Suggested Reading

Poverty, slavery, slavery to poverty — still all too real in the twenty-first century. We are moved to action to the extent that we feel the pain. But we know so little!

Trouble strikes all of us. Rich, poor, young, old, black, brown, white, gay, straight — we all  experience trouble at one time or another. Catastrophic trouble hits less often, yet it, too, strikes across all barriers. (Post by Stephanie Downey, guest reviewer)

United Methodists have struggled with internal controversy for centuries, and today we face yet another test of our resolve to follow Jesus as one. The following books contribute to a fuller understanding of issues regarding our ministries to and with LGBGQ persons.

Having read several social justice books in rapid succession this spring, I am reminded that even Jesus’s simple command to love one another often leaves us to ponder what the loving course of action really is in a given situation. How do compassion and justice relate? How do they play out when Christians disagree?

Our patron Pat Kay checked out 52 books from our library in the past 15 months. Wow! I couldn’t resist asking what kept her coming back. Her response: “My relationship with Christ, to draw near to him.” Pat was my inspiration for this post.

A voice that spoke of hope and redemption for all people, especially the hurting, the marginalized, the questioners, went silent this week with the passing of beloved Christian author Rachel Held Evans at the age of 37.

“All her books center on various life events, challenges, and joys, and how by faith, connecting with God through prayer, we can get through them and find joy and God’s purpose for us.” — Suzy Drake, White Plains Library patron and Kingsbury fan.

Ponder life’s big questions along with these authors and find new insight for genuine living — whether it’s about finding your true calling, fostering true intimacy in a relationship, or finding what truly matters in face of your own mortality.

Greetings, White Plains Library patrons and friends! Thanks to your generosity, we have added over 200 titles to our collection since January 2018, mostly nonfiction. Reviews are on the way, but to jump-start the process, here are some recently added fiction titles. Except for my personal comments about the first book below, the information comes mainly from the publishers’ descriptions. Click on any title for more information. Do We Not Bleed? : A Jon Mote Mystery, by Daniel Taylor. “A…

Christianity has been tainted by other worldviews that have slid almost unnoticed into our lives.

The Jewish journalist Daniel Radosh takes a surprisingly tolerant, serious, and (mostly) respectful look at the inner workings of a subculture within Christianity that many mainline Christians are barely aware of. Also see a list of other recent acquisitions.

By coincidence or divine providence, a remarkable number of our latest books to be cataloged relate in some way to hope, a fitting subject for Advent.

Certainty isn’t necessarily a good thing, nor is it a prerequisite to faith, according to two Christian authors who have written books on the subject. At best, it would seem that certainty is overrated.

Who of us has not seen or experienced a change that was hard? Or a need for change that has not yet happened because it is hard?

When I was a child learning “memory verses” in Sunday school, there was no question of which version to memorize. Everyone I knew used the King James (KJV), though we never called it that. It was just the Bible, or the Holy Bible (a term my friend insisted didn’t apply to my pocket New Testament because it wasn’t “whole”). In 1952 the Revised Standard Version (RSV) arrived on the scene as the first serious rival to the nearly 350-year-old KJV.…

Many of us are stuck in a “safe” place where we can practice our faith without risk, but also without passion or power. Author Mark Buchanan invites us to enter “the holy wild,” the exhilarating environment we encounter when we go all-in and discover a God who is not safe but …

In her memoir, Zora Neale Hurston describes a professor and mentor in her life who instilled a wonder and curiosity in his students, as if to say “There is something wonderful to behold just ahead. Let’s go see what it is.” …

There’s so much good to be done, beauty to enjoy, love to give and receive, stuff to learn; so many wrongs to right, holes to fill, songs to sing, challenges to meet, reasons to give thanks. Life’s too short to pretend we don’t see or don’t care, or that there will ever be a better time to begin. God has given us this time.

Every day on a disciple’s path is a new opportunity. Several of our recent library acquisitions, both fiction and nonfiction, relate to walking paths and the far-reaching effects the choice of path can have.

If your New Year’s resolution includes broadening your reading list, why not ramp up the fun with our Book Bingo challenge? View post to learn more and see a slew of new books in our collection to get you started.