I hope you enjoy this reflection of mine, published on Wallflower Journal!
“Virtue consists in rejoicing and loving and hating aright.”
THE MUSIC POST
I came from a musical family. My sister earned a graduate degree in music and is now a music educator. My mother and grandmother were both piano teachers. Music is a very deep part of me, even if many days go by now where I do not practice (but we can remedy that). I hope you enjoy this section of Aristotle as much as I did.
HIGHLIGHTS (COMMONPLACE QUOTES):
Virtue consists in rejoicing and loving and hating aright.
Education should be based upon three principles – the mean, the possible, the becoming, these three.
Enthusiasm is an emotion of the ethical part of the soul.
They should be taught music in such a way as to become not only critics but performers.
NARRATION:
Music not only provides rest, but it also provides “active recreation.” Even more so, music has power to form the character and the soul. When hearing a melody, people cannot help but be “swayed” to sympathy with what they are hearing. Music imprints on the very nature of our soul, making us feel at turns angry, courageous, sad, happy, and everything else. This “virtual reality” experience is not so far from actual reality, at least in terms of how our brain understands it. Therefore, music is a very strong propaedeutic tool. As we might expect, some types of music weaken and slacken our character, while others give rise to a “moderate and settled” temper. The use of music in studies can help mitigate that “difficulty in learning” which we mentioned last time, and “sweeten” the youth’s taste for study.
So much for the power and value of music. Now let us turn our attention to whether or not children should learn to play it themselves. Aristotle’s first point is that learning to play music will inevitably shape the soul of the child. Children need some kind of amusement and occupation, so they may as well learn to play instruments. Being able to play will also make them more suitable as judges, both of music, and even as legislators or politicians [which, as we have seen throughout these narrations, was very important to all the Greeks – being able to have worthwhile judgments on things. People’s opinion as such was quite simply irrelevant. They needed to have opinions worth having, which means they needed to demonstrate worthy character, in order for others to listen to what they had to say]. How much should the youth study? Aristotle says they should stop short of being able to participate in professional competitions, as these are essentially a waste of time. But they should study until they can enjoy “noble” melodies and rhythms, and not just “common” ones.
Aristotle then discusses which instruments the youth should learn. He gives his opinion on the flute, the harp, the voice, lyre, triangle, and many others. It seems he does not like any of them, at least, not when they are being performed by hired musicians (for in his opinion, receiving payment for musical performances degrades the work). He turns his attention to the various rhythms and harmonies which can be taught and says he will discuss them broadly, not in too much detail.
Aristotle states that music has three purposes: (1) to promote relaxation and intellectual enjoyment, (2) education and (3) purification. Depending on what kind of emotions a particular melody excites, it may be used for either education or purification. Aristotle essentially distinguishes between somber, “manly” music (which subdues the passions), and music which stirs up all kinds of passions from pity to sadness to excitement and religious fervor. Aristotle says that the elderly should sing gentle melodies, which are more appropriate to their energy level, while the young men should sing strong, warlike melodies.
APPLICATION
- I was so inspired by how Aristotle says that listening to good music can cultivate good character. It inspired me to turn on my Ancient Faith Radio app and listen to the Global Music channel for a while, while doing dishes. Additionally, I have been slowly listening to many of the composers recommended in the Ambleside Online Composer Study, which seems to represent quite a wide range of world music (mostly Western, from medieval to modern times). This is a common thread I sense in Aristotle – he encourages us to adopt what are generally deemed stodgy, old-fashioned attitudes (like preferring classical music), on the grounds that these choices simply and ultimately lead to virtue. In addition to all of this, I recently discovered “Music as Medicine,” based on the idea that certain vibrations can heal. Without subscribing to New Age beliefs, I can definitely say that listening to this kind of music is extremely soothing. I find myself falling in love with the sounds of flutes, human voice, and bells, mixed over sounds from nature like crickets, frogs, laughing brooks, and thunderstorms. Truly, the Creation is extremely musical.
- As a young child, I remember driving to church. We had almost a 40-minute commute. It always baffled my young mind to see people out and about on Sunday morning. Don’t they know it’s church? I remember singing a church melody in my head for almost the whole commute, and being drawn to tears for anyone who would go their whole life without knowing such beautiful music. I grew up in the American Russian Orthodox tradition, which has some extremely beautiful music. I am sharing some very top highlights below, these songs are deep in my soul. You do not have to speak Russian to appreciate the music itself, but I will provide a translation for the Russian titles.
- Paschal Music from the Paschal Midnight Liturgy (Easter Mass) at the Trinity-St. Sergius Lavra, located outside Moscow, Russia. This recording was from late Soviet times, when it was still somewhat illegal to be Christian. Listen all the way through for a chillingly beautiful expression of the joy of the Resurrected Christ, performed by men (monks) who have dedicated their entire life to serving God. For my very most favorite hymn EVER (“Christ is Risen”, arranged by Alexander Kastalsky), fast forward to 25:04. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TC_q6CL8gzo
- “It is Truly Meet,” an ancient hymn to Mary, the Mother of God. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLCDmXz0bks
- “Glory to God in the Highest” (in English), from the Orthodox Matins (morning) service, performed by the nuns of St. Paisius Monastery in Arizona. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wd_2pnxyeSg
- An interesting thought came to me during the section on how music shapes our character through the vicarious experience of listening. I wonder if Virtual Reality can be harnessed for building virtue? Although I do think it is important to be fully aware of the addictive natural of digital technology, I am also inspired by those who find a way to harness its power for good purposes, like Bishop Barron and Doug Wilson. We shouldn’t condemn all new technology out of hand, that’s far too simple. Instead, let’s think of ALL the possible good things we can do with it, and hold ourselves to that standard instead. “Do the one (abstain when necessary and control ourselves) without leaving the other undone (researching, employing, investing, multiplying).”
- In the section where Aristotle says music can be used to sweeten the burdens of study for students, I wonder if he would approve of the use of background music during studies? I think he just meant the study of music, but it’s an interesting thought. Despite what I said in the first point of this section, I principally tend to eschew the use of music as background noise and think we should give our attention to it fully, so as to fully appreciate it. For one thing, it is only in the very recent past that we have been able to create and listen to recordings of music. Historically, music was a communal experience, which today we have all but lost. That reminds me of another dream I had, which was to share Orthodox Christian music with the greater public by “busking” (playing music in public, like on a park or city bench) and maybe even doing a whole prayer service outside, near a well-trafficked area. (Orthodox prayer services are almost 100% sung.)
- This whole section about music inspired me to invest more time and effort into studying the guitar and acquiring a piano.
