The
Vol. 1, No. 5 –
Diving for pearls in the endless stream of books (Eccles. 12:12B)
Chris Smith, editor
“In Sickness and In Health”
A review of
Joel James Shuman’s
The Body of Compassion:
Ethics, Medicine and the Church.
By Chris Smith.
[ EDITOR’S NOTE: While this book is hardly a new one (originally published 1999), it is a important book that should be read, and we are fortunate to be able to offer it at a great, discounted price. ]
Joel James Shuman’s The Body of Compassion: Ethics, Medicine and the Church is a wonderful treatise on the problems of modern medicine and how the Church is uniquely posed to address such problems. The primary problem that Shuman identifies is that medicine typically attempts to apply technology to a patient’s disease, without taking into consideration the person in which the disease resides. This tendency is – Shuman argues – simply another incarnation of the modern world’s separation of mind and body; i.e., the body is treated medically as if it were an entity isolated from whole person. In the book’s introduction, Shuman summarizes how the Church has a different perspective on illness and suffering:
“What finally matters when Christians are sick or dying is not simply that they get well right away or die quickly, painlessly, in control and without being a burden to others, but that they remain faithful to their most basic convictions about what it means to worship a crucified God.”
This is a meaty book, especially the first half, which deals with the question of what the purpose of medicine is (from the world’s point-of-view). In this first section, the author unravels the mysteries of bioethics, and demonstrates why this application of (modern) philosophy to medicine is particularly at odds with Christian theology.
On the other hand, the second half of the book is focused on the practical – rather than the philosophical – issues of how the Church is to treat the sick in our midst: providing care that goes “beyond bioethics.” These chapters should be required reading for all members of the Body of Christ. The Christian community is, as a result of its participation in the Scriptural narrative, a “body of compassion” and it is precisely because of compassion (i.e., willingness to enter into the suffering of others) that it is prepared to demonstrate the place of suffering in God’s redemption of all things. Additionally, Shuman maintains that because we do not view disease as a supreme evil that is to be conquered, we are free to listen to and deeply care for the ill person.
Shuman, a former student of Stanley Hauerwas, has deep roots in theological ethics, but he also demonstrates a rich knowledge of bioethics and the history and philosophy of medicine. He makes his points well, but his arguments are richly flavored with snippets from the fiction and social commentary of Wendell Berry, stories from his own experience as well as that of the Catholic novelist Flannery O’Connor, and the founder of the L’arche Christian communities, Jean Vanier. This is a book for all followers of Christ, but it will be especially beneficial for those disciples who are inclined toward theological reflection about our place in God’s redemption of a fallen and sick world.
The Body of Compassion: Ethics, Medicine and the Church.
Joel J. Shuman. Hardcover. Westview. 1999.
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $5 ] SPECIAL
[ A note on buying books: We offer you the opportunity to buy the books listed here, either directly from our little independent bookstore (Doulos Christou Books), or through amazon.com. The prices listed for our bookstore do not include shipping or
Used Book Finds
The bread-n-butter of our bookstore business is the sale of used books, and we do a fair amount of scouting around for used books each week. In this section we will feature some of the interesting books that we have found in the past week. Generally, we will only have a single copy of these books, so if you want one (or more) of them, you’ll need to respond quickly.
( Just in time for Lent!!!
From the author of The Divine Hours… )
Final Sanity:
Stories of Lent, Easter, and the Great 50 Days.
Phyllis Tickle. Trade Paperback. Upper Room. 1987.
Very Good. Clean pages / Minimal wear.
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $6 ]
Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life.
Henri Nouwen, et al. Trade Paperback.
Image Books. 1982. Very Good.
Clean pages / Minimal wear.
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $5 ]
Following Christ in a Consumer Society:
The Spirituality of Cultural Resistance.
John Francis Kavanaugh.
Trade Paperback. 1981. Very Good.
Clean pages / Moderate wear. Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $5 ]
Reviewed Elsewhere
Scott P. Richert reviews three excellent new books on
the agrarian movement
http://www.kirkcenter.org/index.php/bookman/article/of-the-soul-and-the-soil/
“ … Whether an agrarian worldview can continue to survive in the modern world without an explicit connection to Christian belief is a serious question. Industrial capitalism has proved quite efficient at what Joseph Schumpeter called “creative destruction,” yet, at best, it is unclear whether what it has created has been, on balance, better than that which it has destroyed. The bulk of the artistic and literary legacy of Christendom (whether English, French, Italian, German, Greek, or Eastern European), for example, may have its direct roots in cities, but those cities had yet to be cut off completely, or even substantially, from the life of the surrounding countryside. … ”
Read the full review:
http://www.kirkcenter.org/index.php/bookman/article/of-the-soul-and-the-soil/
Eric T. Freyfogle. Agrarianism and the Good Society.
Hardcover. University Press of
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $30 ] [ Amazon.com ]
Jason Peters, ed. Wendell Berry: Life and Work.
Hardcover. University Press of
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $28 ] [ Amazon.com ]
Gene Logsdon.
The Mother of All Arts: Agrarianism and
the Creative Impulse.
Hardcover. University Press of
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $35 ] [ Amazon.com ]
Timothy Egan reviews
Michael Shnayerson’s Coal River for the New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/books/review/Egan-t.html
“If it is possible for one industry to destroy both land and culture, the coal companies clawing at West Virginia have found a way to do it. Used to be, coal mining was done deep underground, employing legions of miners. It was dangerous, but at least a little coal town could coexist down the road from the mine, and there was always a river nearby for fishing on Sunday afternoon. Now the industry employs far fewer people by simply blowing up entire hillsides — mountain-ectomies. Towns, farms, forests, schools, rivers — anything near the blast zone is a casualty.
Is it legal? Perhaps not. But the coal industry is also adept at backing judges and legislators who turn federal laws like the Clean Water Act into spaghetti with Orwellian interpretations. They also play the jobs card, in which union miners are just as complicit as their employers.
This is the story Michael Shnayerson tells in “
… [T]his book is a history lesson worth heeding, even though most of what is described in “
Read the full review:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/20/books/review/Egan-t.html
Michael Shnayerson. Coal River.
Buy now from: [ Doulos Christou Books $20 ] [ Amazon.com ]
 Reading for the Common Good From ERB Editor Christopher Smith "This book will inspire, motivate and challenge anyone who cares a whit about the written word, the world of ideas, the shape of our communities and the life of the church." -Karen Swallow Prior Enter your email below to sign up for our weekly newsletter & download your FREE copy of this ebook! |
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