7 Reasons You Should Buy “Who is Jesus Christ?” by Eric Sammons

Who Is Jesus Christ? Unlocking the Mystery in the Gospel of Matthew

By Eric Sammons (Our Sunday Visitor, 2010)

This is a top notch, can’t-go-wrong book .   I had a hard time writing a review because everything I had to say sounded so trite and trivial and fluffy, and this book is none of those.  I finally just decided to gush away in a nice neat top-7 list (no biblical allusions intended).  So here you go:

Jen’s Top 7 Reasons You Should Buy This Book

1. It is interesting! When I picked this book for my Catholic Company book review item, I thought it would be boring-but-good-for-you. I was so wrong. Not boring. Not at all. The book is packed with interesting perspectives on Jesus – how he was seen by his contemporaries, how Jesus fits into the Old Testament prophecies of a messiah, and how the Gospel impacts our lives today. Loaded with details, and never slow and belaboring. (But I was right about the good-for-you.)

2. It is not hard to read. Chapters are short, and within a chapter, ideas flow steadily from one to the next. I found I could pick up and put down at will, as long as I could get about three or four paragraphs read before the next interruption. My test readers (normal people) said they had no difficulty with the reading level, but that it is full of information, so you do need to pay attention. No big technical theology words. Well-written.

3.  It is very well organized. Eric Sammons is like a tour guide for ideas. He takes you all over the place, connecting history, prophecies, new testament passages, church fathers, catholic doctrine, and personal spirituality, and at the end of the chapter you get the sense your trip took you to exactly the right places. It all fit perfectly together, and you aren’t one bit worn out.

4.  It tackles the tough topics. Suffering. Unpopular doctrines. Common apologetic attacks. All the difficulties people have with the catholic faith show up sooner or later. But this isn’t a book about “difficulties with the faith” – it’s a book about Jesus. Just like getting to know your best friend naturally uncovers many puzzling questions (“why does she act that way?” “why is he is asking this of me?”), getting to know Jesus means getting to understand why the universe is how it is.  Very encouraging and helpful for those who are struggling with the faith and want substantial, honest answers.

5.  Did I mention it’s good for you? Each chapter ends with two or three reflection questions that act like prompts for self-examination. Simple stuff you really probably already know, but every now and then you need a little kick in the rear to help you refocus. Emphasis on “the little way” of St. Therese, so very appropriate for us mere mortals.  This would make an excellent book for Advent or Lent, or for a couple or study-group to read together and then use the reflection-questions to generate discussion.

6.  This book is made for ordinary catholics. You do need to have a general knowledge of the scriptures and of the catholic faith, but of the kind you would naturally have gained just by sitting in Mass for a few years. (Preferably: paying attention. At least mostly.) If you are new to studying the faith, the book is loaded with intro’s. You’ll get a feel for the bible, meet the church fathers, and see how the catholic faith really works and why it makes sense.

7.  Smart people will not find it too “easy”. Think of it like the skilled-chef rule of eating — the more you know about cooking, the more you appreciate a well-cooked meal.  Eric Sammons isn’t afraid to delve deep and wander wide in his building of theological and historical connections, and in doing so he’s put together a book full of  solid meaty catholic-y goodness.   Yes, you may well be hungry for more when you put down this book.  But not because you ate poorly — because you ate so well.

Summary: I give it an unqualified “Buy” recommend.

PS: The cover art is really cool.

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Edited to add:

Chris Cash, long-suffering blog-herder at The Catholic Company, reminds me to remind you: Also be sure to check out their great selection of baptism gifts.

I’ll also point out that The Catholic Company is still accepting new reviewers, and they have a long list of great books to review right now.

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Full disclosure: I’ve never even met Eric Sammons. Though I think he might be a member of the Catholic Writers’ Guild, maybe. But I say that because he is from Gaithersburg, and you might think this favorable review is all a big “People from Gaithersburg” plot. Not so. Indeed my first thought on reading his bio was, “Can anything good come from Gaithersburg?” Unfair. I knew many good, sincere, devout persons (of various faiths) during my years in the metro area. I wasn’t one of them, of course. But now I know better, and I assure you I would recommend this book even if Eric were from North Potomac.

 

Math War (card game)

Math War is a fighting game disguised as a math game.   Played like the card-game “War” (aptly named), each card contains a math fact question, but no answer.   At each turn, the player whose card has highest answer gets to take the pile.  The kids, of course, have to figure out the answer to each card’s math fact, in order to know who wins the battle.

You can purchase a deck, or make your own using index cards, which would allow your children to practice whichever facts you choose.  (With a mixed-ability group, you could mix decks and assign each kid to answer a certain type of fact.)

