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Cybils 2013

Sep17

Yeah, hooray, I’m going to be judging Cybils again this year. Along with a great team of litbloggers, I’m going to be helping to choose the finalists for the Young Adult Nonfiction category this year, a category which I expect to add to my knowledge base and broaden my reading horizons.

My fellow nonfiction panelists are:
Jessica Tackett MacDonald, Her life with Books

Kim Baciella, Si Se Puede

Stephanie Charlefour, Love, Life, Read

Cheryl Vanatti, Reading Rumpus

Alyssa Feller, The Shady Glade

Sarah Sammis, Puss Reboots

This year’s Cybils is going to be fun. I hope you enjoy it, too, as I read and review nonfiction on all sorts of topics. I may even sneak over to the fiction side and read some of the nominees in the other categories. Hang on, and get ready to start nominating your favorite YA and children’s titles starting October 1st at the Cybils blog.

U.S. Constitution Day

Sep15

Constitution Day is celebrated in the United States each year on September 17th, the day that the U.S. Constitutional Convention signed the Constitution in 1787. Educational institutions receiving funding through the Department of Education are required to participate by holding educational programs pertaining to the U.S. Constitution. I think this particular instance of unwarranted interference by the federal government in educational affairs is probably unconstitutional, but well-meaning and perhaps helpful. At any rate, if you want to introduce students—or yourself– to the U.S. Constitution and its meaning, here are some titles to help you to do so:

Miracle at Philadelphia by Catherine Drinker Bowen. Subtitled “The Story of the Constitutional Convention May to September 1787,” this book is the one that gave me the story of the US constitution. It’s suitable for older readers, at least middle school age, but it’s historical writing at its best. I loved reading about Luther Martin of Maryland, whom Henry Adams described as “the notorious reprobate genius.” Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts who was”always satisfied to shoot an arrow without caring about the wound he caused.” (Both Gerry and Martin refused to sign the final version of the Constitution.) Of course, there were Madison, known as the Father of the Constitution, George Washington, who presided over the convention in which all present knew that they were creating a presidency for him to fill, and Ben Franklin, the old man and elder statesman who had to be carried to the convention in a sedan chair. Ms. Bowen’s book brings all these characters and more to life and gives the details of the deliberations of the constitutional convention in readable and interesting format.

A More Perfect Union: The Story of Our Constitution by Betsy Maestro; illustrated by Guilio Maestro.

If You Were There When They Signed the Constitutionby Elizabeth Levy; illustrated by Joan Holub.

Shh! We’re Writing the Constitution by Jean Fritz; illustrated by Tomie dePaola.

We the Kids: The Preamble to the Constitution of the United States Illustrated by David Catrow.

We the People: The Story of Our Constitution by Peter Spier.

Great Little Madison by Jean Fritz.

Cobblestone: Celebrating Our Constitution. Cobblestone Publishing, September 1987. (magazine for kids)

Cobblestone: The Constitution of the United States. Cobblestone Publishing, September 1982. (magazine for kids)

Celebrate the Constitution game.

Unexpected Gifts: Discovering the Way of Community by Christopher L. Heuertz

Sep11

This book was an unexpected gift. I was in the mood for something nonfiction, inspirational, and thought-provoking. And Mr. Heuertz delivered.

I know nothing at all about Word Made Flesh community, the community that Mr. Heuertz lived in and among and from which he takes his examples in the book. I know nothing of the jargon that Mr. Heuertz uses in his book: “contemplative activism”, “transitional awakening” and “prophetic community”. I am skeptical about the pantheon of heroes of whom the author has pictures pinned up in his office: Gandhi, Romero (who?), Che (?), Mother Teresa and Bob Marley(?). I got lost in the “progressive” new monasticism that Mr. Heuertz espouses and the sometimes dense, esoteric language he uses to describe his insights into community. I don’t think the author and I are on the same page, theologically speaking.

And yet . . . Mr. Heuertz has deep experiential understanding and wisdom about how Christians can and should live in community. I found a lot to think about and mull over, especially in relation to my church family, my immediate family and my homeschool co-op family, all of which make up the community where God has placed me. The chapters in the book talk about eleven “unexpected gifts” of living in community: failure, doubt, insulation, isolation, transition, the unknown self, betrayal, incompatibility, ingratitude, grief, and restlessness. All of these would seem to be issues and problems rather than gifts, but as we allow God to redeem our failures, doubts, griefs, and restlessness, we can receive these things as gifts to spur us on to greater growth and deeper relationship with Him and with others.

