Elevate Difference

Reviews tagged Christianity

Threads of Hope

I have to admit to watching this film with much trepidation. Too many films and documentaries are dedicated to analyzing the poor state of women’s lives in the developing world, but few dedicate their focus to researching and explicating the systemic inequalities rooted in patriarchy, that exist to reinforce women’s conditions. However, while watching I was determined to keep an open mind and value the work and perspective of a young woman of color, endeavoring to make a difference in the world by documenting women’s lives in Kolkata, India.

Voices of Witness Africa

Voices of Witness Africa honors the truth and plight of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Anglicans in Africa, who have often been excommunicated by the Anglican Church. This is an admirable task for the producers of this film, since their target audience is Anglican bishops at the Lambeth Conference, a meeting of bishops which happens once every ten years. The producers must work not to overly offend the church bishops that they are trying to win over. However, this tension to represent various sides of the issue leaves the film with a sense of having been diluted to be palpable.

Sins of the Mother

Will we eventually be accountable for the decisions we made in the past? This is essentially the idea that Murray explores throughout her book Sins of the Mother. Through the use of multiple first-person narratives, Murray follows the actions and reactions of her characters after the young daughter of her protagonist and converted sinner, Jasmine Bush, is kidnapped.

Hannah Free

If LOGO and the Hallmark Channel had a baby, they would name her Hannah Free. The story goes like this: an aging lesbian couple, together for four decades, both now find themselves confined to the same nursing home, but unable to see one another.

Competing Kingdoms: Women, Mission, Nation, and the American Protestant Empire, 1812-1960

A great deal of important criticism has emerged recently in the area of women’s contributions to the history of evangelical Christianity, and this collection brings together some of the scholars largely responsible for this upsurge in interest.

Whom Not to Marry: Time-Tested Advice from a Higher Authority

After reading Whom Not to Marry by Father Pat Connor, a Catholic priest, I contemplated the different ways to approach this review. I could discuss the practical aspects of this book, but Maureen Dowd already addressed this in a July 6, 2008 op-ed in the New York Times.

Fish Out of Water

In Fish Out of Water, Ky Dickens recalls her effort to reconcile her devout, Christian faith with her homosexuality. She claims she feels like a “fish out of water,” because, after coming out during her senior year of college at Vanderbilt, she was ostracized from her academic community, but, at the same time, didn’t quit feel an affinity to the gay community at large.

Jesus Boy

Star-crossed intergenerational love between a Christian matriarch and a young church pianist sounds like an unlikely fictional masterpiece, but in Jesus Boy, Preston L.

Jesus Girls: True Tales of Growing Up Female and Evangelical

Jesus Girls is a truly beautiful array of humbling feelings and bittersweet experiences, from fears of generational sin to tales of exchanging the pants off your own body with those from a hitchhiker. Divided into sections—community, worship, education, gender and sex, and story and identity—many of the stories were first printed in publications like Geez Magazine.

Girl Mary: A Novel

The Mary in _Girl Mary__ is known by many names and revered by many people. Type “Mary” into Google and the first match is a Wikipedia entry for “Mary (mother of Jesus),” her best known role. She is a major player in the spirituality of millions, yet much of her life remains a mystery.

Not That Kind of Girl

Carlene Bauer was a seven-year-old child when her mother became a born-again Christian, catapulting the family into a regimen that put avoiding devilish distraction front and center.

A Cup of Comfort, Women of the Bible Devotional: Daily Reflections Inspired by Scripture's Most Beloved Heroines

Let’s face it, regardless of our daily routines or obligations we can all use a bit of comfort from time to time. As such, I would strongly recommend A Cup of Comfort Women of the Bible Devotional, which I found to be less of a daily devotional and more of a mystical adventure. It seemed that each day’s message had been distinctly crafted just for me.

Losing My Religion: How I Lost My Faith Reporting on Religion in America and Found Unexpected Peace

Faith: not wanting to know what is true.- Frederick Nietzsche William Lobdell was a twenty-something flake. He blew one marriage and was on his way to blowing a second when a friend dragged him to a gathering of evangelical Christians. Lobdell was born again, and he started attending Sunday services. His wife, a lapsed Catholic, appreciated his newfound Christianity and joined with him in a subsequent odyssey through various Christian denominations. Lobdell was a born again with one difference: he was a journalist.

