And let me start by saying that I share Dr. Mohler's concern over a loss of literacy in our time.
A crucial question is how one defines literacy. As Dr. Ehrman explores in his recent book, Misquoting Jesus1:
"And what does it mean to read? Are people literate if they can manage to make sense of the comic strips but not the editorial page?And Dr. Ehrman cites an example to illustrate the problem of defining literacy from second century Egypt. Villagers complained that a local scribe was illiterate. His superior refuted their charge by asserting that the scribe was literate: he could sign his name! The superior himself was inconsistent at that very task!
[T]he ancients themselves had difficulty defining what it meant to be literate."
With the present quiz, a couple of us were unable to grasp Kim's intent on at least one question ... plus ça change ...
Has reading Christian blogs increased your desire to tackle weighty Christian tomes?
No.
Have you learned of Christian authors and theologians that you might not have otherwise known or read?
Certainly.
Have you purchased or borrowed books that were recommended by bloggers?
Absolutely.
Have you read fewer "real" books as your blog reading has increased?
No.
Has the availability/searchability of great Christian works caused you to rely upon them merely as resources?
I wouldn’t say so. I wish that more Christian classics were indexed online. I quote only books that I have read, and re-read and re-read! A small set, indeed. Having those classics online facilitates referencing the excerpts I want to share.
Do you think reading the great Christian authors and theologians is important and/or profitable?
Yes.
Do you read them?
When I can.
If so, who do you recommend?
Mostly, I read biblical commentators and devotionals. But, within the discipline of Christian theology, my preference is for ecclesiology. And, to the same names repeated over and over again in the responses, I offer some different experts, most of whom I met initially in Ford’s Modern Theologians: An Introduction to Christian Theology in the Twentieth Century:
Avery Dulles
Beth Johnson
Hans Küng
Bernard Lonergan
Thomas Merton
Henri Nouwen
Karl Rahner
Edward Schillebeeckx
Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza
Francis Sullivan
Paul Tillich
Many of the links contain bibliographies at the end.
1 Bart D. Ehrman, Misquoting Jesus: The Story Behind Who Changed the Bible and Why (New York: Harper San Francisco, 2005), 38-9.
5 comments:
Hi Teresa!
Thanks for playing along!
I know that yours is a Catholic list, but I am familiar with and have read from three on your list--Merton, Nouwen, and Tillich.
Thanks for broadening our perspectives! Thanks, too, for reading today. : )
Oh, and I meant to ask you if I can clarify the question "in question."
If so, feel free to ask in the comments on the post. : )
Merton, Nouwen, and Tillich.
You picked the best ones! But Tillich is not Catholic.
clarify the question "in question."
How to understand the question on using great Christian works merely as resources?
My comment was intentionally anecdotal and can be disregarded.
But, FWIW, I thought you meant classics online at sites like CCEL.
Even so, Christian classics ought to be indexed, annotated or even anthologized to make them more accessible.
I wish someone would annotate Merton's 50-year-old autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, for instance. As we all know from our experience of the Bible, reading works from earlier periods calls for better than average knowledge.
I saw your invitation on Ellen's blog. I guess that's eavesdropping. And when I saw the same authors again and again (and all male!) I knew that I just had to post. I hope that you understand. Of course, those authors are all great, too, don't get me wrong. Heaven knows.
I do want to include your blog again in my normal rotation. My bookmark stopped working when your URL changed and, even with the click-thru, I just got lazy.
But, let me update my bookmark now ...
That is what I meant! I fell into the habit of "using" sources instead of reading sources for a brief period and found it to be unsatisfactory.
I still search through the works that are online, but instead of mining them to find portions to study on a particular subject or find an answer to a particular question, I have gone back to my former practice of accessing the online versions of books I have read instead of cherry picking as I had for a while.
I wondered if anyone else had found themselves doing that.
I'm going to answer the survey myself, hopefully sometime tomorrow. I think I've got all the responses I am going to get, so I'll weigh in soon.
(You just got a bit of a sneak peak!)
I think Merton can be uplifting when things seems dark. Thanks.
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