- The point about studying breeding good taste really stuck with me. We can’t appreciate the truly good melodies, says Aristotle, until we are well-versed in playing the instruments themselves. This is so hopeful to me as a form of growth mindset! As an analogy to something I spend more time on currently, if I am having trouble enjoying or even digesting difficult reading right now, I can rest assured that by continuing to plod through, and by engaging in practices like this narration which help me digest bite-sized chunks of knowledge, my taste will, in time, develop.
- I so wonder what Aristotle would have thought of our capitalist society. Is it true that doing anything for money vulgarizes it? I think there might be a sense in which taking pride in something enough to ask for, or accept, money for it can encourage one to hone one’s craft.
- “They should be taught music in such a way as to become not only critics but performers.” I love this idea that we should be producing as much as we consume, or at least not being consumers only. I believe this is all the more important for Christians. As Dorothy Sayers wrote in The Mind of the Maker back in 1941, there is a new divorce between the Church and the world of art. We need to bring the two back together in order to once again create a beautiful heritage for future generations, instead of letting the world of art be colonized by agnosticism and atheism.
- “Enthusiasm is an emotion of the ethical part of the soul.” I think by this, Aristotle means that there is both an ethical and an unethical way of showing enthusiasm. I would be interested to think more about what these are, particularly the ethical ways!
Questions for discussion:
I would love to hear any of your thoughts!
What do you think constitutes good music?
What have been your experiences learning to play an instrument?
What do you think about listening to music in the background while doing something else?
Any favorite religious hymns, or, favorite composers of any kind of music?
8 Ways To Cultivate Joyfulness In The New Year
I hope you enjoy my article published on the delightful Wallflower Journal on being happier in the new year!
Read: 8 Ways To Cultivate Joyfulness In The New Year
“To be seeking always after the useful does not become free and exalted souls.”
Commonplace Quotes and Narration: Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics and Politics (excerpted from The Great Tradition, edited by Richard Gamble)
I am so excited to dive into Aristotle, y’all! What a rich treasure trove of quotes and insightful ideas, which have stood the test of time and become the basis for so much of Western thought.
HIGHLIGHTS FROM READING (COMMONPLACE QUOTES):
“It would seem to be the duty of the individual to assist his own children and friends to attain virtue, or even if not able to do so successfully, at all events to make this his aim.”
“Individual treatment is better than a common system, in education as in medicine.”
“Courage is found associated, not with the greatest ferocity, but with a gentle and lion-like temper.”
“What is noble, not what is brutal, should have the first place. No wolf or other wild animal will face a really noble danger; such dangers are for the brave man.”
“Now obviously youth are not to be instructed with a view to their amusement, for learning is no pleasure, but is accompanied with pain. Neither is intellectual enjoyment suitable to boys of that age, for it is the end, and that which is imperfect cannot attain the perfect or the end.”
NARRATIONS:
Nicomachean Ethics, Book X
Aristotle begins this section by noting that it is difficult to be brought up “temperately and hardily,” therefore, laws should regulate the upbringing of youth, so they become accustomed to temperate and hardy living. Additionally, the youth must practice and ingrain the lessons they have learned. Therefore, laws must also regulate the behavior of adults. For even if people do not want to do what is right just because it is right, they will want to escape punishment by law. Aristotle explains the benefits of legislating morality. There is a tension or balance between legislating rules for everyone, and taking individual circumstances and cases into consideration. We need to be able to do both. Therefore, a virtuous person should be familiar with the “science of legislation.” Should we have everyone study political science? But those who teach political science (the sophists) are not the same as those who practice it (the politicians). This is the only discipline where the masters of the subject are not the ones who teach it. We should be wary of these unskilled sophists. Should we simply have people read compilations of laws? But without expert guidance, how can they interpret these laws?
Politics, Book VIII
The legislator’s #1 priority should be the education of the youth. This means that we should suit children for the type of government under which they will grow up. Education should be public and common. All of us belong to the state, we should not labor under the delusion that we are independent.
Aristotle now turns his attention to the character and content of this free, public education. First of all, we must decide which is most important to pass on: moral virtue, intellectual virtue, or practical, useful life skills. We must not teach or pass on any skill that will degrade or “vulgarize” the mind or body of the pupil, and render it less capable of exercising virtue.
The four branches of education are: reading and writing, gymnastics, music, and drawing. Reading, writing and drawing are the most useful, while gymnastics makes people more courageous. Music is useful insofar as it enables us to use our leisure time well, and “the first principle of all action is leisure” (we work to live, not live to work). If we do not know how to use our leisure time well, we will simply amuse ourselves to death. Amusement is useful and necessary for the relaxation of those who have hard jobs, but leisure is superior to it, for it “gives pleasure and happiness and enjoyment of life.” Therefore, the subject of music is an end in itself. Reading, writing, drawing and gymnastics all have some other use or purpose. And so we should keep this in mind when planning a curriculum for our students. We want them to live a happy life, therefore, we should give them the means to actively enjoy themselves intellectually, and not simply bounce between work and relaxation all the time.
Parents, like those in Lacedemonia (Sparta) who devote their children excessively to gymnastics, vulgarize them by making them unfit, unprepared, or unskilled for any other activity. In general, gymnastic education for the young should be light and moderate, not interfering with mental study.
Aristotle now dives into his discussion on music. What is the purpose of learning it, and why should we learn it? Why is it not enough for us to simply enjoy listening to it? Aristotle replies that “it makes the hearts of men glad,” and that is a good enough reason to learn it. And we will stop there for today!!! Super rich discussion on the merits of music coming up next time!
APPLICATION:
Oh man! How much do we vulgarize ourselves and our children through the use of screens and digital media? Check out the two excellent recent posts from Peco and Ruth Gaskovski on ways to slow down and enjoy our real life (not our digital one): How to Grow a Garden in the Technopoly and Fasting from the Virtual, Feasting on the Real. So grateful for the work these two are doing, and their leadership in the “anachronistic community”!
This whole concept also reminds me of the idea of scholé or leisure (as in Josef Pieper’s Leisure, the Basis of Culture). This is essentially active rest. It is not doing nothing, but it is doing things that are pleasurable and worthy in themselves. I often find myself procrastinating scholé because it takes effort and is not “productive,” but this wake-up call from Aristotle reminds me that the practice of leisure is essential for happiness! Some to-do items on my scholé list include: working in my garden, memorizing Scripture, and creating more resources for my blog readers.
