Tag: hatred

3 of the 5.4 Books I Read in February 2024

February was another interesting reading month for me, even though I did not read as many books as in January. Here’s my take on three of the 5.4 books I read last month.

Fortune Favors the Dead, by Stephen Spotswood

Fortune Favors the Dead, by Stephen Spotswood

I was not familiar with Stephen Spotswood’s writing until I read about Fortune Favors the Dead in an e-newsletter from Main Street Books in Davidson, North Carolina. This is the first book in a four-book mystery series and was recommended by the bookstore’s staff.

The novel is written in first-person in the voice of Willowjean “Will” Parker, a teen with several years of experience working for a circus. In her employment with the circus, Will has learned many skills (such as knife-throwing) and life lessons. Through those experiences she comes to be employed as an assistant for private investigator Lillian Pentecost in New York.

Ms. Pentecost is a well-respected investigator. She and Will get involved in investigating the Collins family of Collins Steel. As one expects in a mystery, there are many secrets and a couple of murders. A clairvoyant is involved, as well as a college professor.

The story held my interest throughout. It is written with humor and suspense, and it will keep you guessing.

The Kingdom, The Power, and The Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism, by Tim Alberta

The Kingdom, The Power, and The Glory, by Tim Alberta

Where do I begin?

This book tries to get to the heart of a question I have wondered about and to which I have been unable to find a satisfying answer: How did so many evangelical Christians in the United States get so far removed from the teachings of Jesus Christ?

I really want to know. I want to understand what happened and why.

Written by the son of an Evangelical Presbyterian pastor, Tim Alberta set out to discern the answer. For starters, I find “Evangelical Presbyterian” to be a bit of an oxymoron. Presbyterians by nature are not what I would call evangelical. I’m a member of a church affiliated with the Presbyterian Church USA, which is a much more liberal denomination than the Evangelical Presbyterian church.

This book is fascinating. The author’s theory is that for many evangelicals in the United States, America is their kingdom. They see the United States as a nation set apart and uniquely blessed by God. But this love of country has transitioned into nationalism bordering on idolatry. He documents case after case where worship services look and sound more like political rallies than places where “love your neighbor” is proclaimed.

The book looks at famous televangelists as well as not-so-famous preachers and congregations that are focused on winning at all costs and praising their political darlings instead of God. They have somehow forgotten that the kingdom that Jesus Christ promised was not the kingdom of the United States.

The author was hit in the gut by the extremism and hatred in the fractured right-wing of the conservative evangelicals when he attended his father’s funeral. His father had been pastor of the church where the funeral was held. When speaking to the author as he stood in the receiving line, a number of church members took that opportunity to verbally attack him for the stand he had taken in favor of leaving politics out of American Christianity and unflattering revelations he had made in his earlier book about a twice impeached, 91 times indicted US president.

More people than Mr. Alberta could count spoke to him that day not to offer condolences but to attack him. It was on that day that Mr. Alberta saw the true colors of these people, many of whom he had known all his life. He set out that day to try to determine how and when the conservative right-wing segment of American Christianity went so horribly off the rails and lost sight of the teachings of Jesus Christ.

The people this book is about are the people who claim to be Christians (and in their hearts they believe they are Christians), but they have lost sight of people who are not exactly like them. They have confused their worldview with Christianity. They have lost sight of love your neighbor as you love yourself. They not only don’t want to welcome the stranger or the foreigner, they hate them and wish them harm. They have gotten so obsessed with arming themselves to the teeth that they have lost sight of the Prince of Peace.

The most frightening part of all is that they have proclaimed a foul-mouthed, hate-spewing former US president as their savior. He has tricked them into thinking he is one of them.

If you wonder what has happened to many American evangelical Christians, I think you will find this book to be thought provoking.

Ninety-Day Wonder: How the Navy Would Have Been Better Off Without Me, by Stephen Davenport

Ninety-Day Wonder: How The Navy Would Have Been Better Off Without Me, by Stephen Davenport

I learned of this book from Liz Gauffreau’s January 24, 2024 blog post: https://lizgauffreau.com/2024/01/24/bookreview-ninety/. Mr. Davenport’s book is a memoir of his years in the U.S. Navy in the early 1950s. It is a humorous telling of the way he more or less bumbled his way through the service. He tells of bungled practice runs of amphibious landings off Morehead City, North Carolina and how he was often put into situations where he did not know what he was doing.

Mr. Davenport entered Reserve Officer Candidate School in 1951 but, when he was thrown into various situations where he was the ranking officer, he often learned the hard way that the enlisted sailors until his command were more familiar with the tasks at hand than he was. Hence, the graduates of the Reserve Officer Candidate School were called “Ninety-Day Wonders,” and perhaps are to this day.

Liz Gauffreau gives a more detailed overview of the book than I have here. She is more adept at writing book reviews. I highly recommend that you check out her blog, or poetry, and her other writing.

Until my next blog post

I hope you have at least one good book to read. Support your local public library and your local independent bookstore!

