\u200b<\/p>\n
[1] Summer reading is often wide-ranging.\u00a0 We dip into genres outside our typical work to explore worlds beyond our everyday existence.\u00a0 This book review issue honors that summertime trend as it explores ethical dimensions in literature, science, Buddhism, and Womanist Sass.<\/p>\n
[2] Diane Yeager takes us into the world of secular literature through the eyes of the late Ronald Thiemann.\u00a0 In\u00a0The Humble Sublime,\u00a0<\/em>Thiemann’s deeply Lutheran notion of “sacramental realism” illuminates the sacred that is hidden in everyday life, including in the “darkness of the mundane.” In dialogue with Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Thiemann refutes Charles Taylor’s supernaturalist dualism in which transcendence requires a separate spiritual sphere. For Thiemann, the sacramental character of the reality in which we live comes alive in the literature of Langston Hughes, Anna Akhmatova, George Orwell and Albert Camus. \u00a0These authors use the lens of literature to expose oppression and make visible the lives so often hidden behind social barriers of race and class.\u00a0 Emphasizing the importance of empathy in generating transformative action, Thiemann’s “politics of resistance” or “ethics of responsibility” provides a contrast to “knowledge-based” ethics. Yaeger brings an appreciative and critical eye to this work.<\/p>\n [3] \u00a0Silenced voices are reclaimed and celebrated in\u00a0Womanist Sass and Talk Back: Social (In)justice, Intersectionality, and Biblical Interpretation<\/em>\u00a0by Mitzi Smith.\u00a0 Surekha Nelavala’s review describes this as a book of scriptural interpretation addressing biblical texts and contemporary contexts where women find empowerment in claiming their voices.\u00a0 Rejecting unjust interpretations of sacred texts, Smith raises up the personal experiences and collective knowledge of African American women as critical hermeneutical resources.\u00a0 She juxtaposes biblical narratives with current cases studies of police brutality, racial stereotyping, and gender violence as she brings womanist voices to the analysis of texts.\u00a0 Smith argues that claiming these voices and breaking their silence is a language of resistance.<\/p>\n [4] Roger Willer reviews\u00a0Chance, Necessity, Love: An Evolutionary Theology of Cancer\u00a0<\/em>by Hummel and Woloschak.\u00a0 Asking why ethicists should study a book about cancer and theology, Willer finds in this small volume, accessible scientific material that is critical to addressing thorny practical problems in medical ethics, bioethics, and biotechnology. More broadly, he argues, the book also offers a model for taking seriously the implications of well-established science\u00a0qua<\/em>\u00a0science as it challenges and even changes the contours of fundamental ethical questions.\u00a0 Willer insists that “it is crucial that ethics, like theology today, take into account the findings of science.”<\/p>\n [5] Science is the unique lens through which Robert Wright studies Buddhism in his\u00a0Why Buddhism is True.<\/em>\u00a0 If the world’s religions concur in their diagnosis of the human condition, “that something within us and among us isn’t right,” Wright asks whether one tradition has the most effective analysis and approach to our predicament.\u00a0\u00a0 Wright argues that modern science anoints philosophical secular Buddhism as the winner.\u00a0 Scientific knowledge about how our brains work coheres with Buddhist articulations of the root of human suffering and prescriptions for freeing ourselves. Will Bergkamp’s review describes key points of both Buddhism and science that undergird Wright’s argument, and then proceeds to explore some questions and implications for Christian theologians and ethicists.<\/p>\n Nancy Arnison<\/p>\n Book Review Editor<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" \u200b [1] Summer reading is often wide-ranging.\u00a0 We dip into genres outside our typical work to explore worlds beyond our everyday existence.\u00a0 This book review issue honors that summertime trend as it explores ethical dimensions in literature, science, Buddhism, and Womanist Sass. [2] Diane Yeager takes us into the world of secular literature through the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-book-review-introduction"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n