Finally, I had some thoughts on the idea that learning is supposed to be difficult, not cater to our students’ amusement, because the end is years down the road. As C. S. Lewis writes in The Weight of Glory:
The schoolboy beginning Greek grammar cannot look forward to his adult enjoyment of Sophocles as a lover looks forward to marriage or a general to victory. He has to begin by working for marks, or to escape punishment, or to please his parents, or, at best, in the hope of a future good which he cannot at present imagine or desire. […] the reward he is going to get will, in actual fact, be a natural or proper reward, but he will not know that till he has got it. Of course, he gets it gradually; enjoyment creeps in upon the mere drudgery, and nobody could point to a day or an hour when the one ceased and the other began. But it is just insofar as he approaches the reward that he becomes able to desire it for its own sake; indeed, the power of so desiring it is itself a preliminary reward.
The Christian, in relation to heaven, is in much the same position as this schoolboy. Those who have attained everlasting life in the vision of God doubtless know very well that it is no mere bribe, but the very consummation of their earthly discipleship; but we who have not yet attained it cannot know this in the same way, and cannot even begin to know it at all except by continuing to obey and finding the first reward of our obedience in our increasing power to desire the ultimate reward.
C. S. Lewis
What a beautiful commentary, and symbolic connection between our secular studies and our Christian life!
This is so important. As a teacher, I am still struggling against the tendency to want to please my students in the moment. How to build a trusting relationship with them and pass on my true enthusiasm for subjects, but still grow their capacity for grit, resilience, and antifragility. It is a true challenge and ideal towards which to strive!
Let me know your thoughts in the comments!
Narration: Isocrates, “Antidosis”
It was a busy week and I took a few days off from reading the Great Tradition. I finished the short remaining section on Plato’s Laws and read the excerpt from Xenophon’s Memorabilia, but wasn’t inspired to narrate what I found in either. Moving onto Isocrates’ (436-338 B.C.) Antidosis:
Narration:
Isocrates notes the debate between those who say that philosophy is corrupting the youth, and those who are teaching philosophy to the youth. He undertakes to get to the bottom of this and find out which is the truth. As he is one of these teachers of philosophy to the youth, he states that he will first explain the nature of this education, and then why he thinks that it is beneficial.
He starts at the beginning by explaining that since man is composed of body and mind, our ancestors created one system to train the body, which is gymnastics, and one to train the mind, which is philosophy. As the mind is superior to the body, philosophy is superior to gymnastics, but these two disciplines go hand in hand. Isocrates then notes that, while teachers can improve upon natural talent in their students, especially when the students practice, they cannot magically wave a wand and make everybody into an amazing human being. Thus, Isocrates tells all of his prospective students that they must have a natural aptitude, they must absorb his teaching, and they must practice to the best of their ability.
Isocrates then remarks that the primary quality that a good orator needs is natural talent, followed by practical experience. Education is not as important as these two qualities. Isocrates notices a dynamic whereby those who are envious of the success of others, yet do not take any action to cultivate their own skill, grow resentful of the effort being forth and subsequent progress made by others toward this goal. They have a seemingly fatalist mentality, and want to prevent others from becoming the masters of their own fate. However, this is hypocritical, because one of the Goddesses is “Persuasion,” and they worship her. Furthermore, they show their hypocrisy in their preference for gymnastic training over philosophical training, as though the body were more important than the mind.
Isocrates then goes on to praise the art of persuasion and speech as the most human of the arts. Language is the means by which we establish laws, teach right from wrong, and make the ignorant wise. Nevertheless, there are those like Lysimachus who disparage the teaching of rhetoric, as well as astronomy and music, on the grounds that these subjects are highly theoretical and abstract, and have no application to practical life. Isocrates answers that this is true, but that study of these subjects sharpens the mind and prepares it for the study of other subjects.
Isocrates then moves on to discuss philosophy. He begins by defining it: Philosophy is a study which allows man to make better decisions. He then proceeds to give examples of what he means. Isocrates says that it is impossible to make wicked men good, but it is possible to make average men better, if they learn to speak well, persuade their hearers, and “seize their advantage.” In order to speak well, men must first select a noble cause about which to speak, and then find the most shining and glorious examples. Through meditating on these good, true and lovely things, people will begin imitating the good examples, and fruit will come from their life. In order to persuade one’s hearers, one must live a worthy life, so that one’s words will carry more weight among people, because of one’s good and worthy reputation. Isocrates then defines what he means by “seizing the advantage”: it essentially means leading a sinless life – doing what is good, not leaving anything undone, even if on the surface one would profit by doing the wrong thing. In other words, this differs from garnering a good reputation, because this is more about what you do when no one is looking.
Isocrates notes that today in Athens, all these rules are turned upside-down: men are said to “have the advantage” when they defraud others, they are said to be gifted when they are given to mocking and buffoonery, they call philosophers those who split hairs and argue about pointless things, while ignoring those who are actually engaged in the good work of governing society.
(Leaving off here for today – I’ll pick back up later)
Application:
What stood out to me most from today’s reading was the section where Isocrates explains how by endeavoring to become a persuasive person, one can also become virtuous. It reminded me of how I have committed to write 500 words every day and the benefits I am seeing in myself from doing so. First, as Isocrates notes, we must choose worthy subjects to speak (or write) on. This is challenging enough! I find myself finding inspiration and taking mental notes after conversations with friends more and more. I think I can learn a lot from his second point, which is immersing ourselves in good examples. There is far too much emphasis in our individualistic culture on originality. Instead, we should focus on retelling good stories in our own words, familiarizing ourselves with virtuous and inspiring people, being well-read, and sticking to tradition. There are so many great things to write about without feeling like we need to have an original take. We can write about other writers and their masterpieces, great artists and their masterpieces, or elements of our religious tradition. I’m inspired to go “old-school” and stem the flow of meaningless, self-centered words. Instead, let’s turn our attention to “a light that is so lovely that [people] want with all their hearts to know the source of it” (Madeleine L’Engle).
Commonplace Quotes:
None from this reading yet, but how about this:
We draw people to Christ not by loudly discrediting what they believe, by telling them how wrong they are and how right we are, but by showing them a light that is so lovely that they want with all their hearts to know the source of it.
Madeleine L’Engle
Note, she doesn’t say that we don’t use words to do this!
What are your favorite things to write and talk about? How do you manage the pressure to “be original”?
Narration and Commonplace Quotes: The Spiritual Roots of the Ecological Crisis by Jean-Claude Larchet
This is the second book I will be working through on this blog. I am reading The Spiritual Roots of the Ecological Crisis by Jean-Claude Larchet, published in 2022. It is part of my list of books to read this year, falling into my “Orthodox Christianity” category.
Today I read the Introduction, and got partway through the first chapter.
