Baggas’ Blog

Nice start to the working week today - nothing too taxing, keeping on time with all the patients. Hopefully this week should be a little less hectic than last week - not expecting as many babies.

I’m going to start making a few brief notes on here about some of the books I’m reading. I never seem to have the time to do a full review but I’ll try and make some quick, one paragraph comments. Of course, as I realised talking to Jen the other day my reading habit may have to be curtailed once I start Uni in a month or so. Trying to fit in 12 hours or more of study a week will be a challenge, and reducing the amount of time I spend reading other books will have to be one of the first changes I make… So in the next month or so I’ll try and churn through as many books as I can while I have the chance

Two books I want to mention today :

1. The River of Lost Footsteps : A Personal History of Burma by Thant Myint-U. Reading books like this makes you realise what a big world we live in and how there are vast swathes of human history that I haven’t even thought of. Well written narrative history with lots of little stories to keep it interesting. Looks at Burma’s history from ancient times to the current regime. Ordered this when it looked like I might be going over there. I’m doubtful that will happen now but it’s still a fascinating read. Hope to get the chance to visit there one day.
2. Arminian Theology : Myths & Realities by Roger Olson. I’ve been thinking a bit lately on Arminianism and Calvinism and this is not a bad book on the subject. Olson does a good job at articulating some of the core Arminian beliefs and debunking some commonly held myths about Arminianism. Along the way he also takes a few good-natured swipes at Calvinism. It’s a worthwhile book to read but I have a couple of criticisms. Firstly it tends to be repetitive as he examines the theology of a range of historical Arminians from Arminius and Wesley down to the present day. Secondly, although he makes it clear what classical Arminians do and do not believe, I didn’t feel he interacted enough with scripture. This may not have been his main aim but for me it would have been nice to have more written on the Biblical basis for Arminian concepts (like that of prevenient grace, for example) and also a more thorough critique of Calvinist exegesis of key passages. Overall though it’s a well written, fairly easy to read, irenic, and generally convincing treatment on the subject. Worth reading for both Arminians and Calvinists and also those who aren’t sure.

Along similar lines to my last entry about wild west cowboys to be blamed for legalism in 20th century evangelical/fundamentalist churches, one of my favourite bloggers Fred the slacktivist weighs in with his take on C.S. Lewis’ book Prince Caspian :

I haven’t seen Prince Caspian yet, but since it was the “No. 1 Movie” this weekend, let’s revisit what that wonderful little book was about:

Prince Caspian is about beer.

He then goes on to quote Lewis from Mere Christianity discussing this very issue of legalism, especially relating to alcohol. And Lewis, as you may or may not know, enjoyed his beer. Fred’s interpretation of Prince Caspian is that the bad guys (Telmarines) represent excessively legalistic “anti-beer Christians” and the mission of the Pevensie children is to help Caspian and Aslan restore joy and wildness to the land.

It’s a long long time since I’ve read the book, and I’m also yet to see the movie (not sure when it comes out here in Australia) but it’s an interesting take on a classic children’s book. I’ll have to try and revisit it sometime soon.

You can read Fred’s post here.

You know the old taboos that used to abound in Christian circles (and still do in some ultra-conservative or fundamentalist groups) - like no playing cards, no dancing, no alcohol at all, no going to movies etc? Well according to the following quote from a book I’m currently reading, this sort of thing might be directly attributable to the excesses of the American Wild West! Who would have thought that all that stuff we know so well from old cowboy movies could have such a big impact on the 20th century church?

The origins of the dos and don’ts in American evangelicalism go back to the revivals in the frontier days of the nineteenth century. All of us have seen the western movies and the depiction of life in the western spread of the American frontier. The center of town is a bar with it’s heavy drinking, gambling, card playing, and lewd women. As Christianity spread west in the revival tradition, it was imperative for Christians to distinguish themselves from the crude, boisterous, drinking, smoking, dancing, card playing, gambling, and lascivious crowd. Christians, therefore, swung the pendulum to the other side and insisted on a cleaned-up life as a demonstration of a converted life and a spiritual walk with God. In time these outward expressions of a cleaned-up life turned from sin became the external marks of the spiritual life.  While abstinence from wordly practices was a genuine choice of an original generation of Christians, the dos and don’ts became for the second and especially the third generation of Christians an imposed structure of spirituality. The inner convictions that generated the original choice to refrain from wordly practices was lost. In it’s place now stood a legalistic ethos, that is, restraint from wordly practice became the sum and the substance of the spiritual life.

Unfortunately these dos and don’ts oten get in the way of seeing the real ethics of Christian spirituality such as the growth of character, the concern for justice, and the care of the poor and needy.

~ Robert E. Webber - “The Divine Embrace” p81

Ever become aware of a stupid habit you have when someone mentions it in themselves? This happened to me this morning in church where Mark mentioned the habit he has of packing far too many books whenever he goes travelling, even if it’s just for the weekend. I too am seriously guilty of this - I pack 4 or 5 books in my suitcase if I’m going away, only to get maybe one or two of them read.