Lumo: One Young Woman's Struggle to Heal in a Nation Beset By War

Lumo is a documentary, named after its central character, of an African woman healing from a rape endured by military men that left her with a medical condition called fistula, a tear in the wall between the vagina and bladder caused by violent rape. It left her incontinent and uncertain of her chances to birth children.

My Sister, My Love: The Intimate Story of Skyler Rampike

My Sister, My Love is Joyce Carol Oates’ thirty-fifth novel in forty-five years.

Quiverfull: Inside the Christian Patriarchy Movement

When I attended a production of Jesus Christ Superstar as a wee lad of fifteen, I marveled at the song-writing, vocal skills, and daunting cross that loomed amidst a gloomy set design. Being then (and now) agnostic, I was appalled by the religious persecution depicted. I have always been puzzled by the penultimate utterance of Jesus.

Christotainment: Selling Jesus through Popular Culture

For years now, “Bible-thumping ideology” has clashed with a mainstream popular culture that seems to stand for everything fundamentalist Christians oppose. That is, however, until fundamentalist Christians discovered how they could harness the power of popular culture to sell their own messages of purity, penance, and prayer. This is where Shirley Steinberg and Joe Kincheloe’s anthology Christotainment: Selling Jesus through Popular Culture begins.

Witnessing Suburbia: Conservatives and Christian Youth Culture

The short disclaimer is this: I grew up in a family filled with the Holy Spirit. My grandfathers were, respectively, a theology professor and a youth and music minister. One of my uncles, after making his name founding a Phoenix-area megachurch in the '90s, currently works as a professional church-grower, teaching other pastors how to rapidly expand their soon-to-be behemoth congregations of believers.

Wannabes, Goths, and Christians: The Boundaries of Sex, Style, and Status

Labels—freak, geek, wigger, poser, prep, to name just a few—are plentiful and ever-expanding, flourishing in the fertile social grounds of high school and college. Often, labels are used against individuals, assigned and branded as tools of marginalization and preservation of social hierarchies. Amy C.

Dating Jesus: A Story of Fundamentalism, Feminism, and the American Girl

As a feminist who was raised within the Christian fundamentalist paradigm, I was immediately drawn to this memoir. Though Susan Campbell and I come from different flavors of fundamentalism, all of the experiences she writes about ring true.

Night of Sorrows

If you only knew the basic plot of Frances Sherwood’s Night of Sorrows, you might think it was a novel set in the 21st century. It’s a story about an invasion done in the name of a higher good with an ulterior motive of wealth. And it’s hard to tell who the good guys are because both sides are nowhere close to being saints. But this isn’t a story about America’s invasion of Iraq, Middle East terrorism, oil or the altruistic spread of democracy.

End of Silence

End of Silence is a powerfully themed album with dynamic vocals and a wonderful message. Jasen, Mike, Randy, Anthony and Hayden provide outstanding lyrical talents with matching musical prowess as well. The theme is one of powerful spirituality along with haunting soul-searching lyrics.

The Book of Mary

Initially, this novel annoyed me. It begins with the story of Mary at the age of 14. She is of marriageable age, but she is a willful girl who is not only literate, but a teenager with ideas of her own. She sneaks out at night, and catches the eye of a young man named Jeremiah at a brothel, where she is allowed to dance. Joseph is there, too, and he has his eye on Mary, but she finds him to be dull. Mary and Jeremiah fall in love, and Mary gets pregnant. She then finds that Jeremiah is a rogue.

The Secret Magdalene

Although the daughter of a privileged affluent Jewish aristocrat, Mariamne is unable to overtly display her love of learning as females do not obtain a formal education. Thus, she secretly studies whatever she, her personal slave, Tata, or her father’s ward, Salome, can borrow books without anyone knowing. After becoming ill, she began hearing voices in her head that she assumed were prophecies even as she fully recovers from her ailment.
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