Friday State of the Blog(ger)

So, as I apparently feel the need to do from time to time when I go through these blogging dry spells, I feel the need to inform the lot of you fools that read this drivel that I call intelligent blogging that I am still indeed around and reading away at different books that either boggle my mind and/or flat out fascinate me.

There’s been more than a few issues contributing to my absence:

1) Two separate car accidents, one where I was at fault and one where I wasn’t. Worry not; I am fine, though I was subject to the awful rigamarole of fighting with insurance companies and finding a new means of transportation, only to rear-end someone with THAT car and having to get that one fixed now (it’s currently in the body shop). As you can imagine, this whole process has been stressful.

2) A lot of youth group stuff has been going on in the last month or so that required a LOT of my attention in the absence of one of our group leaders (and even then I’m not taking care of as much as the other leader who’s with me).

3) In the midst of flu season and one brutal winter, work at the hospital has been utterly insane. I come home pretty drained every night, so grabbing up one of the theological texts I’m trying to read is like trying to do push ups after a rigorous upper-body session at the gym. Not gonna happen.

4) I got stupid and overloaded myself on books again. Checked out a bunch of them from the library even though I have next to no time to read any of them. I do this often. You know this.

So this is where I’ve been for however long it’s been. As someone who kinda sorta dreams about making something of this blog, I’d like to find a way to get my act together and make this more regular, even though my schedule is really erratic.  It doesn’t help that I struggle with a strong clouding of consciousness that I find to be pretty crippling to my productivity in general, but existential angst seems to be something I should just expect anymore.

Here’s what’s in my magic murder bag right now:

• A Scandalous Providence: The Jesus Story of the Compassion of God by E. Frank Tupper
• Omnipotence and Other Theological Mistakes by Charles Hartshorne
• How to Use a Runaway Truck Ramp by Shawn and Maile Smucker

I’m gonna TRY to keep it to that for now, though I’m sure something else will weasel it’s way into the bag.  Anyway, y’all have a good weekend!

The List 2014: Year of Mostly Everything (and by that I mean postmodern theology, existential philosophy, a little Historical Jesus, and a couple novels for kicks)

Here it is: the 2014 reading list!

From left to right:

• Lord of the Rings trilogy by JRR Tolkien
• If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler by Italo Calvino
• The Brother’s Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
• Christian Origins and the Question of God vol. I-III by NT Wright
• A Theology of Liberation by Gustavo Gutierrez
• Fear and Trembling by Soren Kierkegaard
• Radical Theology and the Death of God  by Thomas J. J. Altizer and William Hamilton
• She Who Is: The Mystery of God in Feminist Theological Discourse by Elizabeth Johnson
• Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
• Anselm’s Discovery by Charles Hartshorne
• Patience & Fortitude by Nicholas A. Basbanes
• Between Faith and Thought: An Essay on the Ontotheological Condition by Jeffrey Robbins
• Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jared Diamond
• Lexicon by Max Barry
• The Stand by Stephen King
• Theology of Hope by Jurgen Moltmann
• On the Genealogy of Morals by Friedrich Nietzsche (From Basic Writings of Nietzsche translated by Walter Kauffman)
• Letters and Papers From Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer
• A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking
• Religion, Politics, and the Earth: The New Materialism by Jeffrey Robbins and Clayton Crockett
• The Myth of Sisyphus and Other Essays by Albert Camus
• Madness and Civilization by Michel Foucault
• The Courage to Be by Paul Tillich
• Grendel by John Gardner
• New Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton
• Major Works by Ludwig Wittgenstein
• Capital by Karl Marx
• Jesus: A New Vision by Marcus Borg
• The Gift of Death by Jacques Derrida
• Resurrection City: A Theology of Improvisation by Peter Goodwin Heitzel (Speakeasy Review)
• Cinematic States by Gareth Higgins (Speakeasy Review)
• Lies My Teacher Told Me by James Loewen
• The First Crusade by Thomas Asbridge

On the Kindle

• Blackbirds by Chuck Wendig (and probably the rest of the series, knowing me)
• Does Jesus Really Love Me? by Jeff Chu
• Black Theology and Black Power by James Cone
• On the Mystery: Discerning Divinity in Process by Catherine Keller
• What Would Jesus Deconstruct? by John Caputo
• Nikola Tesla: Imagination and the Man That Invented the 20th Century by Sean Patrick

I’m going to tackle this a little differently than I did last year.  Couple guidelines:

1. No deadlines (save for Speakeasy books and library books).  Seriously, it’s my blog.  Who cares? None of this “52 Books in a Year” crap.
2. In fact, the list is entirely malleable.  If I want to say, “Screw Jared Diamond!  I’m going to buy Merchants of Culture and have at that!” I can do that!  However…
3. Start a book? FINISH IT.* I’ve been working out a one-chapter-a-day goal with the books I’m juggling right now, and that’s been keeping me at a steady pace, which is good.  Even if a book is completely kicking my butt (like The Weakness of God did), I shall endure!
4. Fiction books are not breaks from nonfiction books.  Somewhere last year, this idea entered my head, like I could just read a fiction book to “take a break” from reading theology or philosophy or history or whatever.  DO NOT DISRESPECT THE FICTION.
5. Have fun with it!  And how could I not?  Seriously, this is a nerdy undertaking right here, and I reserve the right to nerd out all over the internet, if you people are so kind as to make my humble little blog viral.

All right, I got some reading to do!  READ OR DIE!

 

*If you read this with the Mortal Kombat voice in your head, +5 points to you!