRfhqmgffIgeipUYYTPFfXlcmhz_z6UR_D112CJP-Kfrfj6YjQiYOS0AtIgRA6bGeZNXTO9lbXXzTEs9RrlL3pboBRPuEGwZhT3K6OgCIK_GnkQ2KeTwYbqmMKfYayTQYH8j_WiRUkAP5zDm7MLNhtmwgZUQ=s617" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="362" data-original-width="617" height="376" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhN63TVMo08FqunyOmIRgRQpFxRfhqmgffIgeipUYYTPFfXlcmhz_z6UR_D112CJP-Kfrfj6YjQiYOS0AtIgRA6bGeZNXTO9lbXXzTEs9RrlL3pboBRPuEGwZhT3K6OgCIK_GnkQ2KeTwYbqmMKfYayTQYH8j_WiRUkAP5zDm7MLNhtmwgZUQ=w640-h376" width="640" /></a></div></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">As in 2020, I read more nonfiction than fiction, whereas in previous years this was more of a 50-50 split.</div>
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<b><u>More specific genres and categories I tracked:</u></b></div>
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C. S. Lewis Studies: 8 <i>(these overlap with various genres)</i></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both;">LGBTQ Studies: 22</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Seminary: 56 <i>(these overlap with Bible & Theology, obviously)</i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><i><br /></i></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Theology: 71</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Bible: 26</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Memoir/Bio: 19</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Fantasy: 52</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">Science Fiction: 17</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">General Fiction: 6</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">General Nonfiction: 11</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiRnjLlS7BacQcPJlgcX1n7jxenz_M2XcDBBpus8-NhUMX0mlrtqaFjR1HOOEDDqWzCvcJdsCVdCbIJajdOsjlT1GfVPI6h0CpZtkWlZ9Yw-2rzAF911JYkNSZboM19xOb185ugKcadlOoybkvdkFl59PuPfM8taWGw14F33tAa7kX5zcB9zw=s612" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="363" data-original-width="612" height="380" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiRnjLlS7BacQcPJlgcX1n7jxenz_M2XcDBBpus8-NhUMX0mlrtqaFjR1HOOEDDqWzCvcJdsCVdCbIJajdOsjlT1GfVPI6h0CpZtkWlZ9Yw-2rzAF911JYkNSZboM19xOb185ugKcadlOoybkvdkFl59PuPfM8taWGw14F33tAa7kX5zcB9zw=w640-h380" width="640" /></a></div></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Male/Female Authorship:</b></div>
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This might be the first time I've read slightly more women authors than men! </div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg8Tgdn3x7-pztgHksyw4ASw5n31QHU92DNuVdQTLYHKL7Js95etnJ8iKzEFgE6jfgNfR213wpP8_AuFfWxq2ok20ieZ3n0K8Rw6HiJEo2NDRkhiumfOPs9KYfCX9qGYsX5zZqWyLyKWPh_AE6C9Uc9c6xG8rNIxSQRGjGHZkG7gvCnHogQxw=s610" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="376" data-original-width="610" height="394" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg8Tgdn3x7-pztgHksyw4ASw5n31QHU92DNuVdQTLYHKL7Js95etnJ8iKzEFgE6jfgNfR213wpP8_AuFfWxq2ok20ieZ3n0K8Rw6HiJEo2NDRkhiumfOPs9KYfCX9qGYsX5zZqWyLyKWPh_AE6C9Uc9c6xG8rNIxSQRGjGHZkG7gvCnHogQxw=w640-h394" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>Books Read Per Month:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><b>2021:</b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiA9-vjs847-I2B6EkVyZ64AnroC3zHth5fmyBMAK5NcQyru6ykcBev_RB5-T3w_ckMwCfzmp7Iu6qaqHa_Yb2283mEkQIbWFqqhbcHHoVONLdrXAltUedJBu3JH3Q821nvW8VXT1c3F1L2vixPTq0rzZ1y-ARTZ2wEXstRz4sZBLvXnAX6Nw=s613" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="367" data-original-width="613" height="384" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiA9-vjs847-I2B6EkVyZ64AnroC3zHth5fmyBMAK5NcQyru6ykcBev_RB5-T3w_ckMwCfzmp7Iu6qaqHa_Yb2283mEkQIbWFqqhbcHHoVONLdrXAltUedJBu3JH3Q821nvW8VXT1c3F1L2vixPTq0rzZ1y-ARTZ2wEXstRz4sZBLvXnAX6Nw=w640-h384" width="640" /></a></div><b>Read vs. Re-reads:</b></div>
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First time read: 172</div>
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Re-read: 30</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;">(This seems back to my normal amount from last year where 46% of the books I read were re-reads.)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQsdS668GTHrnpTn1YziUFiWlxfcDRDXTEVL_TnTALg0k9AgKYxnEYrzNjS13prBnARX73D0z-8oLMB4S_Mw5rn-_BiRsfiOkSa7WZxq4hCzgFd4UgIneJ4LrRMbZKKnDqpWfK/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="358" data-original-width="588" height="390" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQsdS668GTHrnpTn1YziUFiWlxfcDRDXTEVL_TnTALg0k9AgKYxnEYrzNjS13prBnARX73D0z-8oLMB4S_Mw5rn-_BiRsfiOkSa7WZxq4hCzgFd4UgIneJ4LrRMbZKKnDqpWfK/w640-h390/image.png" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">According to Audible, I listened for 19,114 minutes (318.5 hours) which is up from 279 hours in 2020. It means I averaged 52 minutes of listening per day. Of course, I wonder if that takes into account the times I'm listening at 1.5x speed or 2x speed. But it doesn't really matter. The top genres graphic confirms that I tend to listen to fantasy and sci-fi more on audio and other fiction. And if I'm listening to non-fiction it's probably a biography or memoir.<br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiMcujSjQRMBmAmJj5lR3ZgxN4_VAMy8dqYp0Ci3sXQkWIY3BaZrUFfdy2F4Pff5RlLXHv29nB-4NViAZyHu-K0nrKjuGklMOU-PPlPR3PMfUMdUKF92-3EYS8TbR1WnPDgk6J2bzZ-7ETHo1jEHGvtrlqyVPNm78-CuPB5UYjEdxKfRxW3ug=s1927" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1599" data-original-width="1927" height="532" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiMcujSjQRMBmAmJj5lR3ZgxN4_VAMy8dqYp0Ci3sXQkWIY3BaZrUFfdy2F4Pff5RlLXHv29nB-4NViAZyHu-K0nrKjuGklMOU-PPlPR3PMfUMdUKF92-3EYS8TbR1WnPDgk6J2bzZ-7ETHo1jEHGvtrlqyVPNm78-CuPB5UYjEdxKfRxW3ug=w640-h532" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/01/favorite-fiction-books-i-read-in-2021.html" target="_blank">I posted about 10 of my favorite fiction reads in this post. </a></div><div><br /></div><div>I intend to post about my favorite memoirs and other non-fiction in separate posts.</div><div><br /></div>Feel free to tell me about your reading year in the comments or in an email back to me. <div><br /></div><div>If you are interested in reading progressive type theology books and discussing them with me and other people, <a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/theology-book-club.html" target="_blank">click on over to this page</a> where you can find out more about that and <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProgressiveTheologyBookClub" target="_blank">join the fun</a>! <br /><div><br /></div><div>And if you're not bored yet here are my previous reading recaps and book lists:<div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both;"><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2020/12/2020-reading-recap-with-charts-and.html" target="_blank">2020 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a></div>
<div><a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2020/01/2019-reading-recap-one-with-charts-and.html">2019 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a></div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2019/01/2018-reading-recap-book-stats-and.html" target="_blank">2018 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/12/my-year-in-books-2017-book-stats-and.html" target="_blank">2017 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2016/12/2016-book-breakdown.html" target="_blank">2016 Reading Recap and Book Stats</a><br />
<a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2016/01/2015-book-breakdown.html" target="_blank">2015 Reading Recap</a><br />
<br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/2019-books.html">What I read in 2019</a> (203 books)<br /><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/2.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2018</a> (130 books)<br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/2017-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2017</a> (83 books)<br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/2016-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2016</a> (142 books)<br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/2015-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2015</a> (120 books)<br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/books-read-in-2014.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2014</a> (111 books)<br />
<div>
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/2013-books.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2013</a> (100 books)<br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/p/books-read-in-2012.html" target="_blank">What I read in 2012</a> (56 books)</div></div></div></div> <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-3950930539275093502022-01-04T03:18:00.002-05:002022-01-09T01:00:40.506-05:00Favorite Fiction Books I read in 2021<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgPG1Uf0BmOqJ-2ct0uAkcaJT-Jjw0RLvRp484RRosHbeHvsQti79GVpNSoSJgYmzWNt_RBjiYdDIJgB3ugHqMNE8UYxaiWUCqXcEwUcXK6_5072yIqH2HUShS_Osd-UT4xeuV72-nVTT9tiC9umS62SXi31SGl38-kln1HvUkr33cZoPeqRw=s807" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="430" data-original-width="807" height="342" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgPG1Uf0BmOqJ-2ct0uAkcaJT-Jjw0RLvRp484RRosHbeHvsQti79GVpNSoSJgYmzWNt_RBjiYdDIJgB3ugHqMNE8UYxaiWUCqXcEwUcXK6_5072yIqH2HUShS_Osd-UT4xeuV72-nVTT9tiC9umS62SXi31SGl38-kln1HvUkr33cZoPeqRw=w640-h342" width="640" /></a></div><br />I met my ridiculous reading goal of reading 200 books again in 2021. I actually read 202. Here is the link to <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-reading-recap-book-stats-graphs.html" target="_blank">my super nerdy post with charts and graphs from my reading spreadsheet tracker</a>.