This game is a great way to keep your kids learning on a day when you are feeling tired of the same old math book routine.  Your homeschooled children think they are studying math facts, but in fact they are mastering important socialization skills they might otherwise miss, such as bullying, cheating, and hurling all the cards across the room and stomping away.  Guaranteed to motivate the teaching parent to quickly return to those delightfully boring workbooks.

 

Mater et Magistra Magazine – Fall Issue Free

The fall issue of the catholic homeschooling magizine Mater et Magistra is now out in electronic format, and you can get a copy free Here.

Worth a look, eh?

(It was worth a look even when it wasn’t free, I would note.  You can see my review of my first issue here.)

Tell your friends!

Another Good Book: Operation Mincemeat

If you have seen the film The Man Who Never Was, you can now get the rest of story via  Operation Mincemeat by Ben Macintyre (Harmony Books / Crown Publishing, 2010).   Detailed accounts of all sides — the English counter-intelligence group, the corpse, the submariner, the Spanish & Germans who variously either nearly derailed the mission or who swallowed it whole.   Also details of the subsequent invasion of the Sicily, or why mincemeat mattered.  Plus photos, including images of all the original documents.  And “where are they now” follow-ups on all the major players.

Very fun look inside a great spy story.   Did I mention Ian Fleming is in there?  (Yes, that Ian Fleming.  Though he doesn’t do a whole lot.)  Most memorable passage:

The all-night negotiations went well, but at one point the visitors were forced to hide in a dusty cellar to avoid an impromptu visit from the gendarmes.  Courtney suffered a coughing fit, which threatened to give them away.  General Clark passed the choking commando some chewing gum.

“Your American gum has so little taste,” whispered Courtney, once the spasm subsided.

“Yes”, said Clark.  “I’ve already used it.”

For grown-ups, both for content and reading level.

PS: Watch the movie first.  Or you’ll get lost drowning in the detail.  So to speak.

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Finished reading Eric Sammon’s new book Who is Jesus Christ ages ago, and can give it an unqualified recommendation.  Had a few test-readers evaluate it for reading-level.  My ten-year-old, who can read anything at all so long as it is about guns, told me it was “Not hard to read, but not very entertaining.”  Don’t listen to him.  Parish Secretary, who is a normal catholic person who is pretty happy diving into Scott Hahn (as am I), says: Easy to read, but you have to go slowly because there is so much detail.  Official review coming soon.

More good books – medieval history

Two library finds:

Life on a Medieval Barony by William Stearns Davis (Harper & Brothers, 1923).  Suprisingly good information — I’ve seen far, far worse in more modern works.  Non-fiction, but uses a fictional barony in northern France circa 1220 to ground the descriptions of medieval life in a cast of characters.   Much of the narrative material is pulled from period sources, ie the telling of our baron’s hunt is actually borrowed from a medieval hunting account.  Makes for a very dashing baron — bit larger than life, as will happen with hunting stories.

–>  The narrative style packs in a lot more detail than you could get away with otherwise and still keep readers awake and even flipping pages to find out what  happens next.

Given the amount of information (400 pages)  and the references to mature topics, I’d say this fits better for teens and above.    Would make a good parent-teen book to read together, as it raises all kinds of theological and moral issues for discussion fodder, and using someone else’s era maybe helps take a step back and see things more clearly?

Fine as an introduction to medieval life for a teen or adult reader, but enough good details to be worth a look for any amateur medievalist.  A knowledge of catholicism in general would be helpful, since there is a quite a lot of describing medieval religious practices.

 

My second lucky find was an audio lecture series,  Heaven or Heresy: A History of the Inquisition by Thomas F. Madden.   If you are catholic, sooner or later someone’s gonna bring up the inquisition.  This set of does a good job of distinguishing the facts (sometimes sordid, sometimes not) from the legend. Gives you enough detail that you could reasonably hope to explain not just the differences between the different inquisitions (Spanish versus Roman verus medieval Papal verus medieval local, etc etc), but also how, say, the Spanish inquisition changed over time.

SuperHusband has listened to some of his other lectures in the series, and found them informative and balanced.    (Recall: SuperHusband = SuperProtestant.  Not a guy who would go in for catholic propaganda.)    I found this to be the same way.  If you are Torquemada, well, your reputation isn’t helped.

Pre-requisites: It is expected that you are familiar with the basics of the catholic faith, including vocabulary like “Dominican” “mendicant” “encyclical” “anti-pope” etc.  Madden generally offers a brief definition of these types of words, but you’ll be on much firmer ground if you aren’t hearing them for the first time.  You’ll also want a general idea of the outline of European history from the time of Christ forward.

I’d give this one a ‘buy’ recommend if your budget allows.  Though I wish the man would write a book on the topic.

