Okay, so this isn’t a book review or even book news, but an editorial of sorts…
I’ve been re-reading Reconciling All Things by Chris Rice and Emmanuel Katongole recently and being poignantly reminded of how absent lament is from our lives as Christians in the Western world.
I’ve been working through my thoughts on lament in a series of posts about the Aurora shooting on the Slow Church blog.
You can find the series here: [ Part 1 ] [ Part 2 ] [ Part 3 ]
That series led to an article yesterday on The Huffington Post website calling for us to imagine a politics of lament.
In the spirit of lament, I also wrote a post on this Wednesday, (aka, Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day) about becoming peacemakers in the cultural wars.
And on top of all that, I’ve been writing a feature review for our print magazine of Brian McLaren’s excellent forthcoming book (perhaps one of the year’s most important books!): Why Did Jesus, Moses, the Buddha, and Mohammed Cross the Road? This book, despite its somewhat corny title, similarly laments the un-Christ-like hostility that we too often assume as Christians today.
And writing a piece for the Relevant Magazine website, lamenting the present drought, which was what got me thinking about lament, earlier this summer, even before the tragedies of Aurora and Chick-fil-A.
I encourage you to check out some of these reflections, engage with them in their comments sections, and if you find them challenging, share them with others…
Image via Wikimedia Commons…
C. Christopher Smith is the founding editor of The Englewood Review of Books. He is also author of a number of books, including most recently How the Body of Christ Talks: Recovering the Practice of Conversation in the Church (Brazos Press, 2019). Connect with him online at: C-Christopher-Smith.com
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