<br /><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj6uQG19VEguIyMxORHdQcpT5x7m0F__rOMHhLrY-Iy7p5KiHUGPpKjO9oLpSAYZrlAV4WuRwt9VnO6mKms157xehy38hNYnmrhnZLmcWEOVRnY9sW7gzNC0Muvq0FNEn2Raudfgq5Of4R5G61CTGUJSri7OeuH0pNxGiBN5qMhg6rrW9cAsg=s861" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="247" data-original-width="861" height="184" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEj6uQG19VEguIyMxORHdQcpT5x7m0F__rOMHhLrY-Iy7p5KiHUGPpKjO9oLpSAYZrlAV4WuRwt9VnO6mKms157xehy38hNYnmrhnZLmcWEOVRnY9sW7gzNC0Muvq0FNEn2Raudfgq5Of4R5G61CTGUJSri7OeuH0pNxGiBN5qMhg6rrW9cAsg=w640-h184" width="640" /></a></div><div>Anyway, out of those 202, 75 were fiction, and out of those 75, these were my top 10 favorites. Well, I left off the C. S. Lewis books I re-read this past year which are obviously still my favorites (<i>The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe</i>, for example, which I re-read again in December). <div><br /></div><div>Here are ten of my favorite fiction reads from 2021:<div><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li><i>The Midnight Library</i> by Matt Haig</li><li><i>The Space Between Worlds </i>by Micaiah Johnson</li><li><i>The Return of the King</i> (The Lord of the Rings, #3) by J. R. R. Tolkien</li><li><i>The Fellowship of the Ring</i> (The Lord of the Rings, #1) by J. R. R. Tolkien</li><li><i>The Two Towers</i> (The Lord of the Rings, #2) by J. R. R. Tolkien</li><li><i>Jonathan Livingston Seagull</i> by Richard Bach</li><li><a href="https://web.cs.ucdavis.edu/~rogaway/classes/188/materials/the%20machine%20stops.pdf" target="_blank">The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster</a></li><li><i>The Neil Gaiman at the End of the Universe</i> by Arvind Ethan David</li><li><i>Lumberjanes, Vol. 11: Time After Crime</i> by Shannon Watters</li><li><i>Lumberjanes, Vol. 14: X Marks the Spot </i>by Shannon Watters</li></ol><div>This was my second or third time reading through The Lord of the Rings trilogy, this time I listened to them on audiobook. The only other re-read was the short story, The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster. It was originally published in 1909 and it amazes me that a story from over 100 years ago basically predicted the Internet and so many of the things we use it for today!</div><div><br /></div><div><i><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgmPEI0g_gbI3bc1SzHGFonx8Pmukjv403iyM9M8pfxc77KW7a9Q4aNtBkAvXemO3XoR8f5zkiwUt8TySiEeSleXNVgG78E3TDWQyAwIXPKro-3Ar2FRV-93DYFoFqk-_nPQmKNOzclmuoymIKf3rjLgikLHzhtGLyP29BkquVxo3kIU8iqNw=s2560" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2560" data-original-width="1694" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgmPEI0g_gbI3bc1SzHGFonx8Pmukjv403iyM9M8pfxc77KW7a9Q4aNtBkAvXemO3XoR8f5zkiwUt8TySiEeSleXNVgG78E3TDWQyAwIXPKro-3Ar2FRV-93DYFoFqk-_nPQmKNOzclmuoymIKf3rjLgikLHzhtGLyP29BkquVxo3kIU8iqNw=w133-h200" width="133" /></a></div><b>The Midnight Library</b></i><b> by Matt Haig </b>was my favorite new fiction book I read in 2021. I can't remember the last time I enjoyed a new fiction book this much. It might have been <i>Dark Matter</i> or <i>Recursion </i>by Blake Crouch. I love the premise and I love the way it unfolds. I just loved it from start to finish!</div><div><br /></div><div>This is the blurb about the book from Goodreads: <i>"Between life and death there is a library, and within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived. To see how things would be if you had made other choices... Would you have done anything different, if you had the chance to undo your regrets?'</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>Somewhere out beyond the edge of the universe, there is a library that contains an infinite number of books, each one the story of another reality. One tells the story of your life as it is, along with another book for the other life you could have lived if you had made a different choice at any point in your life. While we all wonder how our lives might have been, what if you had the chance to go to the library and see for yourself? Would any of these other lives truly be better?</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>In The Midnight Library, Matt Haig's enchanting new novel, Nora Seed finds herself faced with this decision. Faced with the possibility of changing her life for a new one, following a different career, undoing old breakups, realizing her dreams of becoming a glaciologist; she must search within herself as she travels through the Midnight Library to decide what is truly fulfilling in life, and what makes it worth living in the first place."</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiOPYGHRMYnOx06mib41_LYxTQrYxitZ7nT4CE6J7LEYicqEmV_1gDj5UgKNbphGKjLAkWBply5HdAvFC2NUg6jV3K6BbcOQrNDiAqQTuzoVD-1ffKqtjj9icVlxgvlKl-87XmNQzcQXhoeK6iN1G7gT8pwhbsTzY2--js291IX16aZNVW1IQ=s1027" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1027" data-original-width="600" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiOPYGHRMYnOx06mib41_LYxTQrYxitZ7nT4CE6J7LEYicqEmV_1gDj5UgKNbphGKjLAkWBply5HdAvFC2NUg6jV3K6BbcOQrNDiAqQTuzoVD-1ffKqtjj9icVlxgvlKl-87XmNQzcQXhoeK6iN1G7gT8pwhbsTzY2--js291IX16aZNVW1IQ=s320" width="187" /></a></div>The other book I want to highlight is <i>Jonathan Livingston Seagull</i> by Richard Bach, first published in 1970. A dear friend of mine told me this was one of her favorite books and recommended I read it and I loved it so much! It is one of my favorite books I’ve ever read. This allegory/fable reminds me in some ways of <i>The Little Prince</i> by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.</div><div><div><br /></div><div>Here are just a few of the quotes that stood out to me:</div><div><br /></div><div>"Most gulls don’t bother to learn more than the simplest facts of flight – how to get from shore to food and back again, for most gulls it is not flying that matters, but eating. For this gull, though, it was not eating that mattered, but flight."</div><div><br /></div><div>“He spoke of very simple things- that it is right for a gull to fly, that freedom is the very nature of his being, that whatever stands against that freedom must be set aside, be it ritual or superstition or limitation in any form.</div><div><br /></div><div>"Set aside," came a voice from the multitude, "even if it be the Law of the Flock?"</div><div><br /></div><div>"The only true law is that which leads to freedom," Jonathan said. "There is no other.” </div></div><div><br /></div><div>***************</div><div>So, what were your favorite fiction books you read this past year?</div></div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-20612468792091556982022-01-01T16:55:00.003-05:002023-08-14T23:06:40.422-04:002021 Movies - Ranked<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgjrKQihdeXkcbeM4Ttw7r6o2_zMzygdtpeiYqmKDbJktOcabeRUmy0LCjzMYRKXHkow2MinbsUNsITZoAnlbDOfzYt5TTxuYXZD51KJP8vtXpt2U60463x5UmrsvAmjSvZCqDspz2zY_LBW1OdJfKIfokLJhYocw32uenc5x4cFbhWQ2eofA=s847" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="742" data-original-width="847" height="560" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgjrKQihdeXkcbeM4Ttw7r6o2_zMzygdtpeiYqmKDbJktOcabeRUmy0LCjzMYRKXHkow2MinbsUNsITZoAnlbDOfzYt5TTxuYXZD51KJP8vtXpt2U60463x5UmrsvAmjSvZCqDspz2zY_LBW1OdJfKIfokLJhYocw32uenc5x4cFbhWQ2eofA=w640-h560" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div><b><u>Favorite Movies of 2021 (definitely want to re-watch)</u></b><br />
<div>1. Spider-Man: No Way Home <i><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(this is the first time I went back to the theater to see a movie since the pandemic started in 2020)</span></i></div><div>2. In the Heights <i>(I've already watched this at least 3 times!)</i></div><div>3. tick, tick...BOOM! <i>(I really love musicals!) </i></div><div>4. Come From Away <i>(another great musical!)</i></div><div>5. Black Widow</div><div>6. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings</div><div>7. The Matrix Resurrections</div><div>8. CODA <i><span style="font-size: xx-small;">(on Apple TV)</span></i></div><div>9. Encanto</div><div>10. West Side Story</div>
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<b><u>Good Movies of 2021 (would probably re-watch):</u></b><br /></div><div>11. Zoey's Extraordinary Christmas </div><div>12. Luca</div><div>13. Pray Away</div><div><div>14. Cruella </div></div><div>15. Dune</div><div>16. Dear Evan Hansen</div><div>17. Moxie</div><div>18. Respect</div><div>19. Diana: The Musical</div><div>20. 8-Bit Christmas</div><div>21. Passing</div><div>22. Raya and the Last Dragon</div><div><br />
<b><u>Decent Movies of 2021 (less likely to re-watch):</u></b><br />23. Thunder Force</div><div>24. Space Jam: A New Legacy</div><div>25. Single All the Way</div><div>26. Love Hard</div><div>27. Free Guy</div><div>28. The Tomorrow War</div><div>29. He's All That</div><div>30. Cinderella</div><div>31. F9</div><div>
32. Swan Song</div><div>33. Eternals</div><div>34. Don't Look Up</div><div><br />
<b><u>Meh (No desire to re-watch):</u></b><br /></div><div><div>35. Old</div><div>36. Framing Britney Spears</div></div><div>37. Infinite</div><div>38. Reminiscence</div><div>39. Red Notice</div><div>40. Hitman's Wife's Bodyguard</div><div><div><div><ul>
</ul>
<div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-movies-ranked.html">2021 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/08/2020-movies-ranked.html" target="_blank">2020 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2020/01/2019-movies.html" target="_blank">2019 movie rankings</a></div><div>
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2018/06/2018-movies.html" target="_blank">2018 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2018/01/2017-movies.html" target="_blank">2017 movie rankings</a><br />
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</div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-90396866735090182782021-08-02T03:02:00.004-04:002022-08-01T00:22:23.483-04:002020 Movies - Ranked<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnYMfSLBcDXVniJ7FZb_32ui8A2APep7dukxM65uzlfJjC_hgFySrsXq7aseB3u2pIB0T-YiB_sAcHodNrYESzynR81h1iB2CW4oOyDOb0k1k0L7NdVo1kXKBRiiYKhWc_VadV8FjISuSc2MI3dImyKQkQ67ta_vP_TTbrYnjfegnDOGPq0w/s856/2020%20films.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="742" data-original-width="856" height="554" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnYMfSLBcDXVniJ7FZb_32ui8A2APep7dukxM65uzlfJjC_hgFySrsXq7aseB3u2pIB0T-YiB_sAcHodNrYESzynR81h1iB2CW4oOyDOb0k1k0L7NdVo1kXKBRiiYKhWc_VadV8FjISuSc2MI3dImyKQkQ67ta_vP_TTbrYnjfegnDOGPq0w/w640-h554/2020%20films.png" width="640" /></a></div><div><br /></div>2020 was a strange year for all of us with the global pandemic and all... and that impacted everything of course, including movies and television production. So these are the only movies I've seen that were released in 2020.<br /><div><br /></div><div><b><u>Favorite Movies of 2020 (definitely want to re-watch)</u></b><br />
<div>1. Hamilton</div><div>2. Tenet</div><div>3. The Prom</div><div>4. Crip Camp: A Disability Revolution</div><div>5. The Boys in the Band</div><div>6. Wonder Woman 1984</div><div>7. Soul</div><div>8. Disclosure</div>
