Hi there! I was raised in a conservative Christian context. In recent years, in the process of becoming an adult and making sense of the world, I've realized that many of the old answers just don't work. So I'm growing and learning, using this space to save my favorite books and other resources.
You can find some of the books for free at the Internet Archive, and through your local library you may be able to access Hoopla for ebooks and audiobooks, and Kanopy for documentaries. To find books for free more effortlessly, try the Library Extension.
- Spiritual practices
- Biblical interpretation
- Science and cosmology
- Women and gender roles
- LGBT inclusion
- Racism
After our childhood faith is no more, how can we maintain a healthy spirituality?
- 📕Mike McHargue – Finding God in the Waves: How I Lost My Faith and Found It Again Through Science. Later in the book Mike explains how, despite the many doubts he still has about God, spiritual practices still enrich his life. Which makes me wonder: if we all approached religion in a more practice-oriented way (not just belief-centric), maybe our dialogue in and out of church would be healthier.
- 🔊Thomas Moore – A Personal Spirituality: Finding Your Own Way to a Meaningful Life. Includes lots of pointers on healthy and vibrant spirituality.
How did the Bible come to be? How can we read it more skillfully and more fruitfully?
- 📕Adam Hamilton – Making Sense of the Bible: Rediscovering the Power of Scripture Today
- 📕Rachel Held Evans – Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again
- 📕Greg Boyd – Inspired Imperfection: How the Bible's Problems Enhance Its Divine Authority
- 🔊Pete Enns & Jared Byas – The Bible for Normal People podcast. Many episodes are a short exploration of a different approach to the Bible. My favorites are #160 The Risk of an "Errant" Bible, #172 A Whole Different Way of Reading Genesis, and #207 Respecting the Bible for What It Is (and Isn't).
Many Christians think that the truth of the Bible depends on a 6000-year-old Earth, which means denying mainstream science. Science denial is one of the most oft-cited reasons that young people give for leaving the church: a 2011 survey found that 25% of young ex-churchgoers felt that "Christianity is anti-science." And doubtless this same perception keeps many others from ever stepping foot in a church.
- 📕Aaron Yilmaz – Deliver Us From Evolution?: A Christian Biologist's In-Depth Look at the Evidence Reveals a Surprising Harmony Between Science and God. Written by a former young-earth creationist who addresses creationist arguments head-on.
- If you get bogged down in that, an alternate starting point is 📕Denis Lamoureux – I Love Jesus & I Accept Evolution. Or if you prefer a mix of readings and videos, Dr. Lamoureux also made 🌐a free online course.
- For an even shorter introduction: 🎞️"What is the evidence for evolution?"
- 📕Robin Parry – The Biblical Cosmos: A Pilgrim's Guide to the Weird and Wonderful World of the Bible. An investigation of how ancient Israelites viewed the world around them, which (spoiler alert) is very different from how we modern people see the world. The concluding chapters are fascinating, on how we modern people might fruitfully use this ancient view of the world.
- 🎞️InspiringPhilosophy – videos about evolution and faith and 🎞️"The Origins of Young Earth Creationism"
- 📕John Walton – The Lost World of Genesis One: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate
- 📄Greg Boyd – "Evolution as Cosmic Warfare: A Biblical Perspective on Satan and 'Natural' Evil". (Most of the article is available on Google Books via that link. Whenever you see that the next page is unavailable, just write the next page number into the URL bar, e.g. "&pg=PA126", and press Enter.) If you're wondering how evolution (a process necessarily involving death from the very beginning) fits with a perfect creator, here is one approach.
- Along the way, Boyd also sketches an alternative theodicy in which evil does not come from God. It's a great antidote for those classic Christian conversation-enders, "God has a plan" and "God is in control". Oh thanks, it's so reassuring to know that God is the one behind the evil I'm suffering.
- Tolkien's creation account in the Silmarillion beautifully tells a very similar theodicy.
Some people use the Bible to justify placing women in subordinate roles. But just as with young-earth creationism, this is only one possible interpretation. Where did it come from?