Failure: ” . . . let restoration become a journey toward brokenness. For in brokenness, our woundedness is best addressed, our fears are calmed, our shame is lifted, and love is extended.”

Doubt: ” . . . very real times of doubt lead both of us to places of lament—the grieving of the things that are fundamentally broken in the world—even as we simultaneously hope for more of God’s justice, presence and nearness. . . . in our community, when one of us has been down or experiencing doubt, we have found that the faith of those around us helps carry us.”

Insulation: “Our communities won’t always be able to offer us everything we need, nor will we be able to give back all that they need from us. . . That’s often when we need to step back, to refocus.”

Isolation: “The exclusion of the weak and insignificant, the seemingly useless people, from a Christian community, may actually mean the exclusion of Christ.” ~Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Transition (or change): “Avoiding blame, not picking sides, speaking honorably of the communities we leave or the people who transition from our communities are all parts of a bigger process–one that must also include space for grieving and room for celebrating.”

The Unknown Self: I must admit that this chapter about self-image and identity didn’t speak to me, and I didn’t understand what the author was trying to say. Self-discovery is found in self-denial which allows us to be free and whole people? Or something.

Betrayal A powerful meditation on betrayal and forgiveness. “Our response to betrayal can be a powerful force, setting our life trajectories toward grace or bitterness.”

Incompatibility: Subtitled “When Together Is Too Close,” this chapter explores the difficulties and blessings of incompatibility or the flip-side of too much “chemistry” between people who need to maintain some emotional and physical distance (members of the opposite sex, for instance). I’m not sure I agreed with Mr. Heuertz in his simplistic solution, that we all just act like mature people and get along but not misbehave. I think it is more complicated than that and that there is a place for drawing “artificial” boundaries, such as two people of the opposite sex not being alone together or avoiding intimate communication with people who are immature or abrasive. Heuertz seems to sy that we should just exercise common sense and grow up.

Ingratitude: More powerful stuff. “Many of us hadn’t considered the ways in which ingratitude had created subtle distances among us–forgetting to say thank you when someone stayed late, pitched in, or helped complete a big project, or merely thanking each other for common courtesies such as opening a door. Sometimes not saying thank you when a meal tab was covered by a community member or failing to express gratitude for well-prepared meetings caused some of us to judge each other as entitled or ungrateful.”

Grief: “Grief must be accepted. We can’t control it; we have to experience the depths of grief. In a contemplative posture, we are able to receive the pain as a gift filled with healing and lament.”

Restlessness: I think I liked this chapter best of all because it spoke to my temptation to devalue and become tired of the daily-ness of my life and my calling as a mother. “Most of real life consists of living in the ordinary, in-between times, the space and pauses filled with monotony. Most of real life is undramatic. The challenge is to be faithful and consistent, ‘praying the work’ when no one is looking or when there’s no recognition of our contributions.”

“Becoming the best versions of ourselves often requires that we stay. Stay when things get hard. Stay when we get bored. Stay when we experience periods of unhappiness. Stay when the excitement wears off.Stay when we don’t like those we’re in community with. Stay when we fail or are betrayed. Stay when we know who we can become if we have courage to be faithful in the undramatic.”

Unexpected Gifts was sent to me free of charge by the publisher, Howard Books, for the purpose of review. I am grateful to them and to the author for the opportunity to review and reflect on the ideas that Mr. Heuertz presents in this testimony of difficulties transformed into gifts.

Running the Books by Avi Steinberg

Jul24

Running the Books: The Adventures of an Accidental Prison Librarian by Avi Steinberg.

I’m willing to read almost anything that focuses on books and libraries, written by a librarian, even if the setting is a prison and even if the librarian is a lapsed, formerly Orthodox Jewish, now agnostic, Harvard graduate. Mr. Steinberg is hip, cool, humble, lost, aimless, and somewhat annoying. Anyone who can afford to wander around taking crummy jobs whilst he wonders what to do with his life after graduating from HARVARD, is annoying.