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<b><u>Good Movies of 2020 (would probably re-watch):</u></b><br />9. Enola Holmes</div><div>10. Becoming</div><div><div>11. Dolly Parton’s Christmas on the Square</div><div>12. Jingle Jangle: A Christmas Journey</div></div><div><br />
<b><u>Decent Movies of 2020 (less likely to re-watch):</u></b><br />13. The Half of It</div><div>14. Ammonite</div><div>15. The Way Back</div><div>16. Mulan</div><div>
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<b><u>Meh (No desire to re-watch):</u></b><br /></div><div><div>17. The Social Dilemma</div><div>18. The Christmas Chronicles: Part Two</div></div><div><div><div><ul>
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<div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2022/01/2021-movies-ranked.html">2021 movie rankings</a></div><div><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2020/01/2019-movies.html" target="_blank">2019 movie rankings</a></div><div>
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2018/06/2018-movies.html" target="_blank">2018 movie rankings</a><br />
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<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/2000-movies.html" target="_blank">2000 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1999-movies.html" target="_blank">1999 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1998-movies.html" target="_blank">1998 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1997-movies.html" target="_blank">1997 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1996-movies.html" target="_blank">1996 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1995-movies.html" target="_blank">1995 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1994-movies.html" target="_blank">1994 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1993-movies.html" target="_blank">1993 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1992-movies.html" target="_blank">1992 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1990-1991-movies.html" target="_blank">1991-1990 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1989-movies.html" target="_blank">1989 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/08/1987-1988-movies.html" target="_blank">1988-1987 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/09/1985-1986-movies.html" target="_blank">1986-1985 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/09/1983-1984-movies.html" target="_blank">1984-1983 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/09/1980-1981-and-1982-movies.html" target="_blank">1982, 1981, 1980 movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/09/movies-from-1970s.html" target="_blank">1970s movie rankings</a><br />
<a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2017/09/movies-from-1950s-and-1960s.html" target="_blank">1960s-1950s movie rankings</a></div>
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</div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-23824919614317372232021-05-20T05:20:00.004-04:002021-05-20T05:32:38.607-04:00Book Review: YOU CAN TALK TO GOD LIKE THAT by Abby Norman<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieKwpgVmEHXaaj7CJh0BEcyZxOF3sBrp2UDzv-XqE_OI9k_jVFiUcubGruBLZ0g64OmNS4-juHAFSeRIhGN9URgwK2ieLjbLODZ25x4PIYpfEf_PWw343lNbuih9zC2Zxmva45/s2048/you+can+talk+to+God+like+that.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1325" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEieKwpgVmEHXaaj7CJh0BEcyZxOF3sBrp2UDzv-XqE_OI9k_jVFiUcubGruBLZ0g64OmNS4-juHAFSeRIhGN9URgwK2ieLjbLODZ25x4PIYpfEf_PWw343lNbuih9zC2Zxmva45/s320/you+can+talk+to+God+like+that.jpg" /></a></div><i>You Can Talk to God Like That: The Surprising Power of Lament to Save Your Faith</i></div>by <a href="https://abbynorman.net/" target="_blank">Abby Norman</a><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">200 pages</span><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;">Published May 18th, 2021 by Broadleaf Books </span><br />
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<b>My rating: 5 of 5 stars<br /><br /></b><div><div>Abby Norman is a pastor and a gifted writer and it shows. The first thing that jumped off the page as I started reading this book was Abby’s pastoral tone. She is not preaching at you about lament. She is coming alongside you to encourage you as she talks about how lament can draw us in closer to God.</div><div><br /></div><div>Abby <a href="https://twitter.com/abbynormansays/status/1336717658818039808?s=20" target="_blank">tweeted </a>in December of 2020 that she didn't mean to write an increasingly relevant book, but she did! The past year and a half of dealing with the pandemic and the chaotic political nonsense, along with the ongoing violence against Black people by police officers, mass shootings… there is no shortage of things to lament. </div><div><br /></div><div>Abby is a great writer and I am sure she is a great pastor. Abby and I have been internet friends for longer than I can remember now, and I even got to meet her in person at Evolving Faith in 2018. She has been such an encouragement to me in ways big and small over the years. And I am so thankful she wrote this book! I think it could encourage a lot of people. I know it encouraged me. I ended up reading it in one sitting but I definitely want to go back through it and take my time with it.</div><div><br /></div><div>One particularly moving part was when Abby talked about how we can hold hope for each other, and sometimes we need that because hope is too heavy for us sometimes.</div><div><br /></div><div>My favorite part (if I have to choose just one thing) is the prayers Abby prays for her readers at the end of each chapter and at the end of the book. These prayers wash over me like the ones Sarah Bessey often prays for her readers and listeners. This is the prayer at the end of chapter 1:</div><div><blockquote>“I pray that you are comforted. May the outpouring of your grief be accompanied by the outpouring of God’s love. May you work through the practice with patience and mercy for yourself and your circumstances. May your wounds be covered in balm. May you be close to God.”</blockquote></div><div>And this one at the end of chapter 3:</div><div><blockquote>“I know this can be scary. Not all of us have had a lot of practice talking back to God. As you embark on this exercise I pray that you land in the arms of a God who is good and holy and big enough to handle every single bit of your sorrow and rage. I pray that you would not be afraid of the strength of your own sorrows. I pray that you would land in strong arms.”</blockquote></div><div>And also this one at the end of chapter 5:</div><div><blockquote>“It is not lost on me that continually I am asking you to do hard things. This may be the hardest thing of all. Being wrong can be such a gift to us if only we embrace it. I pray that you will be so grounded in your belovedness that you will be open to the Holy Spirit changing your mind. I pray that you will be open to a bigger God, a bigger grace, a bigger community. May you experience your belovedness together.”</blockquote></div><div>Then, at the very end of the book, she brought tears to my eyes as she prayed for us, her readers, in a closing benediction: </div><div><br /></div><div><i>“Imagine me in my collar and my bright-red lipstick, my eyes shut tight behind my cat-eye glasses and one hand held in the air, hovering over your head, as I cry, </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>May you go into the world trusting the God who sees you just as Haggai trusted the God who saw her. May you feel known and validated in your deepest struggles and greatest heartaches. May you always know that you are not alone, that God is with you, that God sees you. </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>May you go into the world with the willingness of Ruth, to lament with others, to see their pain, to identify with them. May your heart break for those who are not like you, for those who have been forgotten by the powers and principalities of this world. May your presence remind them that Jesus is Emmanuel—God with us. May you cry hot tears over other people’s suffering. May you be filled with a compassion that will draw you closer to God. </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>May you go into the world crying out, weeping like the Holy Mother herself, broken at the sight of her child being broken by the empire. May you weep and gnash your teeth and make a holy scene. May you refuse to get up out of the streets until the ways of the world are changed, until the most vulnerable among us are included, until the church means it when they say, “All are welcome, all are beloved by God.” </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>May you go into this world lamenting like Mary Magdalene in the garden, who had been just hoping to bury her beloved rabbi. May Jesus meet you in the places of your deepest grief and invite you into a new and holy way of being, for the kingdom of God is coming, and the kingdom of God is here. Amen.”</i></div><div><br /></div><div>What are you waiting for? Go get her book and read it! :-) </div><div><br /></div><div><div><i>You Can Talk to God Like That</i> Affiliate Purchase Links: <a href="https://bookshop.org/a/25777/9781506469065" target="_blank"><b>Bookshop.org (supports local bookstores)</b></a></div><div><br /></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">Amazon: <a href="https://amzn.to/33WMG77" target="_blank">Paperback</a>, <a href="https://amzn.to/3f0uVdl" target="_blank">Kindle Edition</a>, <a href="https://amzn.to/3ouwnb2" target="_blank">Audible Audiobook</a></span></div></div><div><br /></div><div><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVEHgW9nIARQuLQdrnQOeFk-MydPu-OxhcAVR1rqLhkDBjVhm_ApBvA8Ncr4TnhNAXHPOWkhx4ovhZevhyphenhyphenGuVnGj7cccA-fJtejz4z7joACPAg_HA_RODgHEC7raZg5mqudJav/s768/headshot2016.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="512" data-original-width="768" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjVEHgW9nIARQuLQdrnQOeFk-MydPu-OxhcAVR1rqLhkDBjVhm_ApBvA8Ncr4TnhNAXHPOWkhx4ovhZevhyphenhyphenGuVnGj7cccA-fJtejz4z7joACPAg_HA_RODgHEC7raZg5mqudJav/s320/headshot2016.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><div>Abby Norman is a writer, blogger, speaker, and licensed local pastor in the United Methodist Church. Her writing has been featured in Huffington Post, SheLoves Magazine, and The Mudroom. Abby lives in Atlanta, Georgia with her college sweetheart, two daughters, and a very bad dog.</div><div><br /></div><div><i>Follow Abby on Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/abbynormansays" target="_blank">@abbynormansays</a></i></div>
