Sunday, April 15, 2001
Growing Up Fundamentalist
by Stefan Ulstein
I have to confess, I am a word junkie. I'll read anything. Cereal boxes, charity newsletters, junk mail, you name it. So when we received this book free from Harvest Logos, Seattle's most dangerous bookstore, I threw it on my stack to read. This book is a collection of brief, almost sound bite-sized interviews from people who have grown up in a fundamentalist Christian church and family. It asks them how growing up in that culture has affected them both then and now. All of the interviewees have rebelled to a degree from their upbringing, but most also have some positive things to say about the culture. The challenge for them (as for any person) is to separate the bad from the good, as much as that is possible. (Read Jaques Ellul's The Presence of the Kingdom if you really want to wrestle with that issue.) Anyway, I grew up in a conservative evangelical church, so I could relate in part to the stories told. There were a few nuggets of wisdom that I garnered from the book, so I guess even Harvest Logos' giveaways are a cut above your regular bookstore. Unless you have a great interest in the fundamentalist Christian culture, however, I would classify this as waiting room material.
LibraryThing link
I have to confess, I am a word junkie. I'll read anything. Cereal boxes, charity newsletters, junk mail, you name it. So when we received this book free from Harvest Logos, Seattle's most dangerous bookstore, I threw it on my stack to read. This book is a collection of brief, almost sound bite-sized interviews from people who have grown up in a fundamentalist Christian church and family. It asks them how growing up in that culture has affected them both then and now. All of the interviewees have rebelled to a degree from their upbringing, but most also have some positive things to say about the culture. The challenge for them (as for any person) is to separate the bad from the good, as much as that is possible. (Read Jaques Ellul's The Presence of the Kingdom if you really want to wrestle with that issue.) Anyway, I grew up in a conservative evangelical church, so I could relate in part to the stories told. There were a few nuggets of wisdom that I garnered from the book, so I guess even Harvest Logos' giveaways are a cut above your regular bookstore. Unless you have a great interest in the fundamentalist Christian culture, however, I would classify this as waiting room material.
LibraryThing link
Labels: WaitingRoomMaterial
// posted by John @ 8:52 PM 
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