Mr. Steinberg has a friend who becomes an anthropologist, studying leftover hippies somewhere in the Midwest or Colorado or something. Steinberg himself comes across as an anthropologist who is studying the tribal customs of that esoteric and mysterious tribal group, the American felons. He opens his library to pimps and prostitutes and con artists and drug dealers while pondering that age-old question, “What is the purpose of the library anyway?” To provide books, education, access to information? He is soon disabused of such a quaint notion by his prison clientele who generally use the library for more practical purposes: socialization, communication, and sometimes criminality. The criminal pursuits of these, well, criminals, shouldn’t be a complete surprise, but Mr. Steinberg seems to keep forgetting that he works inside a prison.

And, of course, there are the one or two inmates who are the exceptions that prove the rule:
Jessica, who comes to writing class to catch glimpses of her son, also incarcerated, through the window of the classroom. Her story ends tragically.
Chudney, whose ambition is to have his own cooking show called Thug Sizzle. His story also ends tragically.

I was never sure of the point of all of these stories of lost, violent, victimized, and tragic people, compiled with commentary by the narrator, who was sometimes lost, sometimes victimized, sometimes even a little bit violent in response to all of the violence around him. Maybe that was the point: all of our stories are tragic. We observe and tell each other’s tragic stories. But coming from a Harvard graduate, the moral of the story sounds a little hollow. Avi Steinberg is in prison (as a librarian) for a couple of years, but he doesn’t have to be there. He can get a real job, write a book, get a life. And eventually, by the end of the story, he does.

I first heard about this book on NPR. It’s an NPR-ish kind of book.

Seeing Through the Fog by Ed Dobson

Jul19

I think that had I met Ed Dobson twenty years ago, we would have annoyed each other. That was before he was diagnosed with AML, Lou Gehrig’s disease, and before I had my own peculiar area of suffering and grief in my life. Wikipedia says that Ed Dobson, who used to work for Jerry Falwell and who used to be a leader in the Moral Majority, went on to pastor a large church in Michigan and became a mentor to Rob Bell, the Love Wins guy. I freely admit that I find aspects of the Moral Majority’s agenda and of Rob Bell’s teaching to be suspect and annoying.

Nevertheless, reading Mr. Dobson’s reflections on facing his own mortality and suffering, Seeing Through the Fog, was an encouraging, life-affirming, God-glorifying experience. This book is not Rob Bell speculating on things beyond his understanding (or mine). It’s not a legalist Christian giving a list of rules to be kept and sins to be repented. Seeing Through the Fog is the honest, painfully honest, meditations of a man who is facing a slow deterioration of his muscles and of his ability to care for himself and for others. And he’s not thankful for all the horrible, life-sucking symptoms and disabilities that manifest as AML. He’s not happy all the time, and he doesn’t know why God doesn’t heal him. However, Mr. Dobson’s memoir is an inspiration because he continues to embrace the life that God has given him, continues to serve others, and learns to accept the help and service of friends and family, with thanksgiving.

The book reminded me a somewhat of The Little Way of Ruthie Leming by Rod Dreher. Mr. Dobson pursues healing, too, like Ruthie did. His life gets smaller, and richer in some ways, as the disease progresses. He learns to appreciate his family, his wife in particular, in new ways as he must depend on her for help with daily tasks. And still the disease itself is not a good thing. No one has to feel as if reading this book will make them feel guilty for not embracing their own personal suffering as unqualified blessing. Instead, in Rod Dreher’s book about his sister and in Mr. Dobson’s essays on his experience with AML, we are called to see the suffering and disease as realities that may be used by God to teach us and mold us and even bring us into His presence.

Going Clear by Lawrence Wright

Jul16

Going Clear: Scientology, Hollywood, and the Prison of Belief by Lawrence Wright.

Wow! After reading Mr. Wright’s exposé of L. Ron Hubbard’s “new religion” of Scientology, I want to make sure that I and my family never even read any of Mr. Hubbard’s multitudinous works of fiction, much less his supposed nonfiction best sellers such as Dianetics and Self Analysis, to name only a couple of the many, many books he wrote and published. (Mitt Romney said during his run for the presidency that his favorite novel was Battlefield Earth by L. Ron Hubbard. That’s a little disturbing on several levels.) Yes, I know that sounds a little paranoid, and the books themselves may or may not be harmlessly entertaining, but the information about the abusiveness of Scientology in Going Clear is just that disturbing. So disturbing that I’m looking for my ten foot pole.