Narration:
Introduction
Larchet defines ecology as a movement to protect nature in the wake of the industrial revolution. He notes the response of the various Christian churches to ecology, especially Patriarch Dimitrios’s establishment of September 1 as an annual holiday to honor God’s creation. The Russian Church, in turn, has established the first Sunday in September as a day of prayer for the creation. Larchet notes that Orthodox monasteries often live out an ecological commitment by the way they tend their own gardens and livestock. Larchet then turns his attention to the secular forms of ecology, which arose in the 1970s. He notes the parallels between ecology as a religion, with sin and redemption, but then concludes that when understood within an Orthodox Christian context, ecology finds balance in a centuries-long tradition. Larchet questions whether an ancient, spiritual tradition such as Orthodoxy is qualified to address a modern, scientific problem like ecology. He concludes that at the heart of the ecological problem is a wrong mindset and lifestyle, manifested in wrong ways in which man relates to the creation. Therefore, its resolution is spiritual. Larchet explains that in the present work, two underlying themes will be present, which also characterize his other work: the first being a description of various illnesses and their cures, and the second being a focus on the work of St. Maximus the Confessor.
Chapter 1 | How It Was in the Beginning: Man’s Original Relationship with Nature
Larchet turns his attention to the book of Genesis, which symbolically tells us what man’s relationship with the creation was like, when both were still in a state of paradise. The creation was entirely good, as the writer of Genesis repeats several times in the first chapter.
Larchet addresses the privileged position of man within the creation, and the criticism on the part of adherents to other religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, and paganism or shamanism) regarding this preeminence. These critics would instead give central importance to nature, placing man off to the side. However, in Christianity, the Bible and Orthodox tradition teach that man was the crown of creation, and that God created all the rest of creation for the sake of man. St. John of Damascus writes about how every plant and animal not only has a use for man, but also leads man to contemplate God. Additionally, we can see that man is the crown of creation for several reasons. First, he is created as the culmination of progressively more complex entities. Second, he is a microcosm of the universe, containing within himself everything that the world has to offer. Next, he is superior to every other created being, because he is both material and intellectual. Additionally, he is the only perceptible creature (meaning, one with a body) which also has free will, and is the only one created in the image and likeness of God. Being in the image of God means that he is endowed with intellect, free will, and reason. Being in his likeness refers to the seeds of virtue in his soul, which he may cultivate. Therefore, man is not only a microcosm but a micro-God. Once again, Larchet notes that man’s preeminence over creation is symbolized by his final entrance onto the scene, after everything else had been prepared, as a king arriving at a banquet where everything has been made ready. Finally, God calls man in three different places in Genesis to have dominion over the whole created world, especially plants and animals.
Because man unites within himself the whole cosmos, he is essentially a mediator between the world and God. Adam failed at this, but Christ, the new Adam, accomplishes it. Additionally, Larchet notes that “Be fruitful and multiply” is understood in the Church not only as referring to procreation, but to increase in virtue.
Larchet notes that in the beginning, man was not to eat animals. This squares with everything we know about prehistory: the hunting of game came after foraging for fruits. Nevertheless, man was called to work, even in the garden. There are three reasons for this. First, so that man will never forget that God is his master. Second, to remind him of his responsibility – the preconditions for enjoying the garden. Third, to involve man synergistically in the life of God and in his own redemption, which is a cornerstone of Orthodox theology.
All of this notwithstanding, man is not the only reason why God made creation. Rather, the creation came from an overflow of God’s love, which we see in the incredible beauty and diversity of all created species, as well as in the fact that they exist in places where they will never be seen by people. Larchet goes on to share several beautiful quotes from Orthodox thinkers, which detail the ways that all of these plants and animals and other entities praise God, each in their own way.
Commonplace Quotes:
As God is good, and beyond all goodness, He was not content to contemplate Himself alone; but through His overflowing goodness it pleased Him to bring forth beings who would profit from His liberality and participate in His goodness. He brings from non-being to being and creates the whole universe, visible and invisible, and man, composed of both the visible and invisible.
St. John of Damascus
Each blade of grass, each insect, an ant, a gilded bee, […] witness to the divine mystery and fulfil it themselves continually.
Fyodor Dostoevsky
Every dumb and inanimate creature trembled and protested in its own way with its own language. The dumb earth shook—this is its language. The rocks were rent—this is their language. The Sun hid its light—this is its language. All inanimate creatures protested in their own ways. For all these inanimate creatures are subject to Him as once in Paradise they were subject to Adam. For all the inanimate creatures know Him as once they knew Adam in Paradise. How it could be possible that creatures without senses should know Him and obey Him, we cannot tell. This comes from the inner sensitivity of these creatures imparted by the word with which God created them. […] The earth shook, the rocks were rent, and the Sun hid its rays as much in anger as in pain. All nature was afflicted by the sufferings of the One who had called them from non-being and bid them rejoice in their being. It was as if they said: “With whom will I be left and who will sustain me now, when He who upholds all things suffers death?”
St. Nicholas Velimirovich
Peoples exult, nations give ear: Christ is arisen bringing us joy!
St. Nicholas Velimirovich
Dance ye stars, ye mountains sing: Christ is arisen bringing us joy!
Whisper ye forests blow ye winds: Christ is arisen bringing us joy!
Thunder ye seas and roar ye beasts: Christ is arisen bringing us joy!
Hum ye bees and sing ye birds: Christ is arisen bringing us joy!
Let the heavens bow down and the earth arise: Christ is arisen bringing us joy!
Application:
Just reading about ecology always reminds me of several latent goals: to strive for a zero-waste lifestyle; to declutter my pantry and freezer; to increase my skill at making clothes and other home goods by hand; to work on my garden. This week, I took advantage of the rain-soaked earth (our yard is pure clay, making it very hard to till in the summertime) to turn over some ground and scatter some Calendula seeds.
The discussion on the differences between Eastern or pagan religions and Christianity reminded me to pray for some loved ones who are being captivated by these false teachings.
I was interested during the discussion on man being made in God’s image, about the difference between intellect and reason.
Finally, during the discussion of the beauty and diversity of creation, I was reminded to purchase some coffee table books or field guides on animals and other life forms, especially books that describe local trees, mushrooms, insects, amphibians, and other animals, native to this part of California.
Narration and Commonplace Quotes, Plato’s “Laws”
I will be trying something new here: practicing the art of narration as I dive into some heady books. I’m working through Richard W. Gamble’s anthology on education, The Great Tradition. Today, I got halfway through the excerpt of Plato’s Laws. Here is my narration (retelling in my own words) of the passage, as well as a few commonplace quotes (quotes I want to remember, because I found them beautiful or thought-provoking) and some application for my own life.
Narration: In the excerpt from Book I, the unnamed Athenian and Cleinias discuss education. The Athenian says that education begins in the nursery and should consist in the child practicing and growing to love the very thing which he is destined for as an adult. His soul should be trained to love what he must love, even as his body and mind become accustomed from the youngest age to fulfill the work that will be laid out for him as an adult, whether this is undertaken in seriousness or in play. True education is education in virtue, towards citizenship and right ruling and obeying, not merely mental or physical training.
