No surprise that since I was over at Glasgow University Library in the diligent pursuit of knowledge, and since I was in the immediate vicinity, I found time to engage in some extreme used book searching at Voltaire and Rousseau's. I say extreme because venturing between the stacked aisles of books in that shop isn't all that different from walking through the threatening unstable landscapes of middle earth. I came away unscathed though, and with three purchases -
one of Heiko Oberman's earlier books, Masters of the Reformation.The emergence of a new intellectual climate in Europe (Cambridge, 1981) - a clean, hardback copy of a hard to get book. Oberman was one of the finest Reformation scholars whose detailed research and at times hard to read essays nevertheless provided a much more nuanced picture of the interface between medieval and Renaissance culture and the events and historical contexts of the European Reformations.
John Todd's careful study of John Wesley and the Catholic Church, a book I've read before but am glad to have. There's still alot of important and unexploited insight in some of the earlier work on the Wesleys. This book, along with others like Wesley and the Church of England, and Wesley and the Puritans highlights the range and variety of Wesley's theological taste - he has been called a 'devout eclectic', a classic case of pick'n mix theology long before pick 'n mix was made a cliche for post-modern consumer led choices!
And then it's always good to find a book by a friend - David Smith, Mission After Christendom, a nice fresh copy to replace the one of mine that went the way of most lent out books! What I enjoyed about buying David's book (at a ridiculously good price), was that it was shelved in the esoteric section, sandwiched between - wait for it - Buddhism Without Beliefs, a kind of western new age take on Mahayana Buddhism, and on the other side Awake at 3a.m. a study of the spiritual psychology (whatever that is) of insomnia!
As I looked at this book on mission, pressed on both sides by quite different and alien worldviews, I couldn't help thinking - for a book intended to open up new frontiers for witness in a globalised world, placing it amongst the esoterica seemed like an unintentional but highly symbolic prophetic act, indicating the plight of the church trying to do mission after Christendom!
Jim, I had you down for an easter blog at hopeful imagination yesterday. If you're able to blog today or tomorrow that would be great. I'm trying to find a few more bloggers to join in, limited success so far.
Posted by: andy Goodliff | March 29, 2008 at 09:12 AM