Scientology doesn’t get many (any) kudos in this book by a Pulitzer prize winning author and journalist. Famous Scientologists come across as either well-meaning fools (John Travolta) or deluded jerks (Tom Cruise). Hubbard himself seems to have been a megalomaniac with delusions of grandeur and a sadistic streak. Then, of course, he did establish a religious empire with millions of dollars in assets and a lot (Scientology won’t say exactly how many, with estimates varying widely and wildly) of adherents.

I won’t go into the specific abuses and illegalities that Mr. Wright alleges against Hubbard and the Scientology organization. You can read the book for more corrupt and salacious details than you probably want to know. I will warn anyone who is even considering taking one of Scientology’s copious and expensive courses that he or she should read Wright’s book first. If even half of what Mr. Wright writes is right, then you will want to stay as far away from Scientology as possible.

Of course, Lawrence implies in the final chapters of his book that all religious faiths are much the same as Scientology in their irrationality and odd beliefs. He writes, ” . . . every religion features bizarre and uncanny elements.” Then he proceeds to compare Scientology to Christian Science, the Amish, Shakers, Buddhists, Pentecostals, and several other groups. He’s struggling to put Scientology into some sort of context, but there is very little precedent for an L. Ron Hubbard and his invention of a money-making pseudo-science that outlived its founder. To invoke one of those beliefs that Mr. Wright classifies as bizarre, I think Scientology is simply demonic.

Read the book and weep for those who are enmeshed in a belief system that defies belief. I especially felt moved to pray for those children who are raised and indoctrinated in Mr. Hubbard’s exploitative religion. I believe the only Power that can free them from such an insidious and insane cult is the power and sanity of Jesus Christ.

Famous Scientologists and former Scientologists. I was surprised to read (not in this book but online as I looked up information) that author Neil Gaiman was raised in a Scientology family. He has left the Church of Scientology as an adult, but prefers not to talk about it either negatively or positively, probably because he still has family members who are deeply involved in Scientology.

Other author connections with Scientology:
Science fiction author Robert Heinlein was close friends with L. Ron Hubbard in their early days in the 1940’s as aspiring writers of science fiction. In fact, Hubbard had an affair with Heinlein’s wife, after which they weren’t such good friends anymore.

L. Ron Hubbard’s Writers of the Future contest for new writers of science fiction and Illustrators of the Future contest are “prestigious and lucrative. They feature judges who are among the biggest names in the field, and they’ve helped launch the careers of important new artists.” These contests are administrated, sponsored, and funded by a subsidiary of The Church of Scientology. However, the judges and the authors who win the annual contests are, for the most part, not members of the Church of Scientology. (Scientology’s Writers of the Future Contest, Village Voice, by Tony Ortega)

The Big Burn by Timothy Egan

Jun24

The Big Burn: Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire that Saved America by Timothy Egan.

I remember the story from history class of how FDR tried to pack the Supreme Court by creating new justices behind Congress’s back and of how John Adams tried to fill a bunch of vacant judgeships with his own appointees just before leaving office so that Jefferson wouldn’t fill them with his people. Teddy Roosevelt tried something similar, but with forests, and he got away with it—to the everlasting benefit of all Americans.

“In 1907, an amendment was tacked onto a spending bill, a bit of dynamite in a small package. The add-on took away the president’s authority to create new national forests in a huge part of the West without congressional approval. . . .

Roosevelt felt cornered. Not so with Pinchot. To the forester, the Senate amendment was no defeat; it was an opportunity–but only if they acted quickly. The president had a week to sign the bill, and it had to be signed because it kept the government in operation. Pinchot had an idea. Why not use the seven-day window to put as much land into the national forest system as possible? Just go full bore and do in a week’s time what they might normally do over the course of four years.

Roosevelt loved it. He asked the Forest Service to bring him maps–and hurry!–a carpet of cartography, every square mile in the area Heyburn was trying to take away. . .

At the end of the week, Roosevelt issued executive proclamations covering sixteen million acres of land in half a dozen states, bringing them into the fold of the national forest system. And then he signed the bill that prevented him or any other president from doing such a thing again.”