Next, in the excerpt from Book VII, the Athenian describes the two types of education: gymnastic, which is concerned with the training of the body, and music, concerned with the training of the soul. He then delineates the two types of gymnastic training, which are wrestling and dancing. He connects these to their usefulness both in wartime and peacetime. He complains about governments which change the sports of the youth, and thus disrupt the transmission of a common culture from the older to the younger generations, and spoil the appreciation of the younger generation for tradition and antiquity. Because the young are being taught in this way not to revere tradition, they will ultimately grow up to overthrow their government in favor of a new one which better suits them, which is a great evil. Therefore, new varieties of songs and dances must be prohibited. One way in which this can be accomplished is to dedicate songs and dances to the gods, goddesses and festivals. Then, those who break custom and sing the wrong songs on the wrong occasions will be ostracized. The Athenian suggests a new law to this effect, but then says that it cannot be enforced, because it is similar to what already goes on during sacrifices, when the relative of one being sacrificed blasphemes the gods, even though this is prohibited. So, as a more realistic law, the Athenian simply suggests prohibiting all evil songs. He also suggests creating a law that prayers should be offered to the gods during sacrifice, and another law that the poets composing the prayers should be very careful to ask for good and not evil from the gods. However, the poets themselves do not always know what is good or evil, so this third law should be modified to have the poets submit all prayers to judges and authorities for approval, before they are prayed. The Athenian proposes a fourth law, that those who have died after living a good life should be honored with eulogies, with songs and dances. The songs, dances and poems used for this purpose should be old and classic, selected by judges not less than fifty years old, although people need to be brought up on this old music or they will not appreciate it. The songs, poems and dances need to be carefully selected in order to match the character of the person they are praising, otherwise there will be a disharmonious result.
Commonplace Quotes:
The most important part of education is right training in the nursery. The soul of the child in his play should be guided to the love of that sort of excellence in which when he grows up to manhood he will have to be perfected.
For we are not speaking of education in this narrower sense, but of that other education in virtue from youth upwards, which makes a man eagerly pursue the ideal perfection of citizenship, and teaches him how rightly to rule and how to obey. This is the only education which, upon our view, deserves the name; that other sort of training, which aims at the acquisition of wealth or bodily strength, or mere cleverness apart from intelligence and justice, is mean and illiberal, and is not worthy to be called education at all.
Those who are rightly educated generally become good men.
Application: It is so important to train our children from the youngest ages in the love of God and other people. (This is how, as a Christian, I “translate” Plato’s ideas of citizenship and right ruling and obeying. Just put it in the context of us and God. How can we be right citizens of paradise, rightly ruling our passions, and obeying the Lord?) I am slowly working through the Moms on Call toddler book to learn how to discipline my toddler with love and common sense. We are in a tough phase with church attendance, as she cannot stay in the sanctuary for more than ten minutes at a time usually, if that. About 95% of our time there with her is spent outside.
As a young girl, my daughter should be trained in the love of family; taking care of people; keeping the surroundings tidy and clean and neat and beautiful and cozy; and learning how to cook delicious, healthy, attractive, modest food.
I was inspired during the section on hymns and songs to go back to my ongoing project to collect the hymns from my youth (called “special melodies”) and compile them into a binder for the liturgical year.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on these ideas in the comments below!
Have You Read These Authors? Some Classic (and Lesser-Known) Women Writers of Fiction
Children have two basic needs, writes Erich Fromm in The Art of Loving: they need both milk and honey from their parents. Milk symbolizes the care given to physical needs: brush your teeth, drink your orange juice, eat your vegetables, get enough sleep. Honey symbolizes the sweetness of life, that special quality that makes life sing with enjoyment for all it holds. Fromm says, “Most [parents] are capable of giving ‘milk,’ but only a minority of giving ‘honey,’ too.” To give honey, one must love honey and have it to give. Good books are rich in honey, and hence the title of this book.
Gladys Hunt, Honey for a Child’s Heart
If you are a mother, or someone who loves children, and you haven’t read Honey for a Child’s Heart yet, stop now! Close this tab and go read it, then come back. Seriously!
The beautiful quote above explains the vital necessity of reading good books, and among them, fiction. Novels and short stories, so far from being unnecessary fluff, are part of the sweetness of life. When is the last time you enjoyed a good novel or short story? In case the answer is, longer than one day ago, here I am with a wonderful list of not only fiction writers, but specifically women fiction writers.
The Catholics have a beautiful phrase called the “feminine genius.” According to Pope John Paul II, who coined the phrase, this feminine genius means that all women have been endowed by God with a unique gift for serving others. This does not depend on the external femininity of a woman, nor her religion, nor anything else about her; rather, it is given to her as an unalienable birthright. She cannot disinherit it–she can only to choose whether or not to cultivate it.
So, that means that every woman who writes will leave traces of this divine gift in her writing.
I’m indebted in compiling this list to Sarah Clarkson, who introduced me to several of these women and their works through her excellent guide, Book Girl.
Without further ado, please read on for my suggested reading list of women authors and their works of fiction, seven for each side of the Atlantic, in chronological order. I’ve included just a few tidbits of information about these women’s lives, as well as a quote, either from the authors themselves, or from someone else about the authors. Enjoy!
British Women Fiction Writers
(1) Jane Austen (1775-1817)
Faith Tradition: Church of England
Family Situation: Unmarried
Selected Works: Persuasion, Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Emma
[In Jane Austen’s works,] there is, rather, the gentle and expert probing of a woman who observed human nature with sympathy, wisdom, and kindness, demonstrating the way that love in ordinary time must often travel the rocky ground of pride, silence, and inherited prejudice.
Sarah Clarkson
(2) Elizabeth Gaskell (1810-1865)
Faith Tradition: Unitarian
Family Situation: Married to William Gaskell, mother of 5
Selected Works: Cranford (1853), North and South (1855), Wives and Daughters (1866)
How deep might be the romance in the lives of some of those who elbowed me daily in the busy streets of the town in which I resided. I had always felt a deep sympathy with the careworn men, who looked as if doomed to struggle through their lives in strange alternations between work and want.
Elizabeth Gaskell
(3) George Eliot, pen name of Mary Ann Evans (1819-1880)
Faith Tradition: Agnostic
Family Situation: Married, no children
Selected Works: Scenes of Clerical Life (1857); Adam Bede (1859); The Mill on the Floss (1860); Silas Marner (1861); Middlemarch (1872); Daniel Deronda (1876).
The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.