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I am an affiliate of Bookshop.org and Amazon and I will earn a small commission if you click through and make a purchase.</span></i>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-87080555973135157412021-05-20T01:02:00.002-04:002021-05-20T01:16:10.879-04:00How to Earn Badges in Audible's Mobile Apps (2021 Update)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9YDVGYVsXNyYXu6jtjYbCaUxhcETLfP1gquZ-ljTqSYNqC-MIvuUfax-nJCUDzNuvvSsF8TiFXbBdMbK-RN1vPW77ut3U83KZa3JSwg4jPGkF4dkWGmuyy9J5eGxYhUjFHhuM/s1600/IMG_3750.PNG" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi9YDVGYVsXNyYXu6jtjYbCaUxhcETLfP1gquZ-ljTqSYNqC-MIvuUfax-nJCUDzNuvvSsF8TiFXbBdMbK-RN1vPW77ut3U83KZa3JSwg4jPGkF4dkWGmuyy9J5eGxYhUjFHhuM/s320/IMG_3750.PNG" width="228" /></a></div>
I originally published this post in June of 2015 and it has the most hits of any of my posts at 15,411 as of today (5/20/2021). Since Audible just updated the badges for the first time since then, I thought I should update this post.<div><br /></div><div>I still do most of my audio-book listening using Audible, specifically, the Audible app on my iPhone. One of the extra features of the app is that you can earn badges as you listen to your books. There are now 18 different badges you can earn. From what I understand, Android devices and Kindle Fire devices utilize the same feature.<br />
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The badges you earn on one device from an Audible app syncs between devices (like when I listen from my iPad at night vs. my iPhone in the car).<br />
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There are three different levels of badges you can obtain: silver, gold, and platinum.<br />
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<b><u>Mount Everest:</u></b><br />
Complete an Audible book that is longer than 24 hours long. <i><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOkS_dntQGaLZDYXTq6W6S1zHxmXHtzb8JmBiqWHbI__s_kkuk9Vv1etNSDgmrRixyHTzpLjOZg0FHBgjxYECR3uVW7mN5D3HvXJvTytqO6W7ytr1bw7MzY3J_Tm516f4qF7T8/s1033/IMG_1722.PNG" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1033" data-original-width="750" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOkS_dntQGaLZDYXTq6W6S1zHxmXHtzb8JmBiqWHbI__s_kkuk9Vv1etNSDgmrRixyHTzpLjOZg0FHBgjxYECR3uVW7mN5D3HvXJvTytqO6W7ytr1bw7MzY3J_Tm516f4qF7T8/s320/IMG_1722.PNG" /></a>(Infinite Jest did the trick for me!)</i><br />
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<b><u>Watchtower:</u></b><br />
Look at your profile page and badge page and switch back (in and out) over 50 times to obtain the Watchtower badge.<br />
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<b><u>7-day-stretch:</u></b><br />
Read in at least 2 books in the course of any consecutive 7 day period.<br />
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<b><u>Weekend Warrior:</u></b><br />Listen to an audible book for at least a total of 10 hours on a weekend.<br />
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<b><u>Night Owl:</u></b><br />
Listen to any selection of books for a course of at least 8 hours on any given night.<br />
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<b><u>Repeat Listener:</u></b><br />
Listen to the same book 3 or more times in a given day or week.<br />
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<b><u>Daily Dipper:</u></b><br />
Listen to books on any 7 consecutive days.<br />
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<b><u>High Noon:</u></b><br />
Read a book for at least 3 hours during a lunchtime stretch between 11am and 3pm.<br />
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<b><u>The Closer:</u></b><br />
Complete an entire book in one session.<br />
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<b><u>Marathoner:</u></b><br />
Listen to an Audible book for at least 2 consecutive hours in a day.<br />
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<b><u>Nibbler:</u></b><br />
Listen to 3 book titles in one day.<br />
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<b><u>The Stack:</u></b><br />
Have at least 50 Audible audiobooks in your library.<br />
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<b><u>Social Butterfly:</u></b><br />
Share your badge progress 5 times on Twitter and Facebook.<br />
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<b><u>Stenographer: </u></b><br />
Place 10 bookmarks in a single book.<br />
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<b><u>Dabbler <strike>(the only one I don't have yet)</strike>:</u></b><br />Hey! They finally fixed this and now it shows that I have this badge too! (as of 5/20/2021)<div><br /></div><div><span style="font-size: large;"><b>They've also added 3 badges:</b></span></div><div><br /></div><div><b><u>Collector:</u></b></div><div>You get this badge for earning badges... you get the gold ring for having earned 10 badges.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>Sampler</b>:</div><div>"If you like to try before you buy, then this badge will soon apply." (I don't have this one yet so I don't know how many books you have to try before you buy or if it gives you credit for listening to the free sample of a book if you don't end up buying the book.)</div><div><br /></div><div><b><u>Alexa</u></b>:</div><div>"To your Echo utter 'Alexa, read my book', and you'll get a badge for the effort it took."</div><div>This one annoys me because I don't own an Amazon Echo and I don't want or need an Echo device. But I get it. They want to promote their product.</div><div>
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</div><br />J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-14802317575139436142021-03-12T03:10:00.002-05:002021-03-12T03:10:51.724-05:00Book Review: The Disabled God - Toward a Liberatory Theology of Disability by Nancy L. Eiesland<i><a href="https://amzn.to/30Dvhyo" target="_blank"></a><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://amzn.to/30Dvhyo" target="_blank"></a><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFLSihUfG468dmcEuB4nKlN5HYewkCG2vsoMnBIy2F8IBKYkArrvi4i7UmsEZkgGRIFO-GWQgN05ZadBkh-yuQBbHMxJll726fXpl7dFMtUQFJumzRG3OYNETl-Cq2SbCVXInK/s499/51nlgjxxMOL._SX331_BO1%252C204%252C203%252C200_.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="499" data-original-width="333" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjFLSihUfG468dmcEuB4nKlN5HYewkCG2vsoMnBIy2F8IBKYkArrvi4i7UmsEZkgGRIFO-GWQgN05ZadBkh-yuQBbHMxJll726fXpl7dFMtUQFJumzRG3OYNETl-Cq2SbCVXInK/s320/51nlgjxxMOL._SX331_BO1%252C204%252C203%252C200_.jpg" /></a></div>The Disabled God: Toward a Liberatory Theology of Disability </i>by Nancy L. Eiesland, 140 pages<div><br /><div><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Finished reading on 3/10/2021 for my seminary class on political and liberation theologies. What follows is an edited version of my summary of the book I wrote for an assignment.</span></i></div><div><i><span style="font-size: x-small;"><br /></span></i></div>
My rating: <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/3871229253">5 of 5 stars</a><br /><br />
I think pretty much everyone should read this: pastors, leaders of all kinds, and really just, everyone.<br /><br />This book was published in 1994 but it started out as Nancy Eiesland’s Master’s thesis at Candler School of Theology. It seems significant that The Americans with Disabilities Act was just passed in 1990. She also writes out of her own experience of lifelong disability.<br /><br />Eiesland argues that disabled people are a marginalized, minority group that society and churches have a responsibility to include and not discriminate against. The expectation should not be put on the disabled person to adjust and just have to figure it out for themselves as an individual. Disabled people do not need to be “fixed” and that mentality has been very damaging. Sadly, churches in the United States fought to be excluded from the requirements of The Americans with Disabilities Act so they would not have to bring their buildings up to the new accessibility requirements.<br /><br />Chapter Three: The Body Politics “offers a social framework for reconceiving disability, incorporating the history of the civil rights struggle.” She examines a shift in the sociology of disability where the person with disabilities becomes the subject instead of the object of inquiry which led to “the emergence of the disability rights movement and continues to offer a theoretical construct for empowerment and liberation” for disabled people.<br /><br />Chapter Four: Carnal Sins - Disability has never been religiously or theologically neutral. Eiesland talks about three themes that illustrate the theological obstacles encountered by people with disabilities seeking inclusion in Christian communities: 1) sin and disability conflation (blames the disability on the person’s sin and/or lack of faith), 2) virtuous suffering, and 3) segregationist charity. Eiesland spends the rest of this chapter talking about a particular case within the American Lutheran Church where their supposed theology of access for disabled people did not match their policies for ministerial qualification that rejected many disabled people as “categorically unsuitable for ordained ministry” (70).<br /><br />Chapter Five: The Disabled God - This chapter explores the revolutionary implications of the resurrected Christ as the disabled God as a divine affirmation of the wholeness of “nonconventional bodies” (87). She opens by describing an epiphany where she saw God “in a sip-puff wheelchair,” the kind used mostly by quadriplegics. She writes, “I beheld God as a survivor, unpitying and forthright. [...] This theology of liberation emerged from those conversations, our common labor for justice, and corporate reflection on symbol.”<br /> <br />Chapter Six: Sacramental Bodies: The main focus of this chapter is on the centrality of the Eucharist in the symbolic and actual inclusion of disabled people. In the Eucharist the disabled God. In the resurrected Christ, “the nonconventional body is recognized as sacrament” (116).