- 📕Beth Allison Barr – The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth. "Biblical womanhood" is in reality not biblical, but a modern twist on the age-old ways of the world.
- 📄Joseph A. P. Wilson – Recasting Paul as a Chauvinist within the Western Text-Type Manuscript Tradition: Implications for the Authorship Debate on 1 Corinthians 14.34-35 and an interview with the author
- 📕Cynthia Westfall – Paul and Gender: Reclaiming the Apostle's Vision for Men and Women in Christ. By paying attention to the context of Paul's remarks men and women, they take on a whole new meaning.
The Bible is widely believed to condemn gay marriage. But does it really?
- 🎞️For They Know Not What They Do
- 🎞️Justin Lee – "Through My Eyes"
- 📕Andrew Marin – Us versus Us: The Untold Story of Religion and the LGBT Community. Did you know 86% of LGBT people were raised in church? And of the 54% that left, 76% are open to returning. (Compare that to the only 9% of ex-church-goers in the general U.S. population who are open to returning.)
- 📕Ken Wilson – A Letter to My Congregation: An Evangelical Pastor's Path to Embracing People Who Are Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, and Transgender in the Company of Jesus. The part addressing the biblical texts is especially helpful.
- If you're not convinced that "homosexuality" in the Greco-Roman world was categorically different than what we call by that name today, in that it was violent and exploitative, then read the third chapter of 📕Sarah Ruden – Paul Among the People: The Apostle Reinterpreted and Reimagined in His Own Time. Here's a preview of the first few pages.
- 📕Mark Wingfield – Why Churches Need to Talk about Sexuality: Lessons Learned from Hard Conversations about Sex, Gender, Identity, and the Bible. The story of how one church stopped avoiding the question.
- 📕Kathy Baldock – Walking the Bridgeless Canyon: Repairing the Breach Between the Church and the LGBT Community. Delves deeper into history than most other books, answering questions like "Where did our modern idea of homosexuality come from?"
- 📕James Brownson – Bible, Gender, Sexuality: Reframing the Church's Debate on Same-Sex Relationships. A deeper examination of the oft-cited biblical texts.
- 📕Karen Keen – Scripture, Ethics, and the Possibility of Same-Sex Relationships. If you're still uncomfortable going against traditional interpretations, this book might be for you. It shows that biblical commands have always been interpreted and re-interpreted with discernment for human need. Old Testament writers did it, Jesus did it, Paul and the other epistle writers did it, and it's been done throughout church history.
I've often wondered, at different times and in different churches, "Why is my church so white?" The fact that I noticed at all may have been due to my childhood in Brazil, where it's more normal for people of different skin tones to mingle. But it's only now as an adult that I've set out to learn more in this area where my conservative upbringing failed me by avoiding race issues and skirting over the ugly history and the present reality.
- 📕Jamar Tisby – The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism. Shows how white American Christians, far from fighting against racism, have on the whole encouraged it and participated in it.
- 📕Derwin L. Gray – How to Heal Our Racial Divide: What the Bible Says, and the First Christians Knew, about Racial Reconciliation. Skip it if you've already noticed the parallels between the early church situation and today's racial divisions.
- 📕LaTasha Morrison – Be the Bridge: Pursuing God's Heart for Racial Reconciliation
- 🎞️Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Movement. A must if you didn't learn much about the civil rights movement in school.
- 📕Michelle Alexander – The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness. A depressing read but probably the most important one on this list.
- 📕Heather McGee – The Sum of Us: What Racism Costs Everyone and How We Can Prosper Together. Have you ever wondered why conservative whites oppose social programs that would benefit them more than anyone? It's the rich and powerful convince them that non-whites are getting unfair advantages (welfare queens, affirmative action), and that life is a zero-sum game where any benefit to (lazy) black and brown people comes at the expense of (hardworking) white people. Or to put it another way: no matter how bad the economic situation of whites, they can continue to feel like they're on top as long as black and brown people have it worse.
- 📕Clint Smith – How the Word Is Passed: A Reckoning with the History of Slavery Across America