George Eliot, Middlemarch
(4) Sheila Kaye-Smith (1887-1956)
Faith Tradition: Catholic
Family Situation: Married to Theodore Fry, no children
Novel: The End of the House of Alard
As characters who break with Victorian convention, Gervase and Jenny most deeply honor the truths at the heart of Kaye-Smith’s vision of English tradition, a tradition that, she implicitly argues, is deeply consonant with Catholic understandings of human equality and equal dignity across lines of class and gender, by contrast with the rigidly hierarchical and frequently devaluing conventions of Victorian socioeconomic stratification.
Katy Carl
(5) Elizabeth Goudge (1900-1984)
Faith Tradition: Church of England
Family Situation: Unmarried
Selected Works: Gentian Hill, A City of Bells, The Little White Horse, The Scent of Water, The Bird in the Tree, The Dean’s Watch, The Rosemary Tree, Pilgrims’ Inn, and Green Dolphin Street
As a writer, Goudge combines a Dickensian talent for character description and plot twist, with a Montgomeryish delight in the created world and the sacramental vision of a poet like Gerard Manley Hopkins. Her books are a juxtaposition of wry, amused, and very English evocations of human folly and desire, with an almost mystical vision that recognizes in the beauty of the earth, in the making of home, and in the rhythms of worship the real presence of God, charging the earth with his grandeur, as Hopkins would say.
Sarah Clarkson
(6) Barbara Pym (1913-1980)
Faith Tradition: Church of England
Family Situation: Unmarried
Selected Works: Excellent Women, A Glass of Blessings, and Quartet in Autumn
That word “spinster” is key to understanding Pym’s persistent and seemingly resurgent appeal. Critics often compare Pym to Jane Austen, but several people at the conference told me that they regard her novels as comfort reading precisely because they forsake Austen’s happy endings: her spinsters remain spinsters, and the breaking off of an engagement often produces more celebration than its announcement.
Hannah Rosefield
(7) Muriel Spark (1918-2006)
Faith Tradition: Catholic
Family Situation: Married and separated from Sidney Spark; mother of 1
Selected Works: Memento Mori and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
In the course of events, Miss Spark’s trim, unloitering narrative reveals a fairly complete gamut of human seaminess. The flesh may lapse after three-score-and-ten, but at least five of the Seven Deadly Sins can still proliferate. So, too, can love, humility, and compassion, though their incidence is relatively infrequent. At one point, the Scotland Yard investigator assembles everyone around a table, and observes: “Without an ever-present sense of death, life is insipid. You might as well live on the whites of eggs.” And the solution of the mystery proceeds from this premise. It is fair, implicit, a little more than temporal, and should disappoint only readers without moral imagination.
Robert Sparks
North American Women Fiction Writers
(1) Elizabeth Prentiss (1818-1878)
Faith Tradition: Puritan/Presbyterian
Family Situation: Married to George Prentiss and mother of 6
Selected Works: Stepping Heavenward and The Home at Greylock
There is no wilderness so dreary but that His love can illuminate it, no desolation so desolate but that He can sweeten it. I know what I am saying. It is no delusion. I believe the highest, purest happiness is known only to those who have learned Christ in sickrooms, in poverty, in racking suspense and anxiety, amid hardships, and at the open grave.
Elizabeth Prentiss
(2) Gene Stratton-Porter (1863-1924)
Faith Tradition: Methodist
Family Situation: Married to Charles Porter and mother of 1
Selected Works: A Girl of the Limberlost, Freckles, The Keeper of the Bees
This book was one of those, like the Anne books, that met me in the formative years of girlhood and modeled what determination, spunk, gentleness, and a holy hunger for life could look like in a young woman. There is a reveling in the beauty of the world in this book, such a hearty faith in what may be accomplished by determination.
Sarah Clarkson
(3) Willa Cather (1873-1947)
Faith Tradition: None
Family Situation: Unmarried
Selected Works: Death Comes for the Archbishop, My Ántonia, The Song of the Lark
A novel of artistry and vocation… As one who creates, I appreciate the realistic portrayal of the hard work vital to artistic success and the way one great vision always inspires another.
Sarah Clarkson
(4) Katherine Anne Porter (1890-1980)
Faith Tradition: Catholic
Family Situation: Married and divorced four times, no children
Selected Works: Noon Wine, The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter
Before Flannery O’Connor emerged as the unofficial patron saint of Catholic Southern Literature, there was Katherine Anne Porter.
Casie Dodd
(5) Pearl S. Buck (1892-1973)
Faith Tradition: Presbyterian
Family Situation: Married twice, mother of 8
Novel: The Good Earth
[D]espite Buck’s rejection of her father’s religious beliefs, she inherited “his evangelical zeal, his sense of rectitude, and his passion for learning … she became, in effect, a secular missionary, bringing the gospels of civil rights and cross-cultural understanding to people on two continents.”
Donald H. Sanborn III
(6) Eudora Welty (1909-2001)
Faith Tradition: Methodist
Family Situation: Unmarried
Selected Works: The Optimist’s Daughter and The Collected Stories
What Welty once wrote of E. B. White’s work could just as easily describe her literary ideal: “The transitory more and more becomes one with the beautiful.” Her three avocations—gardening, current events, and photography—were, like her writing, deeply informed by a desire to secure fragile moments as objects of art.
Danny Heitman
(7) Flannery O’Connor (1925-1964)
Faith Tradition: Catholic
Family Situation: Unmarried
Short Story Collection: Complete Stories
I learned to appreciate the abrupt, untidy endings and to expect catastrophes, which I learned were opportunities for the characters to accept or deny the grace of God. “If you read from a naturalistic perspective,” Monsignor had said, “it’s going to appear grotesque. But if you read it from a supernatural perspective, you’ll see more.” Not only have I gotten better at seeing more than the train wrecks the characters are and the wrecks they make, I’ve grown to enjoy the language and to savor the work, taking nutrition as well as enjoyment.
Kiera Petrick
+++
Have you read these authors? What were your impressions? Who are some of your favorite women authors and what are your favorite works of fiction by them?
An Orthodox Christian Guide to Fasting (by a Layperson)
The Orthodox Christian Church observes a season of fasting from November 15 to December 24 each year in preparation for the Nativity of our Lord, God and Savior Jesus Christ. “Fasting” for the Church means abstaining from normal eating habits: eating less, and more simply. Specifically, for all those who are able, we give up all meat and dairy products, resulting in a plant-based plus shellfish diet for forty days.
The primary reason to fast is to draw closer to God. To this end, fasting as the Church prescribes confers many benefits, both spiritual and physical. Eating less food, and lighter food, heightens focus and alertness, allowing us to become more spiritually aware of ourselves and our areas for improvement.