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</div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-90386495705266262942021-02-24T12:00:00.003-05:002021-03-12T03:32:38.819-05:00Book Review: A Black Theology of Liberation by James H. Cone<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/54621356-a-black-theology-of-liberation" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="A Black Theology of Liberation: 50th Anniversary Edition" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1595312112l/54621356._SX98_.jpg" /></a><b><a href="https://amzn.to/3bwOWFr" target="_blank"><i>A Black Theology of Liberation</i></a> by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/17438.James_H_Cone" target="_blank">James H. Cone</a></b>, 200 pages<div><i><span style="font-size: x-small;">Finished reading on 2/11/2021 for my seminary class on political and liberation theologies.</span></i></div><div><br />
James H. Cone (1938-2018) published this book in 1970. In the preface to the 1986 edition, Cone writes, “This book cannot be understood without a keen knowledge of the civil rights and black power movements of the 1960s and a general comprehension of nearly four hundred years of slavery and segregation in North America, both of which were enacted into law by government and openly defended as ordained of God by most white churches and their theologians” (Loc 186). Cone also says his style of doing theology was “influenced more by Malcolm X than by Martin Luther King, Jr.” (Loc 255). Peter J Paris points out in his forward to the 2020 edition that there was little to no conversation in their seminaries in the mid-twentieth century about Martin Luther King, Jr, and the civil rights movement as it was considered out of bounds for theological inquiry. This silence around all of that is what Cone would have been experiencing in seminary. Paris also tells us that Cone was not familiar with the rise of liberation theology in Latin America at the time he wrote this book. Instead, he took his seminary training and used those tools to construct his own theology of liberation (Loc 84). I appreciate what Cone wrote in his preface to the 1986 edition acknowledging his failure to pay attention to sexism in the black community and society at large, and so he changed the exclusive language from 1970 to more inclusive language (Loc 266).<br /><br />Cone directly states in the preface to the 1986 edition: “<i>A Black Theology of Liberation</i> was first published in 1970, and it was written for and to black Christians (and also to whites who had the courage to listen) in an attempt to answer the question that I and others could not ignore, namely, “what has the gospel of Jesus Christ to do with the black struggle for justice in the United States?” (Loc 186).<br /><br />Cone interacts extensively with many of the classical (white) theologians, especially Karl Barth. He mentions Paul Tillich a lot too, and Bultmann. I thought it was interesting that in the preface to the 1986 version he said that if he were writing the book at that time he would not follow the theological structure “that begins with a methodology based on divine revelation, and then proceeds to explicate the doctrines of God, humanity, Christ, church, world, and eschatology” (Loc 319). His reason for saying that is that he now believes that “Revelation as the word of God, witnessed in scripture and defined by the creeds and dogmas of Western Christianity, is too limiting to serve as an adequate way of doing theology today” (319).<br /><br />This book is James Cone’s “attempt to construct a new perspective for the discipline of theology, using the Bible and the black struggle for freedom as its chief sources” (Loc 329). Liberation became the “organizing principle” (329). He explores the implications of this within the framework of classical theology, fully showing off all of the training he had received in seminary about the traditional (white) theologians. Chapters three through seven tackle Revelation, God, human beings, Jesus, the church, the world, and eschatology, always emphasizing "blackness" as opposed to "whiteness." He is writing a theology that is liberated from the racism of white supremacy and oppression. Over and over again he says in many different ways, that any message or theology that is not about the liberation of the poor is not Christ’s message. It’s not the Gospel. It’s not Christian theology. In his preface, he writes, “It is my contention that Christianity is essentially a religion of liberation. The function of theology is that of analyzing the meaning of that liberation for the oppressed so they can know that their struggle for political, social, and economic justice is consistent with the gospel of Jesus Christ. Any message that is not related to the liberation of the poor in a society is not Christ's message. Any theology that is indifferent to the theme of liberation is not Christian theology” (Loc 345).
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J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-72768473307180968722021-02-24T03:00:00.022-05:002021-02-25T06:28:31.196-05:00Mini Book Reviews (February 2021)<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/53564274-a-rhythm-of-prayer" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="A Rhythm of Prayer: A Collection of Meditations for Renewal" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1590672405l/53564274._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://amzn.to/3kgQ97I" target="_blank">A Rhythm of Prayer: A Collection of Meditations for Renewal</a> by <a href="https://www.sarahbessey.com/" target="_blank">Sarah Bessey</a><br />
My rating: 5 of 5 stars<div><i>Finished reading on 2/20/21</i><br /><br />
I have savored every word of this book. I’ve gone back over most of the prayers at least twice already. I have fallen asleep listening to the audiobook multiple times. (Is it any wonder I had a dream last night where Sarah Bessey was comforting me? 😂)<br /><br />Anyway, do yourself a favor and read this book. Buy it if you can, you’re going to want to come back to it again and again.</div><div><br /></div><div>A passage I love from the introduction:</div><div><blockquote>"Often when we find ourselves at a crossroad in our faith, rethinking everything from church to scripture to family to art to politics to science to prayer, we think we have only two options: double down or burn it down. So when it comes to prayer, we might mistakenly believe that if we can’t pray the way we used to or the way we were taught, somehow that means we can’t or don’t pray anymore, period. [...] So no, the point of this is not to give you prayers to pray but to show you: <b>you still get to pray. Prayer is still for you. You still get to cry out to God, you still get to yell, weep, praise, and sit in the silence until you sink down into the Love of God that has always been holding you whether you knew it or not</b>. [...] I want this to help you feel a bit less alone. My hope is that you’ll borrow language from these prayers and be reminded that <b>you are held—always, fully, completely—in the Love of God.</b> I want this to be an act of resistance at this moment in our time, a way for us to fling wide the doors to prayer, to set up a few tables in your wilderness so that we can feast together on truth, justice, and goodness." - Sarah Bessey </blockquote>
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26596352-jonathan-livingston-seagull" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="Jonathan Livingston Seagull: A story" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1442494223l/26596352._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://amzn.to/37HYLPT" target="_blank">Jonathan Livingston Seagull: A story</a> by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/16904.Richard_Bach" target="_blank">Richard Bach</a><br /><i>
My rating: 5 of 5 stars</i></div><div>Finished reading on 2/23/21<br /><br />
I loved this book so much! It is one of my favorite books I’ve ever read. This allegory/fable reminds me in some ways of <i>The Little Prince</i> by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.<br /><br />"Most gulls don’t bother to learn more than the simplest facts of flight – how to get from shore to food and back again, for most gulls it is not flying that matters, but eating. For this gull, though, it was not eating that mattered, but flight."<br /><br />*****<br />“He spoke of very simple things- that it is right for a gull to fly, that freedom is the very nature of his being, that whatever stands against that freedom must be set aside, be it ritual or superstition or limitation in any form.<br /><br />"Set aside," came a voice from the multitude, "even if it be the Law of the Flock?"<br /><br />"The only true law is that which leads to freedom," Jonathan said. "There is no other.”<br />
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<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/38088910-queering-lent" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="queering lent" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1516240131l/38088910._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://amzn.to/3aX5IyB" target="_blank">queering lent</a> by <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/17154476.slats" target="_blank">slats</a><br />
My rating: 5 of 5 stars</div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">Published 1/7/2018</span></div><div><span style="font-size: x-small;">Finished reading on 2/25/2021</span><br /><br />
I loved this short collection of poems/prayers so much. They wrote 40 poems, one for each day of Lent, and included a sermon they preached on Easter Sunday. Absolutely beautiful!</div><div><br /></div><div>This was one of my favorite parts: </div><div><br /></div><div><i>"maybe it's because i grew up </i></div><div><i>in churches </i></div><div><i>crawling under pews </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>and i know You don't </i></div><div><i>constrict Yourself to churches </i></div><div><i>but so often i just want </i></div><div><i>to slump against church walls, </i></div><div><i>to be absorbed into the plaster </i></div><div><i>to kiss the stone </i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><i>because i need somewhere to pour this love. </i></div><div><i>i need somewhere to find my rest. </i></div><div><i>and curling up underneath Your pews </i></div><div><i>is the closest thing i've got </i></div><div><i>to falling asleep in Your arms."</i></div><div>- slats </div><div><br />
<a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36234500-transforming" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px;"><img alt="Transforming: The Bible & the Lives of Transgender Christians" border="0" src="https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1517315484l/36234500._SX98_.jpg" /></a><a href="https://amzn.to/3aLnNPV" target="_blank">Transforming: The Bible & the Lives of Transgender Christians</a> by <a href="http://austenhartke.com/" target="_blank">Austen Hartke</a><br />
My rating: 5 of 5 stars</div><div><i>Finished re-reading on 2/24/21</i><br /><br />
