Beside the Night Stand

These are list of the books I am currently reading.

Actually I just finished this one entitled, "Christian America and the Kingdom of God" by Richard Hughes. The premise is that too often America views itself as being God's, holy, chosen nation. With this type of mentality, it is easy to take an Old Testament approach to how we treat all other countries. Hughes' question is, "How does this square up with Jesus' Sermon on the Mount where he says we are to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute you?".

Many fundamentalists feel that it is the their job to bring all other peoples and countries into line with "American" thinking. The problem with this mentality is that the United States is NOT the kingdom of God (nor is any other country for that matter). Only the Church is God's holy, chosen nation. It's an easy read on a hard topic.


"The People's History of the United States:1492 - Present" by Howard Zinn. I am typically not a huge fan of history, but I have to say I'm getting into this book. It starts with the horrendous acts that were done to the Native Americans when the Spaniards and Europeans came over to settle. Diaries written at the time of Christopher Columbus detail the sad atrocities that were done to the original inhabitants of this land. It is a 700 page book. I am only about a third of the way through.

Along with Zinn' s book, I am reading "Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong" by James Loewen. Loewen reviewed 18 of the most commonly used high school textbooks and found that most (if not all) leave out important facts about the founding of this country, slavery and who actually owned slaves (this will surprise you), racism, the Civil War, Lincoln and his struggle with emancipation, as well as other issues in U.S. History. Loewen emphasizes the "dark side" of U.S. history, to help balance out the part that's missing from our education system. This is a real eye-opening book.

The final book I am reading is called, "Jesus and Empire: The Kingdom of God and the New World Disorder" by Richard Horsley. This gives an account of what Rome was like in the days of Jesus. Everything revolved around the empire and its Caesars. Statutes and coins paid homage to the great political and military leaders. In fact, they went so far as to call them "savior" (a term given to Jesus also). I am 1/4 of the way through this but my guess is that Horsley is going to make parallels between the social, political, and cultural parallels of imperial Rome with those of the empirical United States today. If you wish to be challenged intellectually and spiritually, this is a good book to read. If you wish to be disturbed and forced to think, read this book.