These days I find myself struggling with the Christmas thing. Like most adults, I’ve lived through many of them. I’ve had times when the whole Nativity has been tremendously meaningful to me, and other times when it barely passes through my consciousness – this year, the latter condition seems to apply.
But sooner or later, all those carols on the radio start to get to me – John Rutter’s Candlelight Carol for example, or Harold Darke’s arrangement of In the Bleak Midwinter, or perhaps that most moving German Christmas song, Still, Still, Still, Weils Kindlein Schalfen Will, sung so beautifully by Bryn Terfel on his album Simple Gifts.
I suppose its something about a message based on an infant “bringing down the mighty from their thrones”, which runs so counter to the strong-flowing current of modern life. And so I turn once again to The Other Wise Man. I don’t know how many times I’ve read it but it seems to resonate with my mood most years, when all the paraphernalia of Christmas overwhelms the story of a baby being born who somehow gives a glimmer of hope to those who wish to receive it. You can find The Other Wise Man for free on the net on Project Gutenburg. Its not very long and won’t take more than half an hour or so to read. Continue reading Review: The Other Wise Man – Henry Van Dyke
Share on Facebook
Share on Facebook
This lengthy book, The Power and the Glory, is an account of the John-Paul II years, but with the rose-tinted glasses removed. David Yallop has assembled an incredible amount of material to present the behind the scenes story of what really went on in the Vatican, particularly focusing on the fall of communism, the [...]
Share on Facebook
Mary Roach spent a year investigating the outer fringes of psychic phenomena and has written up her findings in Six Feet Over, a book full of healthy scepticism but also honest investigation. She seems to be a generous and open-minded investigator who does not belittle the enthusiasts she meets and writes entertainingly of what she finds. Starting with “reincarnated children”, Mary Roach travels to India to meet children who are allegedly reincarnations of (mostly)deceased relatives and neighbours. How unlike the western past-lives people who always seem to claim to be reincarnations of more glamorous subjects such as Mahatma Gandhi, Nefertiti etc. Because the surrounding culture is accepting of the childrens’ experiences, the children are not usually subject to even the most gentle questioning of their claims, and Roach finds that a little gentle interrogation of witnesses and the children themselves, soon makes the stories fall apart.
Roach then goes on to look at the history of psychic claims, beginning with the search for the “soul” – where does it reside, what happens when it leaves the body, where does it go? These were hot questions for early scientists of the 18th and 19th century and Roach describes their attempts to find the soul and track its progress from conception to death. The experiments seem highly amusing to us, but Roach reminds us to see them in the context of the days when electricity and radio waves were just being discovered and seemed quite miraculous. She then discovers researchers in the present day who are still on the quest for the soul (in the Univeristy of Arizona for example).
Continue reading Review: Six Feet Over – Mary Roach
Share on Facebook
Share on Facebook
These days I find myself struggling with the Christmas thing. Like most adults, I’ve lived through many of them. I’ve had times when the whole Nativity has been tremendously meaningful to me, and other times when it barely passes through my consciousness – this year, the latter condition seems to apply.
Recent Comments