Fasting is difficult, and a good exercise in self-discipline. By prescribing a fast, the Church is helping us strengthen our willpower. He that is faithful in a little will be faithful in much, and so, by denying ourselves something little, we increase our ability to accept greater and more serious sacrifices for the sake of Christ, if and when we should find ourselves in such a position — which, truthfully, is ever more often.
We do not fast in isolation, but along with the Church around the world. Orthodox Christians in every country take this podvig upon themselves. This is a shared experience across cultures and centuries.
Fasting is an icon, or image, of what we will be like in heaven and what we were like in the Beginning – in the Garden of Eden, when man and woman ate only green plants, no animals. Likewise, it is a vehicle for mercy-giving, as it allows us to simplify our food budgets, and give the leftover money to those who need it.
Fasting pairs well with silence and abstention in other areas of our life. Perhaps we will limit our consumption of podcasts or music, our time on screens or social media.
In general, the call to fast is a call to simplify — to throw off the sin that so easily ensnares us, and to free ourselves from the shackles of our addictions to pleasure and comfort. For freedom Christ has set us free, so let us not return to our yoke of slavery.
Everyone without exception is invited to participate in this spiritual-physical exercise, to the best of their ability. No one who is unable to keep a full fast should feel pressured to do any more than his or her body will allow. Mothers most likely need to consume animal fats and proteins to nourish growing children in the womb or at the breast, as do the children themselves. (As a rule of thumb, children are invited to participate in these more adult spiritual practices, such as fasting or Confession, around the age of six or seven — about when they would start formal studies at school.) Family members with particular dietary needs or habits may require flexibility as well.
That being said, here is an example of how to fast. This can be strived towards and scaled down as necessary.
Meal planning is essential, as is planning for variety amidst simplicity. One way I would like to implement this principle this year is by having a regular weekly meal plan, in which the bare bones of the meal remain the same (rice and beans, salad) but the flavorings change every week. Use what you already have in your pantry — the fast is a great chance to use up those non-perishables that never seem to make it onto the weekly meal rotation otherwise — rice and beans, lentils, grains, and spices. Don’t go overboard on gluten — you want to feel light and free, not groggy and bloated. Rice and beans feed two-thirds of the world on a daily basis, and are gluten-free and a complete protein. Bake homemade bread if your family tolerates gluten well — use a bread maker if you need to save time.
Sample Weekly Meal Plan:
Monday
Breakfast: Oatmeal with flavorings. Experiment with cinnamon, nutmeg, honey, citrus zest, chopped nuts, cacao powder, fruit, maple syrup, canned pumpkin
Lunch: Green smoothie with coconut water, banana, nut butter, maca powder, spirulina, greens (kale or spinach), honey, vanilla, bee pollen
Dinner: Rice and beans (rotate through flavor profiles)
Tuesday
Breakfast: Quinoa with fresh or frozen fruit added halfway through cooking
Lunch: Smoked oysters on crackers
Dinner: Rice and dal
Wednesday
Breakfast: Smoothie – coconut milk base; pineapple, peach, banana or mango; berries; citrus juice; nut butter; honey
Lunch: Hummus and cucumber sandwich on sprouted grain bread
Dinner: Vegetable bean soup
Thursday
Breakfast: Toast with peanut butter, banana, and honey drizzled on top
Lunch: Raw veggies and crackers with hummus
Dinner: Salad with grains and beans — rotate salad greens, grains, beans, toppings, and dressings
Friday
Breakfast: Homemade granola with almond milk
Lunch: Apple slices with peanut butter
Dinner: Canned soup or a frozen entree from Amy’s Kitchen
Saturday
Breakfast: Toast with jam (experiment with different kinds of jam)
Lunch: Salad with grains and beans
Dinner: Seafood stew
Side note, speaking of seafood: why is shellfish allowed, unlike every other type of animal protein? I believe the answer lies in simplicity. My husband has recently fallen in love with crab fishing and mussel and clam harvesting. If you live by the sea as we do, it is so easy to just pick mussels off a rock, dig up clams, or lure some crabs into a hoop net. It’s even easier to boil them up, crack them open and eat them. In Italy, they call seafood “frutti di mare,” fruit of the sea. Much easier than slaying a cow or pig, plucking a chicken, or even cleaning a fish.
Sunday
Breakfast: Fast from midnight before receiving the Lord’s Supper
Lunch: Agape meal after church or potluck with friends
Dinner: Something nice from The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen or Fasting Food (another Mediterranean fasting cookbook)
Snacks for anytime: fresh or dried fruit; dates (stuffed or plain); nuts and seeds (roasted and seasoned); banana chips; dairy-free dark chocolate
As you meal plan for each upcoming week, set aside time to go grocery shopping to make sure your pantry and fridge are well stocked. Set aside time each week to prepare these foods so you are never “hangry.” Try not to substitute vegan meat or dairy products, as these are unhealthy, and take away from the seasonal and spiritual quality of eating in a set-apart way during this time of the year.
There are many feast days and even civic holidays which fall during the Nativity Fast. The primary way to observe these should be to attend Church services. However, above and beyond that, we can create family traditions in our own homes. Here are some ideas especially from the Eastern Church (and a few from the West as well) for ways that we can do that during this time—some, but not all, food-related.
On Thanksgiving, pray the Glory to God for All Things Akathist.
On November 24 (Slavic observance) or 25 (Greek observance), read some Church Fathers in honor of St. Catherine, who converted 500 pagan orators to Christianity who had been sent to convince her to apostatize. Or, bake a St. Catherine’s Heart cake.
For St. Barbara on December 4, decorate a gingerbread tower (house) with three windows, or make a pancake tower.
On December 6, sing a carol for St. Nicholas. (Sheet music here) You can also bake Speculaas cookies, and, of course, set out shoes for the children the night before.
On December 7 (St. Ambrose), make plant-based Milanese minestrone soup for dinner, and serve a spoonful of honey, or honey on a slice of freshly baked bread, for dessert. St. Ambrose was the bishop of what is now Milan (Mediolanum back then), and is known as the “honey-tongued.”
On December 12, make loukoumades (Greek donuts) for St. Spyridon of Trimythous (A.D. 348). (Here’s a beautiful children’s book about St. Spyridon!)
On December 13, make spruce tree-shaped cookies for St. Herman, who brought Christianity to the Alaskan Natives in the 18th century, and lived on Spruce Island in Alaska. (Here’s a beautiful children’s book about St. Herman.) December 13 is also St. Lucy’s feast day, so you could also do the Swedish custom of baking gingersnaps or pepperkakor (you could use almond milk and margarine to keep them “fasting”).
On December 24, have a Holy Supper. This is a beautiful and beloved Carpathian tradition.
What are your most favorite symbolic traditions around food during this season, as we prepare to celebrate the birth of our Savior?
Curious to learn more?