 

The Better Part

This year both of our candidates for governor were close to my own age.  Would have known them at school, if I had gone to the other state U.   So the election forced the same thoughts as whenever I read the alumni news blurbs in the back of the ol’ college newsletter.

–> Having laid aside my career-ish activities a decade ago, I am always surprised, and a touch envious, of how much  my classmates have accomplished since then.  Partner of this law firm, director of that state agency, etc. etc.  Naturally no one’s sending in announcements along the lines of “Bill Smith, BA Philosphy 1994, was recently promoted to assistant-janitor at Target Store #3581 . . .” — I know there are plenty of us non-accomplishers, and we keep our news a little lower-profile.

Being a homeschooling mom, there’s no real credential to report.  Everyone (who can) has got kids, everyone manages to educate their kids.  Homeschooling isn’t some guarantee of a superior child-product:  I know plenty of great teens out there who grew up attending the local public schools, both parents working full-time.

On a good day, though, I’m Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus, while the other ladies bustle in the background.  It’s sort of selfish, honestly.  My peers are running the wider world, and I’m sitting out on the patio table reading Beatrix Potter to a six-year-old.  It’s a sacrifice yes.  Give up something good in order to have something better.

New Review Book – Who is Jesus Christ? by Eric Sammons

My new Catholic Company review book arrived yesterday, and I’m tearing through it.  Super good.  It’s Who is Jesus Christ? Unlocking the Mystery in the Gospel of Matthew by Eric Sammons.

–> Whose blog, The Divine Life, is the one I click on in my feed reader second, right after Dr. Boli.   So I guess I should have known that I would like the book, but somehow with the title and Eric’s smartness and all that, I thought it would be too difficult for me, or sort of dry, or something like that.   I thought this  because I am pretty stupid that way.

Not boring at all.  Not one bit.  Eminently readable, no big words so far (I’m on p. 74), and the chapters are short, too.   Just plain enjoyable.  But jam-packed solid good.  You know I have no patience for touchy-feely watery blathery stuff.

So that’s my mid-book pre-review, which I had to post because SuperHusband is getting sick of me saying “wow, this is such a good book”, so I thought I’d plague the internet instead.  Full official review coming soon.   Meanwhile, I think you can safely ask Saint-a-Claus to get you this one for All Saint’s Day.

Two New Michelle Buckman Books – Recommended

This summer I got to pre-read two new novels by Michelle Buckman as part of the Catholic Writers Guild’s “Seal of Approval” program.  (Both books passed).

They are now in print:  Rachel’s Contrition and The Death Panels.  Two totally different stories, but both are fun, readable, and thoughtful.  And challenging.

–> By “challenging” I do not mean “artsy prose that borders on incomprehensible” and “long passages inserted as a test of your perseverance as a reader”.  MB’s writing is fast-paced, page-turner stuff.  What intellectual-types read when they have the flu, and the rest of us read without having to make up excuses for why we’re allowed to enjoy ourselves once in a while.

But FYI, Rachel’s Contrition leans to contemporary women’s lit (but it’s good!  it is!), and is the more literary of the two.   The Death Panels is a dystopian pro-life thriller.  Lotta fun, but you’ve got to get into the whole dystopia genre, which will require varying amounts of suspension of disbelief depending on which way your politics run.

Don’t say you weren’t warned: Adult topics.  (Fine for mature teens.) –>  If you hear the term “catholic fiction” and imagine some kind of horrid saccharine drivel, you have been hearing wrong.    These books actually are, wait for it . . . . inspiring.  But in a demanding, I-have-seen-the-dark-side-of-my-own-soul way.  No excerpt from one of these two will ever be reprinted in any chicken-soup themed collection.

Good stuff.  Recommended.

More like an Ephesian than I’d like to be

So yesterday in the daily Mass readings we were back to that famous passage in Ephesians, which provokes so many hearty explanations about how it either means that she must obey, or means that she need not.  So naturally I had to think about that.

” . . . as they regard the Lord” seemed to be the key phrase.  Not, “as you regard the President”, or “your boss”, or “your feudal master”.  Jesus.  Not a wife-beater.

Well.  Hmmn.   How exactly do I regard the Lord?

I informed SuperHusband that I was really quite equal in my treatment of the both of them — I talk to him a lot, and listen very little.

SuperHusband thought that was maybe not what St. Paul was hoping for.

 

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For a good Christian role model on this topic, take a look at Mother Theresa of Calcutta in her biography C ome Be My Light. Complete submission to the will of God is also complete confidence in the will of God.  Alignment of the wills.  I think that might be more the goal.

 

Silence Update: Reduced Silence

Not writing doesn’t seem to working out so well.  Tentative return to blogging, 80% chance of unpredictability.  No change on the decrepitude front since last update. Will observe my desk is fairly clean, and very functional.  Quite pleased with that little miracle.