Faith & Life Inspirational Message

I am working my way through a book now that is quite challenging and very rewarding.  Fortunately, I am reading it along with a group that I lead.  The folks in the group are great troupers.  They are plugging along with me.  They are not complaining---no whining!  I fear if I were using it in a normal college class, there would be some grumpiness about how “hard” it is.  The book is by Christian Wiman and is entitled, My Bright Abyss .  The subtitle is revealing: Meditation of a Modern Believer .             I don’t know Wiman and have to confess that I had not even heard of him.  He is a poet.  He also is a lecturer in religion and literature at the Yale Institute of Sacred Music.  He has been editor of Poetry magazine, which one publication calls “the oldest and most esteemed poetry monthly in the world.”  Wiman was born in 1966 and as a relatively young man of thirty-n...

I enjoy getting a new book and diving into the ideas contained in it.   Sometimes I have a fairly good idea of what I will get; other times I have little to no clue what I will read.   A recent read is a book suggested by one of my favorite columnists, David Brooks.   I read Brooks in the New York Times online.   One of his columns mentioned a book by an editor of a poetry journal.   It was a book that was intriguingly religious in Brooks’ estimation.   I became intrigued, too, and jumped into My Bright Abyss by Christian Wiman. I had never heard of Wiman, so I had no idea what to expect.   The book is very engaging, but not an easy read.   The are ample examples of poetry, which is fun for me, since I don’t know that much about poetry and probably don’t understand and appreciate it like I could.   I feel like I am growing.   I feel like I am learning and being challenged.           ...