This is a great resource for anyone who is wrestling with theology around transgender people and is wanting to understand and learn more. Highly recommend.<br /><br /><div><a href="http://www.jenniferneyhart.com/search/label/book%20review" target="_blank">View all my book reviews</a></div></div><div><br /></div>
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J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-73368057258410401872021-02-10T19:56:00.004-05:002021-02-11T11:51:25.871-05:00Discussing "The Universal Christ" by Richard Rohr (Reclaiming Christianity Podcast)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP_d14Rf8yJODawdi6K-nQisnkIL1hdsAW_oMUNUgrVaRDQ2DzsMEyVipRYOqiWLNfCH6ldwN-m8ixaGJ2Cfvx73VqhWnJUrMdx6xPIDsz_7iPLJtXnOiwUgjVe-Q9xRMGwIVV/s1600/universal_christ_3_800x.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgP_d14Rf8yJODawdi6K-nQisnkIL1hdsAW_oMUNUgrVaRDQ2DzsMEyVipRYOqiWLNfCH6ldwN-m8ixaGJ2Cfvx73VqhWnJUrMdx6xPIDsz_7iPLJtXnOiwUgjVe-Q9xRMGwIVV/s320/universal_christ_3_800x.jpg" width="213" /></a></div>In June of 2019, I recorded three episodes with John Weldy on his Reclaiming Christianity podcast discussing <i>The Universal Christ</i> by Richard Rohr. This post has been in my draft folder for some reason for a long time but I'm going to go ahead and post it now. So if you are interested in listening, here are the links to those episodes and the bullet points of what we talked about.<br />
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<li><a href="https://www.spreaker.com/user/10447885/2-5-christ-is-not-jesus-last-name" target="_blank">2.5: Christ is Not Jesus' Last Name</a> (Chapter 1)<br /></li><ul>
<li>Jesus & Christ</li>
<li>Creation: the first incarnation</li>
<li>Supernatural & natural</li>
<li>God loves things by becoming them</li>
<li>The eternal Christ</li>
<li>Names of God</li>
<li>Incarnational worldview<br /><br /></li>
</ul>
<li><a href="https://www.spreaker.com/user/10447885/2-6-worldviews" target="_blank">2:6: Worldviews</a> (Appendix 1)<br /></li><ul>
<li>Material worldview</li>
<li>Spiritual worldview</li>
<li>Priestly worldview</li>
<li>Incarnational worldview</li>
<li>Which of these worldviews sounds like the way you see the world?<br /><br /></li>
</ul>
<li><a href="https://www.spreaker.com/user/10447885/2-7-deconstruction-reconstauction" target="_blank">2.7: Deconstruction and Reconstruction</a> (Appendix 2)</li>
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<li>Order</li>
<li>Disorder</li>
<li>Reorder</li>
<li>Where do you see yourself in this process right now?<br /><br /></li>
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My <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProgressiveTheologyBookClub/" target="_blank">Progressive Theology Book Club</a> group on Facebook discussed <a href="https://amzn.to/3tIQwwa" target="_blank"><i>Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation </i>by Kristin Kobes Du Mez</a> for our January book. </div><div><br /></div><div>Our February book is <a href="https://amzn.to/3a8PNNa" target="_blank"><i>Outside the Lines: How Embracing Queerness Will Transform Your Faith </i>by Mihee Kim-Kort</a> and our March book will be <a href="https://amzn.to/3d2s0jQ" target="_blank"><i>Faith After Doubt: Why Your Beliefs Stopped Working and What to Do About It </i>by Brian McLaren</a>.</div><div><br /></div><div>If you want to read and discuss those books with us, join the facebook group: <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/ProgressiveTheologyBookClub/" target="_blank">Progressive Theology Book Club</a></div>
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</div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-68697869688398244302021-02-01T23:30:00.002-05:002021-02-02T12:44:02.402-05:005 scholars articulation of what womanist biblical interpretation entails<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1075" data-original-width="1871" height="368" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirdF6XNxQ__wRsV0gA7wYfCb2V3jmyN4oNOEtDYRDaqNaM_TgdDcyurstvP6LuF-RUkACCYMEASFVTZWyRQSaERVXDabgd-ia5lg118WooCL_H4ATW_h5EiwKtt5yRMF1ti4fe/w640-h368/womanist+bible+interpretation.png" width="640" /></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Pictured in the top row from left to right are Rev. Yolanda Norton and Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney. <br />On the bottom row from left to right are Rev. Dr. Renita Weems, Rev. Dr. Mitzi J. Smith, and Rev. Dr. Vanessa Lovelace</span></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p>So what exactly does womanist biblical interpretation entail? <a href="https://nyashajunior.com/" target="_blank">Dr. Nyasha Junior</a> states, “I wish that I could provide a definition of womanist biblical interpretation, but I confess that I cannot offer a clear definition because one does not exist” (Loc 2639). Junior says the lack of consensus about what womanist biblical interpretation is “is somewhat masked by the generalizations made by some womanist scholars in describing womanist biblical interpretation in terms that may give the mistaken impression that a consensus position exists” (Loc 3000). She criticizes the lack of consistency and says their “loose usage” of Alice Walker’s definition means that the word itself ends up being the main thing their interpretations have in common. But I’m not sure I agree with her assessment. It seems to me that each of the five womanist bible scholars pictured and listed above is not only informed by Alice Walker’s definition of “womanist” but doing similarly inspired things in their womanist interpretation. First, they emphasize "talking back to the text" and "interrogating the text" and other interpretations of the text that have harmed people. Secondly, they each emphasize an intersectional approach that prioritizes the experiences of Black women and oppressed people in their interpretation. I will highlight these points for each of these five scholars below.</p><p>1. The first part of Alice Walker's definition describes a womanist as a “black feminist or feminist of color” and explains how the term came from a “black folk expression” when an adult would say a girl was <span style="background-color: #fcff01;">acting “womanish”</span> (like a woman), “acting grown-up” or “trying to be grown” (xi). I see each of these scholars using that as a point of emphasis for <span style="background-color: #fcff01;">"<b>talking back to the text</b>" and "<b>interrogating the text</b>".</span></p><p><b><u>Gafney</u></b>: “Above all, this work is womanist because it is womanish. That is,<b> I am<span style="background-color: #fcff01;"> talking back to the text, challenging it, questioning it, interrogating it,</span> unafraid of the power and authority of the text, just as a girl-growing-into-a-woman talks back to her elders, questioning the world around her in order to learn how to understand and navigate it” </b>(9).</p><p><b><u>Smith</u></b>: She says<b> <span style="background-color: #fcff01;">she writes "as an act of womanist resistance, an act of sass and talk-back to (con)texts that disturbingly re-inscribe structures of oppression and are oppressive</span>, </b>that invite us to be complicit in oppression, that primarily depict God as a violent male, that subordinate the other, and that embody and sacralize (the secular is elevated to the level of the sacred) androcentrism, patriarchalism, and misogyny" (3).</p><p><b><u>Lovelace</u></b>: In the introduction to <i>Womanist Interpretations of the Bible</i>, she co-wrote with Gay L. Byron, <b>"<span style="background-color: #fcff01;">all interpreters of sacred texts are responsible for exposing and analyzing the power dynamics in both the ancient texts and the interpretations of the texts that have been used to further injustices and global systemic challenges</span></b>" (15). Exposing and analyzing power dynamics in the texts themselves and the interpretations is the work of "talking back to the text" and "interrogating the text."</p><p><b><u>Weems</u></b>: "<b><span style="background-color: #fcff01;">The Bible cannot go unchallenged in so far as the role it has played in legitimating the dehumanization of people of African ancestry in general and the sexual exploitation of women of African ancestry in particular</span>. It cannot be understood as some universal, transcendent, timeless force to which world readers—in the name of being pious and faithful followers—must meekly submit. It must be understood as a politically and socially drenched text invested in ordering relations between people, legitimating some viewpoints, and delegitimizing other viewpoints.</b>" (46) </p><p><b><u>Norton</u></b>: <b><span style="background-color: #fcff01;">The power of womanism is its refusal to try to “explain away elements of biblical literature that modern sensibilities might find problematic or objectionable in order to produce a more congenial text,” and its willingness to expose those elements and look at the implications for today</span> </b>(266). (In other words, the power of womanism for Norton is its willingness to talk back to the text.)</p><p>2. The second part of Walker's definition of womanist says, <span style="background-color: #01ffff;">“a woman who loves other women, sexually and/or nonsexually</span>. Appreciates and prefers women’s culture, women’s emotional flexibility... and women’s strength…. <span style="background-color: #01ffff;">Committed to survival and wholeness of entire people, male and female.</span>" (xi). And part four of Walker's definition says “<b>Womanist is to feminist as purple to lavender</b>” (xii.). </p><p>I see these five scholars using these parts of Walker's definition as related to their <span style="background-color: #01ffff;">intersectional emphasis which prioritizes Black women's experiences in their interpretation and keeps them concerned with the oppressions that happen at the intersections of race/gender/sex/class etc</span>. All of them emphasize intersectionality and the way multiple oppressions compound each other. </p><p><b><u>Gafney </u></b>lists the primary womanist principles that shape her book, Womanist Midrash, as: "(1)<span style="background-color: #01ffff;"> the legitimacy of black women’s biblical interpretation as normative and authoritative, (2) the inherent value of each member of a community in the text and interpreting the text,</span> (3) <span style="background-color: #fcff01;">talking back to the text</span>, and (4) making it plain, the work of exegesis from translation to interpretation”(8). Gafney also talks about "<span style="background-color: #01ffff;">privileging the crossroads between our Afro-diasporic identity (embodiment and experience) and our gender (performance and identity)</span>" in the process of interpretation (7).</p><p><b><u>Smith </u></b>says her reading perspective is "<span style="background-color: #01ffff;">a womanist intersectional approach that privileges or prioritizes the experiences, voices, traditions, and artifacts of African American women (and their communities) as sources of knowledge production, critical reflection, and ethical conduct</span>" (2). </p><p><b><u>Lovelace </u></b>writes that she hopes their work "will lead to even more collaboration and conversations that will <span style="background-color: #01ffff;">help keep the interests of black women and other women of color "at the forefront of interpretations of biblical and extrabiblical sources</span>" (16).