The Wisdom To Know The Difference

Title: The Wisdom To Know The Difference
Author: Eileen Flanagan
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 9781585428298

From the publisher:
God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can change; and wisdom to know the difference.

Millions of people have been moved by these famous last lines from the Serenity Prayer to make important and lasting changes in their lives. But how exactly can we know the difference? How can we acknowledge the real limits that we face without negating the possibility for dramatic change? In this wise book, Eileen Flanagan guides readers in determining what they can - or perhaps should - change in their lives, accepting what they cannot, and discovering the "wisdom to know the difference."

Drawing on her own Quaker faith as well as a range of other religious and spiritual traditions, Flanagan shows readers how such practices as sifting through culturally preconceived notions and listening to our own inner voice can help us determine when a change is needed in our lives or when instead acceptance is the answer.

Ill Fares The Land

Title: Ill Fares The Land
Author: Tony Judt
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 9781846143595

From the publisher:
'Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates, and men decay'
~Oliver Goldsmith

Something has gone profoundly amiss in our public affairs over the past thirty years. In the West we are wealthy and secure enough to allow ourselves to drift very far off course before anything has to be done. But we have forgotten how to think about the life we live together: its goals and purposes. Not only are we post-ideological; we have become post-ethical. When we ask ourselves whether a particular policy objective should be pursued - universal healthcare or investment in public transportation - we know only how to inquire about its efficiency: its profitability or cost, its impact upon growth and the National Product, its implications for taxation.

We have lost touch with the old questions that have defined politics since the Greeks: is it good? Is it fair? Is it just? Is it right? Will it help bring about a better society? A better world? The US and UK today are more unequal - in incomes, wealth, health, education, life chances - than at any time since 1914. Is this desirable? Is it prudent? Those used to be the political questions, even if they invited no easy answers. Until we have learned - or re-learned - how to pose them, we shall go on as before. Can we go on 'like this'? Yes. Should we? No.

If we are to replace fear with confidence then we need a different story to tell, about state and society alike: a story that carries moral and political conviction. Providing that story is the purpose of this book.

Living Buddha, Living Christ

Title: Living Buddha, Living Christ
Author: Thich Nhat Hanh
Publisher: Penguin Books
ISBN: 9781594482397

From the publisher: Buddha and Christ, perhaps the two most pivotal figures in the history of humankind, each left behind a legacy of teachings and practices that have shaped the lives of billions of people over two millennia. If they were to meet on the road today, what would each think of the other's spiritual views and practices? In this classic text for spiritual seekers, Thich Nhat Hanh explores the crossroads of compassion and holiness at which the two traditions meet, and he reawakens our understanding of both.

This I Believe

Title: This I Believe
Editors: Jay Allison & Dan Gediman
Publisher: Henry Holt
ISBN: 978-0-8050-8658-4

From the publisher: Based on the National Public Radio series of the same name, This I Believe features eighty contributors — from the famous to the unknown — completing the thought that the book’s title begins. Each piece compels readers to rethink not only how they have arrived at their own personal beliefs but also the extent to which they share them with others.

Featuring many renowned contributors — including Isabel Allende, Colin Powell, Gloria Steinem, William F. Buckley Jr., Penn Jillette, Bill Gates, and John Updike — the collection also contains essays by a lawyer; a part-time hospital clerk; a woman who sells yellow pages advertising; and a man who serves on a parole board.

The result is a stirring and provocative trip inside the minds and hearts of a diverse group of people whose beliefs — and the incredibly varied ways in which they choose to express them — reveal the human spirit at its best.

Letter From Birmingham Jail

"I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly."
Martin Luther King, Jr.
April 16th, 1963

Martin Luther King's famous letter is a response to a statement made by 8 white Alabama clergymen in 1963. They argued that injustice should only be fought in a law court. King responded that without non-violent direct action, true civil rights could never be achieved. He asserted that not only was civil disobedience justified in the face of unjust laws, but that "one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws." The letter includes the famous statement "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere," as well as the words attributed to William Gladstone quoted by King: "Justice too long delayed is justice denied." Read the full text of the letter here


Title: A Testament of Hope
Author: Martin Luther King, Jr.
Publisher: HarperCollins
ISBN: 9780060646912

From the publisher: "We've got some difficult days ahead," civil rights activist Martin Luther King, Jr., told a crowd gathered at Memphis's Clayborn Temple on April 3, 1968. "But it really doesn't matter to me now because I've been to the mountaintop. . . . And I've seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land."