That was 1907, and although the National Forest Service had the land, it didn’t have the personnel and equipment and funding to take care of the land, to build ranger stations, and to watch for and fight fires, because Congress still wasn’t on board with Teddy’s little conservation mania. Speaker of the House Joe Cannon declared, “Not one cent for scenery!” And a lot of senators and representatives were in agreement with Cannon. Then, Teddy Roosevelt’s two terms as president were over, and he went off to Africa on safari and left President Taft, his hand-picked successor, in charge. But Taft wasn’t Teddy, although he promised to carry out TR’s conservation policies, and then came the Big Burn.

On August 20, 1910:

“‘All h–l broke loose,’ Bill Greeley reported. For the minister’s son this was as emphatic as he got. His rangers–those still in contact–were sending dispatches that made it sound as though virtually all of the forested domain of the United States government was under attack. They wrote of giant blowtorches flaming from treetop to treetop, of house-size fireballs rolling through canyons, pushed by winds of seventy miles an hour. They told of trees swelling, sweating hot sap, and then exploding; of horses dying in seconds; of small creeks boiling, full of dead trout, their white belies up; of bear cubs clinging to flaming trees, wailing like children.”

It was the worst forest fire anyone had ever seen, and the end result was over 100 people dead, about three million acres of forest burned to a crisp, and the National Forest Service with a mandate for the future: Prevent Forest Fires.

Aside from the availability of helicopters, better communications, and some more advanced firefighting methods, this nonfiction book about the worst wildfire in U.S. history sounds a lot like the newspaper articles and stories from the Colorado wildfires that are still raging and the fires that we read about every year in California. We still don’t know exactly how to manage forests and fires in forests.

Colorado State Trooper: “Forests didn’t used to grow to the point where you have these catastrophic fires. We would have a lot of little fires all the time. We’ve got to stop trying to preserve forests. I think we should work the forest. If we’ve got a 40,000-acre area burning because we have had a lot of beetle-killed trees over a decade, maybe should have done something during those years?”

Colorado State Senator: “We need to thin this dead stuff out. A timber industry can help keep the forest healthy.”

Americanforests.org: “For quite some time, the United States’ federal fire policy focused on suppressing all fires in national forests to protect timber resources and rural communities. However, decades of fire exclusion have resulted in unusually dense forests in many areas, actually increasing the risk of intense wildfires. As suppression proved to often be more damaging than beneficial, federal policy turned to more practical measures, such as prescribed burns and forest thinning. Even these, however, must be practiced carefully to avoid damage to the ecosystem by artificially providing a process that would occur naturally.”

They were saying some of the same sorts of things over a hundred years ago: We can’t let the forests burn because we need the timber. If we just let logging companies harvest the timber, there won’t be any fuel for big forest fires. If we allow forest fires, rural communities will be endangered. We have to save the forests. We have to use the forests.

The added element nowadays is the concern that both controlled and uncontrolled fires can add to the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and contribute to “climate change.” Or maybe climate change is contributing to insect infestation and dryer conditions which in turn cause more forest fires.

Yeah, it’s complicated, like everything else these days. Nevertheless, The Big Burn is a good book, and it features my favorite president, Teddy Roosevelt. If I didn’t learn how to manage forests and wildfires, I at least learned that wildfires in the forests of the United States are nothing new. And I learned the history of the National Forest Service, a bumpy start and a fine heritage.

Timothy Egan also wrote The Worst Hard Time: The Untold Story of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl, the book I passed out for World Book Night in April.

The Little Way of Ruthie Leming by Rod Dreher

Jun14

The Little Way of Ruthie Leming: A Southern Girl, a Small Town, and the Secret of a Good Life by Rod Dreher.

I’ve heard excellent things about Rod Dreher’s memoir of his sister Ruthie’s journey with cancer and its effect on his life decisions. And it was a really good book. However, this book is one that should come with a warning: keep reading. Keep reading to the very end, and don’t assume that you understand what Mr. Dreher is trying to say in his story unless you’ve read it all. Even then, you’ll most likely shut the book with a thoughtful look on your face and in a contemplative mood—my favorite take-aways from any story.

