GODSTUFF

ESCAPE WINTER’S ICY GRIP WITH SPIRITUAL BOOKS

Each summer, I compile a spiritual summer reading list with the idea that those long, lazy, balmy days give us extra time to read for pleasure (and not just on the commute to and from work.)

I don’t know about you, but the summer came and went and was filled with so much stuff that most of books I intended to read still sitting untouched on my nightstand.

Now the Cold Miser has cast an arctic spell on Chicago, blanketing the city with what feels like a mile of snow, while its citizens find shelter inside for the foreseeable future. There are only so many Netflix movies and DVR’d episodes of The Barefoot Contessa that any one person can watch to pass the time until the weather turns more human again, so you may find yourself with ample time to read.

January has always been my high time for spending time in books — taking journeys in my imagination to escape winter’s icy grip when a tropical vacation was nowhere in sight.

Here are a few new books in the spiritual genre that might help you pass the time and embark on a holiday, a new adventure or a quest (from the warm comfort of your living room.)

Go back in time (on a long, strange trip):

The Harvard Psychedelic Club: How Timothy Leary, Ram Dass, Huston Smith, and Andrew Weil Killed the Fifties and Ushered in a New Age for America

By Don Lattin

With equal parts keen historicity and great humor, Lattin, the former religion writer for the San Francisco Chronicle and one of the nation’s preeminent religion journalists (who is known as “Moon Doggie” to some of his colleagues on the God beat), chronicles how these founding fathers of the so-called New Age movement in the U.S. and worldwide met at Harvard in the early 60s and — despite rivalries, infighting and backstabbing — managed to change the spiritual landscape for generations to come.

Lattin is a virtuoso explicator of the counterculutural fringes of American religious life. If you dig The Harvard Psychedelic Club you might also want to check out Lattin’s other books: Following Our Bliss: How the Spiritual Ideals of the Sixties Shape Our Lives Today and Jesus Freaks: A True Story of Murder and Madness on the Evangelical Edge.

Discover the spirituality (and delight) of snow:

Spiritual Adventures in the Snow: Skiing & Snowboarding as Renewal for Your Soul

By Marcia McFee and Karen Foster

McFee and Foster both are theologians and avid outdoorswomen who have found spiritual enlightenment and connection on snowy mountain slopes. “Activities that are exhilarating and fun are not usually thought of as spiritual,” they write. “But to the contrary, such ventures may well point us to our most profound spiritual connections. For when we are able to come fully into the present moment, turn off the noise in our minds, feel our true essence as complete union of body-mind-spirit, we enter into a kind of ‘other worldly’ state of ecstasy that we can experience only as a spiritual dimension.”

Step into someone else’s (uncomfortable) shoes:

That Bird Has My Wings: The Autobiography of an Innocent Man on Death Row

By Jarvis Jay Masters

Writing from San Quentin prison’s Death Row, where he is appealing his death sentence for the murder of a prison guard (a crime for which he claims he is innocent), Masters recounts a troubled life that took him from a heroin-addicted mother to foster homes to drug addiction to prison, and how his renewed faith gives him hope for the future — whatever it may hold. Masters, who spends much of his time meditating in his cell, wrote the book by hand, using a ballpoint pen filler (the only writing implement allowed.) Painfully honest and surprisingly uplifting, Archbishop Desmond Tutu says the memoir, “is a plea for reform, for common humanity, and I share his hope that this moving story will redouble our efforts to make sure that every child matters.”

Go inside (yourself):

The Liturgical Year: The Spiraling Adventure of the Spiritual Life

By Joan Chittister

A Benedictine nun and prolific writer, Chittister takes a look at the spiritual rhythm of the year and why the Christian church celebrates what it does when it does. In what she calls “a journey of the soul through the map of Christian time,” Chittister unpacks the liturgical year, connecting it to a life’s work of becoming a true follower of Christ, or, as she lyrically puts it, “an exercise in spiritual ripening.”

Look at the future (with new eyes):

Rediscovering Values: On Wall Street, Main Street, and Your Street

By Jim Wallis

We all know the economy stinks and we’re living in nervous, tension-filled times, wondering what the future holds for our pensions, our children, and, perhaps, the soul of our nation. In this field guide, Wallis, the bestselling author of God’s Politics and The Great Awakening and the leading voice among Christian progressives, insists that if we focus only on answering the question, “When will this crisis be over?” we’ll end up making the same mistakes that got us into this mess in the first place.

Wallis calls the book a “moral compass for the new economy,” and says we have to reclaim fundamental values that have been misplaced. “It’s time to stop keeping up with the Joneses and start making sure the Joneses are okay,” he says. “The operating principle of God’s economy says that there is enough if we share it.”