</p><p><b><u>Weems </u></b>says womanist hermeneutics of liberation starts with African American women’s "will to survive and thrive as human beings and as the female half of a race of people who live a threatened existence within North American borders" (46).<span style="background-color: #01ffff;"> The interests and experiences of Black women are privileged over theory and harmful interpretations of ancient texts, even sacred ancient texts </span>(46).</p><p><b><u>Norton</u></b>: In her essay, “Silenced Struggles for Survival: Finding Life in Death in the Book of Ruth” Norton argues that the book of Ruth is a more complicated narrative than traditional interpretations have permitted. Norton says “the text masquerades as a treatise on the inclusion of the other” when it actually seems to be “a commentary on the assumed virtue of membership and participation in the Israelite community” (265). Norton is criticizing the implication that it is a good and honorable thing to sacrifice everything - one’s land, people, god, even one’s own self, “for the supposed privilege of participating in what the text depicts as the most desirable community,” in this case, Israel (265). <span style="background-color: #01ffff;">Her entire essay is concerned with an intersectional approach to interpretation that is prioritizing the experience of the character who is most marginalized in this story.</span></p><div><p style="text-align: center;">***************</p><p style="text-align: center;">Works Cited</p><p><b>Byron</b>, Gay L. and Vanessa <b>Lovelace</b>. Womanist Interpretations of the Bible : Expanding the Discourse. SBL Press, 2016.</p><p><b>Gafney</b>, Wilda C. <i><a href="https://amzn.to/39mBLXN" target="_blank">Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to the Women of the Torah and the Throne</a></i>. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2017.</p><p><b>Junior</b>, Nyasha. <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3os8DCJ" target="_blank">An Introduction to Womanist Biblical Interpretation</a></i>. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, 2015.</p><p><b>Norton</b>, Yolanda. “Silenced Struggles for Survival: Finding Life in Death in the Book of Ruth,” in <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3taLU1N" target="_blank">I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader</a></i>, edited by Mitzi J. Smith, Eugene, OR: Cascade Books. 2015.</p><p><b>Smith</b>, Mitzi J. <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3crdlyj" target="_blank">Womanist Sass and Talk Back: Social (In)Justice, Intersectionality</a></i>. Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2018.</p><p><b>Walker</b>, Alice. <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3psC3Sn" target="_blank">In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens: Womanist Prose</a>.</i> Orlando, FL: Harcourt, Inc., 1983.</p><p><b>Weems</b>, Renita. “Re-reading for liberation: African American women and the Bible,” in <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3taLU1N" target="_blank">I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader</a></i>, edited by Mitzi J. Smith, Eugene, OR: Cascade Books. 2015.</p><p><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>This is part of my final project for my class on Womanist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible. You can <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/womanist-interpretation-of-hebrew-bible.html">see the intro post here</a> which is a linked table of contents.</i></span></p>Get new posts in your email:
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<!--End mc_embed_signup--></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-36997106156031573492021-02-01T22:30:00.212-05:002021-02-02T08:18:15.462-05:00Rev. Dr. Mitzi J Smith: “This Little Light of Mine” The Womanist Biblical Scholar as Prophetess, Iconoclast, and Activist<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnaiQz5kk_042pB7dn0UAgulCrhNAcZrPznKS1Ofka0l4LGK-rRjKNFNf6lgwoVNf4J6vMrbr_pnV40wSAjS9i1_NUaahY2uaEJOpF3ZieVcdu-5z4fTMNE35KJ3ki6534qfXp/s200/download+%25284%2529.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnaiQz5kk_042pB7dn0UAgulCrhNAcZrPznKS1Ofka0l4LGK-rRjKNFNf6lgwoVNf4J6vMrbr_pnV40wSAjS9i1_NUaahY2uaEJOpF3ZieVcdu-5z4fTMNE35KJ3ki6534qfXp/s0/download+%25284%2529.jpg" /></a></div>Rev. Dr. Mitzi Smith, <a href="http://mitzijsmith.com/" target="_blank">mitzijsmith.com</a><br />Twitter: <a href="https://twitter.com/MitziJSmithPhD" target="_blank">@MitziJSmithPhD</a> <br /><br />Professor of New Testament at <a href="https://www.ctsnet.edu/mitzi-smith-appointed-davison-philips-professor-new-testament/" target="_blank">Columbia Theological Seminary</a>.<br />You can <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/rev-dr-mitzi-j-smith-womanist-sass-and.html" target="_blank">read more about Dr. Smith and read my summary of her introduction to her book, <i>Womanist Sass and Talk Back,</i> here</a>. <br /><div><br /></div><div>Essay: “'This Little Light of Mine' The Womanist Biblical Scholar as Prophetess, Iconoclast, and Activist" <br /><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">**********</div><div>In this essay, Smith shows how womanist biblical scholars, like so many Black women who came before them, can function as prophetess, iconoclasts, and activists (126). Through these three roles Black women seek to "dismantle racism, sexism, classism, neocolonialism, and heterosexism as interconnected oppressions and systems that invade and infiltrate the lived realities of black women and marginalized communities" (126). Smith writes, "We recognize that God dwells in us as peripheral prophetesses, that God resides in the margins with the oppressed, and that from the margins we can and are called to speak truths to powers, to shatter oppressive strongholds, iconic traditions and beliefs, and to actively participate in the revolution to transform this world into the likeness of God’s incarnate justice, peace, and love" (126).</div><div><p><u>Main points</u>:</p><p></p><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>Womanist biblical scholars acknowledge their social location and the lenses with which they read the Bible, understanding that <b>every interpreter’s “context both limits and illumines interpretation,” (Weems 52) whether or not the person is aware of it and admits it: "All readers, readings, and texts are contextual and subjective </b>(112).<br /><br /></li><li><b>A womanist biblical scholar is a Prophetess,</b> "infused with and guided by the Spirit of God.. as [she] confronts and names oppressions in texts, contexts, readers, readings, and cultures" (112. Womanist biblical scholars, like "proto-womanists and Civil Rights activist Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer" go beyond their written work to "raise their voices, and lift their feet to write and right, to teach and to preach, and to sing “truth to power” with a goal toward transformation and the dismantling of oppressions and oppressive structures, toward revolutionary change (113).<br /><blockquote><i>"Womanist biblical scholars declare that black women and other women of color experience and produce truth and light; they are repositories and creators of legitimate epistemologies. All knowledge production is subjective. Womanist biblical scholars acknowledge the existence of more than one truth, especially with regard to biblical texts, contexts, readings, and readers; truths and potential truths exist; malestream biblical scholars have no monopoly on truths." (113).</i></blockquote></li><li>Womanist biblical scholars know that <b>"the God of the Bible is the God of the oppressed, the God of liberation</b> <b>and they interpret Scripture "within the overarching hermeneutic of liberty and justice for the oppressed and most marginalized"</b> (115).<br /><br /></li><li><b>A womanist biblical scholar is an <a href="https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/iconoclast" target="_blank">Iconoclast</a></b>, knowing that many times the knowledge and systems that have been "produced, petrified, and sacralized by malestream (white men and other men) and white feminist scholars" will not address the needs of black women and will be oppressive. Therefore, the work of womanist biblical scholars "is necessarily sometimes iconoclastic" needing to challenge things that have been revered as holy (119).<br /><blockquote><i>"In confronting biblical texts, contexts, and interpretive traditions, including long-held theological constructions and commentaries that fail to consider the implications of race, gender, class, and empire womanist biblical scholars must sometimes break down and discard traditional, putative interpretive icons or images and paradigms that are oppressive of women of color and our communities and dismissive of our struggles and concerns. (119).</i></blockquote></li><li><b>The womanist biblical scholar is an Activist,</b> concerned with the everyday lives of black people "and their access to necessary resources, the recognition of their civil rights, and the exercise of agency and the negotiation of power as it relates to the health and wholeness of every member of the community and in the world" (122). Therefore<b> they "read, exegete, and write as agents of social change in the church, in the community, and in the world" </b>(122).<br /><br /></li><li>Finally, <b>womanist biblical scholars also challenge (and seek to change) "unjust interpretations, theologies, and pedagogies of our sisters</b>" <b>while also allowing God "to read, indicted or convict, and transform her [own] soul so that she will speak the truths to powers wherever injustice is found. She must constantly make available to God her fallible humanity so that God might continually encourage, transform, and regenerate her for the work she is called to do for herself and her community"</b> (123).</li></ol><p style="text-align: center;"><b><u>Works Cited</u></b></p><p style="text-align: left;"><b>Smith</b>, Mitzi J. “'This Little Light of Mine' The Womanist Biblical Scholar as Prophetess, Iconoclast, and Activist" in <i><a href="https://amzn.to/3j6H7tu" target="_blank">I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader.</a></i> Edited by Mitzi J. Smith, Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2015.</p><p style="text-align: left;"><b>Weems</b>, Renita, “Re-Reading for Liberation: African American Women and the Bible,” in Womanist Theological Ethics: A Reader, ed. Katie Geneva Cannon, Emilie M. Townes, and Angela D. Sims. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2011. </p><p style="text-align: center;">**********<br /></p><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="text-align: left;">This is part of my </span><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/womanist-interpretation-of-hebrew-bible.html" style="text-align: left;">final project for "Womanist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible."</a><span style="text-align: left;">:</span></div><p></p><p></p><ul><li><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/key-terms-in-womanist-bible.html" target="_blank"><b>Key Terms in Womanist Bible Interpretation</b></a></li><li><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/key-questions-womanist-bible-scholars.html"><b>Key QuestionsWomanist Bible Scholars ask when interpreting the Bible</b></a></li></ul><div><p>Other essay summaries:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px;"><li><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/rev-wil-gafney-phd-reflection-on-black.html">"A Reflection on the Black Lives Matter Movement and Its Impact on My Scholarship"</a><span> </span>by Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney</li><li>"<a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/rev-dr-wil-gafney-womanist-midrash-of.html">A Womanist Midrash of Delilah: Don’t Hate the Playa Hate the Game</a>” by Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney</li><li><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/rev-dr-mitzi-j-smith-womanist-sass-and.html">Introduction to<span> </span><i>Womanist Sass and Talk Back</i></a> by Rev. Dr. Mitzi J. Smith</li><li>"<a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/dr-renita-weems-re-reading-for.html" target="_blank">Re-Reading for Liberation: African American Women and the Bible”</a> by Dr. Renita Weems</li></ul></div><p></p><p></p><div>Get new posts in your email:</div>
