books!

So, I've been "tagged." Here goes:

1. How many books have I owned?

I have about 730 (partly in boxes -- we're moving) at our apartment. I have at least another 700-800 -- probably more like 1000 -- in storage at my grandparents' house.

2. What was the last book you bought?

Philip Yancey's The Bible Jesus Read. I've been reading through chunks of the OT in the mornings along with Yancey's thoughts.

3. What was the last book you read?

I'm almost done with Philip Jenkins' The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity. I picked this up from the library -- I'd love to own a copy, though. It's a very timely work.

Also, I'm almost done with a collection of Wendell Berry essays entitled Sex, Economy, Freedom and Community. I was in Crawfordville, Georgia, (the home of Alexander Stephens) last week with a friend of mine. We were taken by the fact that the town itself it completely dead -- deserted except for the county courthouse. This is something that I noticed more this week as we drove through essentially dead towns in south Alabama. How do towns that were active and thriving 50-75 years ago die? Is it Wal-Mart? Decline of an agricultural economy built around small farmers? Berry writes about the problem in a useful way and suggests some possible solutions.

Finally, Peter Brown's The Body and Society: Men, Women and Sexual Renunciation in Early Christianity. Brown essentially created Late Antique studies through his work during the 1960s and 1970s. Everything he has written is worth reading -- not just for classicists and scholars of Early Christianity, but also for general readers. The Body and Society is no different.
Read it to get a clear sense of Christian ideas about the body and sexual mores that have persisted to our own times: e.g. the development of the celibate priesthood and Christian squeamishness about sex.

4. What are FIVE books that have meant a lot to you?

Aside from the Bible and in no particular order:

1. I'll Take My Stand: The South and the Agrarian Tradition. I first read this in high school and find myself constantly going back to it.

2. Reviving the Ancient Faith.

3. The Tennessee (in two volumes). I could have listed other books here, but this one ignited an enduring interest in local/state history and helped me to appreciate who I am as an 11th generation Tennessean.

4. Herodotus' The Histories. In college, I participated in an afternoon reading group with my Greek professor in which we read all of Herodotus in translation. More than anything this first set me down my current career path.

5. I could have easily filled this list with works on cofC history and theology, but that would hardly have been completely representative. So, in closing (and to cheat a bit), I'll list anything by Leonard Allen (The Worldly Church, The Cruciform Church, Things Unseen, Participating in God's Life, Discovering Our Roots).

5. Tag five people who haven't played yet.

Five?? How about three?

Curious Incidents
Mark Horner
Theosebes