Some of this week's readings:

Some time’s your reading a book and the weight of the subject just burden’s you down. I just finished a book for school like that. It was a hard read, Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation by Jonathan Kozol it details over a year’s worth of research into the lives of children in New York City, and specifically those of children living in poverty and disease in the ghetto. The situations described in this book will grip your heart and be profoundly disturbing. Elie Wiesel states about this book “Jonathan’s struggle is noble, his appeal urgent. What he says must be heard. His outcry must shake our nation out of its guilty indifference.” If you want the truth about the poor in America read this book.

On the other hand I am reading two book’s this week that are challenging and uplifting and stir the heart to look to greater heights. They are A Holy Meal: The Lord’s Supper in the Life of the Church by Gordon T. Smith and Amazing Church: A Catholic Theologian Remembers a Half-Century of Change by Gregory Baum. Today at the library I went back and forth reading a chapter in one and then the other.

The first one; A Holy Meal looks at the importance and significance of the lord’s supper or communion in the church and in God’s interactions with man. From Adam and Eve eating with God in the garden of Eden, to the meal’s Jesus ate with his followers after the resurrection. Though I have yet to finish it, it is one of the best spiritual book’s I have read this year.

Baum’s book on the other hand is energetic, fast paced and engaging. Spanning the history of the church from the mid 1800’s till today it examines the Catholic Church’s positions and the shift in focus over the time Baum has been a theologian. As a former professor at St. Michael’s College and now at McGill University Baum is one of the voices at the forefront of Canadian Catholic thought. This book is a retrospective of what he sees that the church is doing well.

Well those are just 3 of the books in the pile on the desk this week. Yet each would be worth taking a look at. Happy reading!