These prohetic words, uttered the day before his assassination, challenged those he left behind to see that his "promised land" of racial equality became a reality; a reality to which King devoted the last twelve years of his life.

These words and other are commemorated here in the only major one-volume collection of this seminal twentieth-century American prophet's writings, speeches, interviews, and autobiographical reflections. A Testament of Hope contains Martin Luther King, Jr.'s essential thoughts on non-violence, social policy, integration, black nationalism, the ethics of love and hope, and more.

Amish Grace

Title: Amish Grace: How Forgiveness Transcended Tragedy
Author: Donald B. Kraybill, Steven M. Nolt, David L. Weaver-Zercher
Publisher: 978-0-470-34404-0
ISBN: Jossey-Bass

From the publisher: The remarkable response of the Amish community to the horrific shooting of ten schoolgirls at Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania, in October 2006, stunned the larger world. Amish Grace tells the incredible story of this community's reaction to this senseless shooting and explores its profoundly countercultural practice of forgiveness.

Outsiders often hold a stereotypical view of the Amish as a stubbornly backwards people—a view rooted in the picturesque images of buggies, beards, and bonnets. But there is much more to know about the Amish as a people, as we discovered after the Nickel Mines incident. The community's collective and radical act of forgiveness—the loving and compassionate response to the shooter and his family—gives us insights into who the Amish are and how they live their faith.

Amish Grace explores the many questions the story raises about the religious beliefs that led the Amish to forgive so quickly. In a world where religion spawns so much violence and vengeance, the surprising act of Amish forgiveness begs for deeper consideration.

From Publishers Weekly: Starred Review. When a gunman killed five Amish children and injured five others last fall in a Nickel Mines, Pa., schoolhouse, media attention rapidly turned from the tragic events to the extraordinary forgiveness demonstrated by the Amish community. The authors, who teach at small colleges with Anabaptist roots and have published books on the Amish, were contacted repeatedly by the media after the shootings to interpret this subculture. In response to the questions why—and how—did they forgive? Kraybill and his colleagues present a compelling study of Amish grace. After describing the heartbreaking attack and its aftermath, the authors establish that forgiveness is embedded in Amish society through five centuries of Anabaptist tradition, and grounded in the firm belief that forgiveness is required by the New Testament. The community's acts of forgiveness were not isolated decisions by saintly individuals but hard-won countercultural practices supported by all aspects of Amish life. Common objections to Amish forgiveness are addressed in a chapter entitled, What About Shunning? The authors carefully distinguish between forgiveness, pardon and reconciliation, as well as analyze the complexities of mainstream America's response and the extent to which the Amish example can be applied elsewhere. This intelligent, compassionate and hopeful book is a welcome addition to the growing literature on forgiveness.

There Is No Me Without You

Title: There Is No Me Without You
Author: Melissa Fay Green
Publisher: Bloomsbury
ISBN: 9781596912939

From the publisher: In a dusty tin-walled compound on the outskirts of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, a middle-class woman named Haregewoin Teferra suffered back-to-back losses: first her husband died of a heart attack; then her beloved 23-year-old daughter was consumed by an unnamed sickness. In grief, Haregewoin turned to the church and asked to be taken into seclusion.

Instead of allowing the bereft woman to leave the world, the church presented her with two teenage orphans and asked her to house them. Over the startled protests of her friends and family, Haregewoin said yes.

Once she opened her gate to the first two children, she never really managed to close it again. Her compound became known as a haven: here was a woman who did not run away from HIV-positive individuals and AIDS-orphaned children. From across the country, children were brought to Haregewoin on foot, by bus, or by donkey cart.

There are a million AIDS orphans in Ethiopia; There is No Me Without You shares the remarkable stories of a few of them, through the eyes of an author whose own life was altered while researching Haregowin's story.


Read more at http://www.thereisnomewithoutyou.com