On the surface, The Little Way is a book about a courageous and spirited woman who lived a life of service and good works and died at too young an age. Dreher repeatedly calls her a “saint”, and this from a man who was Catholic and converted to Orthodoxy and who believes in “saints” who are singular people especially endowed with God’s grace, not as I believe that we are all saints if we trust in Jesus. Ruthie Leming seems at first to be an uncomplicated, straightforward, country girl who loved teaching school, drinking beer and celebrating life with her friends, and caring for her family. The cancer that eventually ended her life was for Ruthie something to treat according to the doctors’ advice and then ignore as much as she could. As we get to know Ruthie more and more through the pages of Mr. Dreher’s book, however, she is revealed to have depths of character and even faults that go unnoticed and unsuspected in the beginning of the book. Maybe it’s the cancer itself, and its influence in Ruthie’s circle of friends and family, that reveal Ruthie’s essential spirit and her long-lasting influence over her family and her hometown of St. Francisville, Louisiana.

Mr. Dreher’s relationship with his sister, and indeed with his entire family and hometown, turns out to be complicated, too. Suffice it to say that Mr. Dreher and his wife and children try an experiment with the old conundrum of whether or not “you can’t go home again”, and the results are, well, mixed and complex. The Drehers move back to St. Francisville after Ruthie’s death because of something attractive about the way the town supported and loved Ruthie and her family through Ruthie’s illness and death. However, the family tensions and small town prejudices that drove Rod Dreher to leave home in the first place before he even finished high school are still evident. The question isn’t really whether or not you can go home again, but rather what will happen to you as an adult, who has been formed by all of the many settings in which you’ve lived, once you get there? Can an adult who’s lived in Washington, D.C. and New York City and seen Paris ever be content with what Mr. Dreher calls “the little way”?

I want to suggest this book to my Eldest Daughter who will be moving back to Houston soon after several years in graduate school in Nashville, but I don’t want her to get the wrong message from my recommendation. Again, although Mr. Dreher certainly buys into Wendell Berry’s localism and idealistic valuing of community, the book indicates, if you read it all the way through, that creating community among loving but flawed people isn’t easy. And of course, he’s right: those of us who love the Lord and live in the light of His grace are all saints, but we’re broken saints, physically, mentally and spiritually. We get cancer; we make harsh judgments, we hurt each other; and we love one another. All mixed up together. And it’s worth working through the messiness in one place with a specific group of people to call our own community–unless you have to escape that particular place and group in order to find your own “saintliness” and way to Grace.

Wherever you are in your journey away from or towards home and hometown values and community, you’ll find food for thought and discussion in Rod Dreher’s book. It’s much more than just a cancer memoir.

There Is No Me Without You by Melissa Fay Greene

Jun9

In case you hadn’t noticed ther is a LOT of controversy going on these days about international adoption, especially adoptions by U.S. parent of Ethiopian, Liberian, and other African children. Lots of agencies and groups involved in these adoptions are being accused of child-trafficking, stealing children from their parents and extended families to feed an American “obsession” with adoption. In fact, journalist Kathryn Joyce has recently published a book called The Child Catchers which seems to imply, or maybe state outright, that all international adoptions are suspect and akin to child abuse and kidnapping, especially those where the children are adopted into evangelical Christian families.

Melissa Fay Greene’s book, published in 2006, tells the story of one Ethiopian woman, Haregewoin Teferra, and the ups and downs of her “odyssey to rescue Africa’s children.” Ms. Greene also writes about the AIDs crisis in Ethiopia and in Africa, the political situation in Ethiopia, the ethics and difficulties and joys of Ethiopian adoption, and the difficulties of running an impromptu, under-funded, and unregulated orphanage. The book feels balanced and honest.

The best thing about this book is that Ms. Greene, although she obviously admires Haregewoin Teferra, does not idolize her. This journalistic trek through the back alleys of Addis Ababa and the orphanages and adoption agencies of Ethiopia is no hagiographic tribute to Haregewoin, even though she is the central character. It is instead a realistic picture of one woman who tries to help the orphans who are brought to her door, who sometimes makes mistakes, and who ends up helping some and being unable to help others.

