A meticulously researched educational tool, particularly for readers with a casual interest in Christian Science and LGBT...
A lifelong gay Christian Scientist explores his religion’s history and its largely uncharted, turbulent relationship with sexual minorities.
Mexico-based American journalist Stores (The Isthmus, 2009) looks at the controversial Church of Christ, Scientist, from the 1950s to the present day. Specifically, he tells of how the church, once devoted to outdated, exclusionary practices regarding gays, has come around to adopting a policy of leniency. Stores includes numerous profiles of intrepid, trailblazing gay activists who advocated changes within the church, such as defrocked Pentecostal Rev. Troy Perry Jr., who established the Metropolitan Community Church in the 1960s, and Chris Madsen, an outspoken lesbian cub reporter who was terminated from her position at the Christian Science Monitor in the 1980s due to her sexual orientation. Madsen’s story ignited a momentous scandal and lawsuit, which would rock the church’s steely foundation. Stores also presents profiles of several other people who wished to exclude sexual minorities from church membership, such as the staunchly anti-gay letter-writer Reginald Kerry and singer and LGBT rights opponent Anita Bryant. By offering such divergent viewpoints, Stores’ intelligent, thought-provoking narrative strives to “provide new frameworks in defining the place of sexual minorities in ecclesiastical institutions.” The author’s closing notes reflect the latest positive inroads, including pro–gay-equality activism by the author’s own son on the Christian Scientist Principia College campus. Ultimately, Stores’ narrative coalesces into a fair-minded look at the evolution of Christian Science’s stance on gay rights, the responses of its leadership and followers, and the hope for change.
A meticulously researched educational tool, particularly for readers with a casual interest in Christian Science and LGBT issues.Pub Date: Sept. 9, 2004
ISBN: 978-0595666584
Page Count: 274
Publisher: iUniverse
Review Posted Online: Jan. 30, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.
A compendium of charts, time lines, lists and illustrations to accompany study of the Bible.
This visually appealing resource provides a wide array of illustrative and textually concise references, beginning with three sets of charts covering the Bible as a whole, the Old Testament and the New Testament. These charts cover such topics as biblical weights and measures, feasts and holidays and the 12 disciples. Most of the charts use a variety of illustrative techniques to convey lessons and provide visual interest. A worthwhile example is “How We Got the Bible,” which provides a time line of translation history, comparisons of canons among faiths and portraits of important figures in biblical translation, such as Jerome and John Wycliffe. The book then presents a section of maps, followed by diagrams to conceptualize such structures as Noah’s Ark and Solomon’s Temple. Finally, a section on Christianity, cults and other religions describes key aspects of history and doctrine for certain Christian sects and other faith traditions. Overall, the authors take a traditionalist, conservative approach. For instance, they list Moses as the author of the Pentateuch (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) without making mention of claims to the contrary. When comparing various Christian sects and world religions, the emphasis is on doctrine and orthodox theology. Some chapters, however, may not completely align with the needs of Catholic and Orthodox churches. But the authors’ leanings are muted enough and do not detract from the work’s usefulness. As a resource, it’s well organized, inviting and visually stimulating. Even the most seasoned reader will learn something while browsing.
Worthwhile reference stuffed with facts and illustrations.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2005
ISBN: 978-1-5963-6022-8
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 23, 2010
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
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