Please visit my website, https://www.janetmorrisonbooks.com and subscribe to my e-newsletter. If you were a subscriber as of last Thursday, you received my March newsletter on Friday. Among other things, I wrote about and shared photos from my recent hike on the Hector Henry Greenway on the Carolina Thread Trail and its connection to my articles in Harrisburg, Did You Know? Cabarrus History, Book 2 about the bridges over Rocky River in Cabarrus County in the 1870s. You never know what you’re going to miss if you aren’t receiving my newsletters!

Remember the people of Ukraine and the innocent people suffering in Gaza.

Janet

“Defeated cultures behave strangely.”

(I set out to blog about a paragraph I liked from The Quantum Spy, a novel by David Ignatius. My thoughts, as usual, took me in some unexpected directions.)

As I write this on Sunday evening, the one-year anniversary of the violence in Charlottesville, Virginia is being remembered across the United States and marked by demonstrations in Washington, DC. Heather Heyer was killed while peacefully protesting against the white supremacists who were marching and spewing vile racist chants at the base of a statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee in Charlottesville last year.

Our nation’s president said, “Very fine people on both sides.”

No, Mr. Trump. Nazis and white supremacists are not fine people. Fine people are not Nazis and white supremacists.

A quote from a novel

I have come to understand that fiction can be used to shine a light on reality. Ideally, a history book presents documented facts. A work of fiction allows an author to present differing opinions on an issue in a creative way. In a novel, a character can voice an opinion or a truth in a way we usually don’t find in a history book.

The Quantum Spy
The Quantum Spy, by David Ignatius

As I thought about the protests in Washington, DC this weekend, I was reminded of a paragraph from The Quantum Spy, by David Ignatius, quoted below. It is written in the point-of-view of a character named Chang. A statue of a Confederate soldier moves Chang to a clearer understanding of the American Civil War.

“There was a curious statue in the middle of the intersection…. It portrayed a Confederate soldier, hat in hand, head down, shoulders slouched as he looked south. It was called ‘Appomattox.’ An inscription under the figure said:  ‘They died in the consciousness of duty faithfully performed.’ It was a monument to defeat. Chang had never admired the Confederacy, but in that moment, he empathized. Defeated cultures behave strangely.” ~ from page 265 of The Quantum Spy, by David Ignatius.

Letting go of the US Civil War

It seems like Americans will forever fight the Civil War, which officially ended in 1865 with the surrender of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee to United States Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox, Virginia.

We as a people need to learn from the Civil War and not repeat the mistakes of the past. We need to stop using the Civil War as an excuse to hate. The Confederate flags and swastika-emblazoned arm bands belong in museums, not on our streets.

Putting away the symbols of division and hate will not solve the problem, though. Taking down Civil War monuments won’t solve the problem. Only honest conversation and empathy can solve this problem.

I am a Southerner. I was born in The South and have lived here all my life. All four of my great-grandfathers and one of my great-great-grandfathers fought for the Confederacy in the Civil War. Each of them must have felt like they were doing the right thing.

I cannot get into their heads to know or understand their thinking. They were products of their times, and they were prisoners of their times. They did not have the advantage of hindsight.

Defeat is a difficult thing to take and pride is a difficult thing to swallow, but I have to wonder if most of those Confederate veterans even came to believe that it was a good thing the Union won the Civil War.

Distrust and Fear: A national problem

There is a problem within America. A facet of it is racism, but it goes beyond racism. There is distrust between many people of different races, religions, and political views.

For reasons I don’t understand, a lot of people in the United States distrust and fear people who don’t look like them, worship like them, dress like them, vote like them, or talk like them.

Although the United States has been called a “melting pot,” that process has been fraught with strife and misunderstandings. As each new group of immigrants entered the country, they faced discrimination and ridicule; however, eventually, they found acceptance. The following words inscribed at the Statue of Liberty meant something.

“Give me your tired, your poor,                                                                                                   Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free;                                                                     The wretched refuse of your teeming shore,
Send these, the homeless,
Tempest-tossed to me.
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

The Statue of Liberty vertical photo
The Statue of Liberty, New York, New York

(Photo by Juan Mayobre on Unsplash)

For reasons I don’t understand, some people can’t get past the Civil War. Some people no longer accept the words of this poem as the embodiment of the American philosophy.

Let the conversation in America begin so the hatred, distrust, and fear can end.

Until my next blog post

I hope you have a good book to read. I’m reading several books, none of which is compelling me to read to the point that I’m skipping meals or losing sleep. Rule #1:  You don’t have to finish reading a book. I’m still trying to embrace that rule.

If you’re a writer, I hope you have quality writing time.

Thank you for reading my blog. You could have spent the last few minutes doing something else, but you chose to read my blog. I appreciate it! I welcome your comments.

Have you had an honest conversation about race, hatred, or distrust with someone of a racial background, religious beliefs, or political stance different from yours?

Let the conversation in America begin so the hatred, distrust, and fear can end.

Janet