“I would watch Haregewoin’s reputation rise and fall like sunrise and sunset. As she blended her life with the lives of people ruined by the pandemic, she became a nobody, like them. Then, she began to be seen as a saint. Then some cried, ‘hey! This is no saint!’ and accused her of corruption. Or maybe she started out as a saint, became a tyrant, then became a saint again. Or was it the reverse? THe story line hanged. But in ever account, no middle ground was allotted to Haregewoin: either she was all good, or she had gone bad. Those who watched, judged her.
Zewedu, her old friend, saw who Haregewoin was: an average person, muddling through a bad time, with a little more heart than most for the people around her who were suffering and half an eye cocked toward her own preservation. But most observers failed to reach this matter-of-fact point of view, and Ato Zewedu probably would not live much longer.
But then I heard, to my delight, that some people say even Mother Teresa herself was no Mother Teresa.”

This. Yes. We are all complicated, sinful, sometimes grace-filled, selfish, well-meaning, compassionate, but also unobservant, people. Some of us manage, by God’s grace, to do something kind and loving for someone else, even for many others, like the orphans Haregewoin helped. Somehow we muddle through and maybe do more good than harm. And God uses our poorest efforts and our mixed motives to serve Him and to serve others and to bring about His will.

If you are considering an international adoption, if you know someone who has adopted children from another country, if you just want to understand the complexities of adoption from the point of view of an adoptive mother and a journalist, read this book. Then read the articles I’ve linked to below for all kind of opinions and stories about international adoption. Some are horror stories; others are stories that inspire hope and sympathy. It’s complicated, but the complications shouldn’t paralyze us.

If God brings an orphan to your door, what can you do but open your home and your heart and let him in somehow?

Orphan Fever: The Evangelical Movement’s Adoption Obsession in Mother Jones magazine.

Evangelicals and Foreign Adoption by Maralee Bradley at Mere Orthodoxy.

Ethiopian Adoption: An Informal Guide by Melissa Fay Greene.

The Common Room and Adoption Advice.

International Adoptions Struggle for Hollywood Endings

Child Sponsorship instead of Adoption.

The Hidden Art of Homemaking, ch. 4, Painting, Sketching, Sculpturing

May14

I have zero, zip, nada, no talent or ability in the areas of painting, sketching, sculpturing or creating visual artwork in any form. Nevertheless, I love this chapter of Hidden Art.

“Ideas carried out stimulate more ideas.” So true. My most recent obsession, other than watching K-dramas, is opening a small library for homeschoolers in my area who could use the books and curricula that I have collected over the years, much of which my own children have outgrown. I have a LOT of books and curriculum materials. I would like to gather these resources into one room in my house, and allow homeschool families to pay a small yearly fee to become “members” of my library. (This idea has almost nothing to do with the chapter we’re reading, but everything to do with where God is leading me in the area of hidden art. My giftedness, such as it is, has to do with reading and recommending “living books” and other educational resources.) Anyway, my idea of opening a full-fledged library is thwarted right now by the season my family is in and by the logistics of devoting an entire room to the purpose of a library. Still, I need to figure out a way to start small, and to carry out my idea in some limited way until I can get to the complete vision of a private homeschoolers’ library.

“A sermon can be ‘illustrated’ and thereby ‘translated’ at the same time, to a child sitting beside you, provided the child has any interest at all in understanding.” I used to do this , despite my lack of artistic ability, with my older children when they were preschoolers. I also sometimes had them draw a picture of what the pastor was talking about in his sermon. In fact, as they got older I had a page long form for their “sermon notes” that had a space for the date, the pastor’s name, the Biblical text, a sentence or two about the sermon, and a picture illustrating the sermon. Sometimes on the back of the sheet I drew stick figures, or Engineer Husband drew more detailed illustrations, helping the children to understand the sermon.

How the Semicolon family is expressing “hidden art” this week:
Engineer Husband is designing the program for the upcoming production of Singin’ in the Rain that two of the urchins are starring in. One of my adult children, Dancer Daughter (23) has done much of the choreography for the production.

Karate Kid (16) is in the living room playing the guitar for his sisters to sing along, as they record a a birthday gift song for a friend whose birthday is tomorrow. They’re singing this song by the group He Is We.

Betsy Bee (14) has been decorating and straightening up her bedroom, ironing the pillow cases (?!) and generally making her space beautiful.

My 80 year old mom, who lives in an apartment behind our house, makes beautifully designed cards for birthdays and anniversaries, using her computer and the artwork that she finds or purchases on the internet.

I continue to write my little blog and to try to figure out how to start a library without a designated space.

I’m looking forward to reading the posts that others write about how they incorporate the visual arts into their lives and homes.