But what’s worse, no matter where I am, I’m always drawn to look in bookshops and wind up bringing back several more books in addition to the ones I took with me. The last 3 times I visited Uganda I brought back at least 4 or 5 books each time (with the justification that ‘you just can’t buy these books back home’) - one of which was a massive 3kg textbook that I ended up having to pack in my luggage the other 3/4 of the way around the world through another 3 countries! Crazy. I can see one attraction of Cambodia (where ob1 was) perhaps being that there is less likely to be a big English language press there and hence less books to tempt me.

The other stupid thing I do is that I am too ambitious in my choice of reading material for travelling. Rather than picking something quick and light, I have a tendency towards choosing books of serious literary or theological cred, only to find that airplanes, airports and even hotels (especially when the kids are around) are not the best settings to try and tackle these sort of tomes.

So, my take home lessons for travelling readers (or reading travellers) are :

1. Choose fairly easy to read, (relatively) lightweight books.
2. Only take 1 or 2 books maximum. If you run out, you can always buy more along the way.
3. If you’re like me, factor in the fact that you almost certainly will acquire more books in your travels, and accordingly allow room in your luggage for that eventuality.
4. Guidebooks can be useful but I’ve found photocopying the relevant sections to be worthwhile. If you know you are only going to be in a couple of cities in a country, then copy those pages and leave the other 90% of the book at home. That way when you move on from that country you can simply leave your photocopied pages in the rubbish.
5. Taking novels set in the country you are visiting is a good way to prepare yourself for your visit, and might also lead you to reading some books you might otherwise have not considered (for example I’ve read a few excellent novels set in Uganda that I probably would never have read otherwise)
6. Consider books in digital format…. I haven’t done this travelling but a few years back I went through a phase of reading PDF books on my Palm Pilot whilst doing long quiet ICU shifts. I read the entire Dune and Wheel of Time series in that way.  Great for saving luggage space but for me this idea has one huge drawback - it violates my whole “books as furniture” principle - just like I prefer a physical copy of my music rather than a purely digital one, I like having books to hold and put on a shelf. There’s just something about holding a book in your hands and turning those pages that a digital reader can’t replicate. This is perhaps why, although I have 19 different bible versions on my PDA phone, I still do virtually all of my Bible reading in physical Bibles (preferably leather ones that sit nicely on my lap but I’m getting way off topic now…)

Anyway if anyone have any other tips they want to add to the list I’d love to hear them. All this talk, and following ob1’s blog of his travels over the last week has got me a bit “travel sick” (I doubt that’s the correct term but I’m using it in the sense of the opposite of “homesickness” wherein I’m actually seriously missing being in airports and on planes and in strange countries - Jen would say I’m crazy). I’ve got no plans to go back to Uganda this year, since we have a newborn baby and wouldn’t want to leave Jen and 3 kids for 3 weeks or so - plus I haven’t heard at all from them if they are actually doing a Watoto medical team this year.. but if another opportunity was to present itself for I’d be seriously tempted to jump at it…

Well in it’s own way the book I’ve just read attempts to answer this classic question. War is a force that gives us meaning is written by Chris Hedges, a long serving war correspondent for the New York Times. He draws on his own experiences in multiple conflicts including Iraq, Palestine and the Balkans as well as a range of literature through Homer and Shakespeare through to the present day to discuss the devestating allure of war and it’s addictive qualities for both individuals and societies. Hedges peels back the layers of myth and misinformation surrounding war, and exposes the complicity of journalists in perpetuating these myths, and that of the public in going along with it. War has little to do with heroism and it truth the vast majority of people would act in quite unheroic, selfish and often savage ways if thrust into that sort of environment. No-one escapes an experience of war unscathed - all bear the psychological scars of the victim or perpetrator (or often both). Hedges ultimately concludes that the only antidote to war is that of love, but the overall balance of this book is a pessimistic one, and love comes across as a weak flower standing in the onslaught of the hurricane of war.

This is a brilliant book - full of anecdotes and thus a flowing, easy read - and yet at the same time a harrowing, difficult read in view of the confronting nature of it’s topic. The sort of book it would do good for all of us to digest. It will be hard to look at the glamorous news stories or even those old war docos in the same light again. I’m not a journo but I would imagine this should be required reading for them - to examine their motives and their potential to succumb to the addictive naroctic nature of war. Hedges mentions the fate and admissions of several of his colleagues who almost seem driven towards death -  an idea struck home to me last night when I heard a Reuter’s cameraman had been killed in Palestine yesterday.

Once in a while a book comes along that really makes you sit up and take notice and might even change the way you think - this is one of those sort of books. Read it.

[Hat tip to Fred aka the Slacktivist for suggesting this book on his blog, which is one of my favourites - check it out]