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<div class="clear"><input class="button" id="mc-embedded-subscribe" name="subscribe" type="submit" value="Subscribe" /></div></form></div></div></div></div>J.L. Neyharthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05000828002102877415noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30696756.post-6580559718768703052021-02-01T21:26:00.225-05:002021-02-02T08:34:56.590-05:00Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas: “Marginalized People, Liberating Perspectives: A Womanist Approach to Biblical Interpretation” <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwutmG8iPjMf0ErvF5l-qhcqdwGYtfByDmjWP2Pik9t2YBYo1d-9Kh15fZozF0wW1G4cUzZarFbex5Kr1cYU2tJgPKldE6FKcF9Djwi40eGV254KzwQiasi_wo3-1WgeACVIdd/s400/KBD_Headshotv.2.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjwutmG8iPjMf0ErvF5l-qhcqdwGYtfByDmjWP2Pik9t2YBYo1d-9Kh15fZozF0wW1G4cUzZarFbex5Kr1cYU2tJgPKldE6FKcF9Djwi40eGV254KzwQiasi_wo3-1WgeACVIdd/s320/KBD_Headshotv.2.jpg" /></a></div><a href="https://utsnyc.edu/faculty/kelly-brown-douglas-82-88/" target="_blank">Rev. Dr. Kelly Brown Douglas</a> is an African-American Episcopal priest, womanist theologian, and the inaugural Dean of the Episcopal Divinity School at Union Theological Seminary. She is also the Canon Theologian at the Washington National Cathedral. She is widely published in national and international journals and other publications. Her groundbreaking and widely taught book <a href="https://amzn.to/36QRBZd" target="_blank"><i>Sexuality and the Black Church: A Womanist Perspectiv</i>e</a> (1999) was the first to address the issue of homophobia within the black church community. Her book, <a href="https://amzn.to/36ynZj5" target="_blank"><i>Stand Your Ground: Black Bodies and the Justice of God</i></a> (2015), examines the challenges of a “Stand Your Ground” culture for the black church.<div><div><br /></div><div><div style="text-align: center;">**********</div><div>Essay: <b>“Marginalized People, Liberating Perspectives: A Womanist Approach to Biblical Interpretation” </b></div><div><br /></div><div>Thesis: We are called to listen to and learn from those on the underside of church and society (46). We need to value the perspectives of the “least of these,” the underside,” those who are marginalized and oppressed (46). <b>When we view God from the perspective of the most marginalized people in the Bible we will more clearly see that "the God of our theologies is not necessarily the God of our lives," and that God is truly transcendent, and so cannot be contained by any theological system or "exegetical attempt to make simplistic the complexity and mystery of a transcendent God"</b> (46). Reading in solidarity with the underside shows us more clearly what it means "for God to be a liberator with those who are most oppressed, even as they are represented in the Bible" (46). Furthermore, <b>if our claims about God are not liberating for the marginalized and oppressed, then we must reevaluate those claims</b> (46).</div><div><br /></div><div><div><div><u>Main Points:</u></div><div><ol style="text-align: left;"><li>Douglas writes as a theologian, not a biblical scholar. Even though the Bible is a significant source for Christian theology, and biblical interpretations have theological implications, the tools of the disciplines are different (44). But <b>in the same way that our theologies tend to reflect more about the person doing them as they do about God, the same is true for our perspectives on the Bible (44). No one does theology or biblical interpretation in a vacuum - it is always informed and influenced by one's social, historical, and cultural context</b> (44). <br /><blockquote><i>"The texts we go to, the way we read those texts, and the authority we give the Bible itself are inevitably informed by who we are as embodied beings, how we experience life socially and culturally, as well as what we perceive as the meaning and value of life" (44).</i></blockquote></li><li><b>This is not an "anything goes" kind of "vulgar relativism".</b> Typically when that accusation is made it is in an attempt to end the conversation, played as a perceived trump card. This kind of mentality would suggest that "slaveholders who used the Bible to place a “sacred canopy” over chattel slavery were just as justified in their use of the Bible as were the enslaved who used the Bible to support their quest for freedom" (44).<b> This kind of approach to the Bible "implies that it is just as appropriate to use the Bible as a weapon of terror and dehumanization as it is to use it as a source for empowerment and liberation</b>” (44).<br /><br /></li><li><b>A womanist approach to biblical interpretation starts by acknowledging the ways our society and many churches still contain "interlocking and interactive structures of domination" which are "characterized by white patriarchal privilege and undergirded by white supremacist ideologies"</b> (44). Douglas also points out that "to be marginalized is not to be powerless... Rather, it signals a certain liberating agency that has several implications for biblical interpretation in our complicated world” (44).<br /><br /></li><li><b>People who exist on the margins of society and church have an epistemological advantage, a way of knowing, "that is fundamental to creating a just society and church</b>” (45). Those on the underside are least likely "to be deceived into thinking that certain systems and structures of domination are not inherently evil but can be mended to be more just" (45). This is in contrast to those who are still outsiders but are able to exist within those structures who might be tempted to protect whatever small amount of privilege/power they have. Because of this,<b> the underside can more clearly see "the radical and revolutionary change required to ensure that all human beings have access to what is needed to live and to fulfill our full human potential”</b> (45). This is similar to what <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gustavo_Guti%C3%A9rrez" target="_blank">Gustavo Gutiérrez</a> suggested about there being a “preferential option for the poor” because they are perhaps better able to understand the revelation of God (45).<br /><br /></li><li>In order to listen and learn from the underside, <b>we must name our own points of privilege so we can even recognize "that our vantage point may indeed not be the best vantage point from which to engage the biblical witness to God"</b> (46). This frees us to appreciate these other perspectives.<br /><br /></li><li>Since various biblical texts "lend themselves to oppressive interpretations", we need to adopt a “hermeneutic of suspicion” as we interpret the Bible (46):<br /><blockquote><b>"Inasmuch as any text or interpretation of a text diminishes the life and freedom of any people, then those texts and/or interpretations must be held under “suspicion,” critically reevaluated, and perhaps lose authority. We must fundamentally denounce any attempts to use the Bible in ways that terrorize others, such as women or gay and lesbian persons. Moreover, the perspective of “the least of these,” those who feel the “terror” of a particular text or interpretation, is the adjudicating perspective in this regard.”</b> (46)</blockquote></li><li>It is imperative that we <b>recognize the impact and consequences that our use of the Bible and our theology can have on people's lives</b>. The Bible can be used "as a weapon of oppression or a source of liberation" (46). Therefore, we must do biblical interpretation not only with humility but also with the firm commitment "to nurture a liberating, not terrorizing, biblical tradition” (46).</li></ol></div></div></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><b><u>Works Cited</u></b></div></div><div><p style="text-align: left;"><b>Douglas, </b>Kelly Brown. “Marginalized People, Liberating Perspectives: A Womanist Approach to Biblical Interpretation” in I Found God in Me: A Womanist Biblical Hermeneutics Reader. Edited by Mitzi J. Smith, Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2015.</p><p style="text-align: center;">**********</p><p>This is part of my <a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/womanist-interpretation-of-hebrew-bible.html">final project for "Womanist Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible."</a>:</p><p><b><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/key-terms-in-womanist-bible.html" target="_blank">Key Terms in Womanist Bible Interpretation</a></b></p><p></p><p>Other essay summaries:</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p></p><ul style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; orphans: 2; text-align: left; text-decoration-color: initial; text-decoration-style: initial; text-decoration-thickness: initial; text-indent: 0px; widows: 2;"><li style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/rev-wil-gafney-phd-reflection-on-black.html">"A Reflection on the Black Lives Matter Movement and Its Impact on My Scholarship"</a><span> </span>by Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney</li><li>"<a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/rev-dr-wil-gafney-womanist-midrash-of.html">A Womanist Midrash of Delilah: Don’t Hate the Playa Hate the Game</a>” by Rev. Dr. Wil Gafney</li><li style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/02/rev-dr-mitzi-j-smith-womanist-sass-and.html">Introduction to<span> </span><i>Womanist Sass and Talk Back</i></a> by Rev. Dr. Mitzi J. Smith</li><li style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;">"<a href="https://www.jenniferneyhart.com/2021/01/dr-renita-weems-re-reading-for.html" target="_blank">Re-Reading for Liberation: African American Women and the Bible”</a> by Dr. Renita Weems</li></ul><p></p><p></p><div>Get new posts in your email:</div>
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