Learn more about the Orthodox Christian practice of fasting: Fasting for Non-Monastics by Fr. Sergei Sveshnikov
More resources on Orthodox Christian Advent: Orthodox Advent Blogs on Ascetic Life of Motherhood
My favorite cookbooks for cheap, healthy, (mostly) vegetarian recipes:
2023 Top Book List
The habit of grown-ups reading living books and retaining the power to digest them will be lost if we refuse to give a little time for Mother Culture.
Karen Andreola
I am glad to bring to you a compilation of the most life-changing books I read this year! I’m indebted in the formation of the list to all the ladies at Schole Sistership. It is their voracity for good books, faithfulness in their vocation, and camaraderie in the reading life, that encouraged me to read so many good books this year.
I highly recommend all the books below. I’ve included just a few sentences about each one, so you can see if they pique your interest! Happy reading!
Mama Bear Apologetics by Hillary Morgan Ferrer (2019)
Does apologetics have to be boring, the property of professors in suits, consisting of dry and brittle logic and devoid of connection to issues of vital interest? Not anymore. This book completely changed my understanding of apologetics and helped me start to see how I can have difficult conversations with anyone, really, and how these conversations can be as enjoyable as they are important. This book provides data supporting the urgency of teaching our kids apologetics, and outlines all the major cultural lies and corresponding Christian truths that affect all of us who live in modern society — and does it all with a generous dash of humor.
The Gospel Comes with a House Key by Rosaria Butterfield (2018)
This book shows how Reformed theology goes hand-in-glove with fulfilling God’s mandates to welcome the stranger and love your neighbor as yourself. Rosaria shares snippets from her life to create a beautiful patchwork quilt showing how God’s faithfulness won her over through simple Christian hospitality, and now overflows constantly from her home into the lives of others. There is a good balance between concrete details to help us practice true Christian hospitality, and theological reflections on the power of doing this.
Spiritual Counsels by St. Paisios (2011)
Fr. Paisios of the Holy Mountain fell asleep in the Lord only 29 years ago, in 1994. It is this historical closeness to our time that makes reading these transcripts of his teachings not only comforting, but also challenging, as we catch a glimpse of what true holiness in the modern world could look like. I recommend starting with Volume 4, “On Family Life,” to start, especially for mothers.
The Convivial Homeschool by Mystie Winckler (2021)
Repent, rejoice, repeat. If St. Paisios gives us a birds-eye view, as it were, of what truly great holiness looks like in the modern world, this book zooms into the microcosm of a Christian homeschooling family and gives us very practical, relatable application of what that holiness could look like on an hourly, even minute-by-minute basis. Mystie convicts, challenges, comforts, and inspires.
The Empowered Wife by Laura Doyle (2017)
I read Doyle’s New York Times Bestseller, The Surrendered Wife, in 2019, but only encountered this book for the first time this year, as part of a book club in Convivial Circle. Applying the Six Skills is already making me much happier and my marriage much more fulfilling. Feminism has yanked the happy-marriage instruction manual out of the hands of modern women everywhere, and Laura Doyle is putting it back. World divorce is going down!
Mere Motherhood by Cindy Rollins (2016)
This book is camaraderie in 188 pages. Rollins is refreshingly humble and self-deprecating as she points to Christ again and again throughout this autobiographical work. She covers so many aspects of Christian homeschooling motherhood, including how to give your children a far better education than you had, falling in love with the classics, and even trusting God with your family size, and submitting to your husband in a Godly way that honors your own spirit and intellect.
God, Where is the Wound? by Mother Siluana Vlad (2022)
This book really helped me have a better understanding of Confession and Communion in the Orthodox Church. It confirmed an intuition I had had about their healing efficacy, and strengthened my hope and trust in God to work through these means. It also encouraged me to make connections between secular knowledge and the spiritual realm, as Mother Siluana draws on advances in medicine and psychology to underline truths about Orthodoxy.
Darwin’s Black Box by Michael Behe (1996)
Behe is a molecular biologist, and this almost 30-year-old book raises questions that still need to be answered. How is it, as Behe points out, that evolution is consistently indicated as one of the most important and pressing areas of modern science, and yet nothing is actually known about its mechanics? What passes for discussion on this topic is not science, but rather, imaginative speculation. Take the red pill and read this book.
The Genesis Question by Hugh Ross (1998)
As a follow-up to Darwin’s Black Box, I recommend The Genesis Question. Ross is an astrophysicist an amateur Hebrew scholar, and in this slim and thought-provoking tome, he lays out a case for old-earth creationism, showing how the Hebrew text in context fully supports all that modern science has shown to be the case regarding the history of the cosmos. Inquiring minds want to know, and though prehistory and the Genesis narrative are shrouded in mystery, I found this book helpful in coming to a place of peace regarding how I think about this issue. No need to either deny science, nor to buy into pseudoscientific theories (like Darwinian macroevolution).
Norms and Nobility by David Hicks (1981)
This book is helping me refine my own educational philosophy for our future homeschool. The discussion of the Ideal Type, the Christian idea of paideia, and the reading list with time tables are my favorite parts. This book will renew your vision for what is possible in our learning communities and for our students.
Good Enough by Leanne Brown (2022)
If you need a cookbook with easy, delicious, and creative recipes, look no further. These recipes are simple, easy to customize, quick to whip up, and healthy. I use it multiple times daily.
Patterns for Life by Lisa Rose and Laura Wolfe (2022)
This book is so needed in the Orthodox world today — a “translation” into “Orthodox” of Charlotte Mason’s teachings on education. This perspective resonated deeply with me and is so inspiring for my future homeschool and actually for our current Sunday school, of which I am the coordinator. I am very grateful to Laura and Lisa for their courage and dedication to bring this work into the world.
Money and Salvation by Andrew Geleris (2022)
There seems to be a theme uniting many of the books on this list: they are devastatingly convicting and dizzyingly inspiring, and this book is no exception. Why do we judge the sexual sin of others and turn a blind eye to materialism and covetousness? Why do we treat ambition and greed as virtues and not vices in modern America — shunning sacrificial generosity, mercy, and hospitality, or only giving “with strings attached”? Why do we act like our money is our own and not God’s? Dr. Geleris brings up all these issues and more, providing searing commentary on them as well as questions for group discussion or personal reflection, and ideas for application. As Dr. Geleris notes, the topic of money is mentioned more times by far than any other topic in the Bible, including love, forgiveness, grace, sin, etc. It is a powerful tool in our salvation or condemnation, and how we use it matters.
Honey for a Child’s Heart by Gladys Hunt (1969)
This is another book to set the standard high in your family and homeschool, uniting faith and love for God the Word with a love of literature, story, and words. The suggestions in this book are already helping me and my husband shape our family culture into one that is loving, faithful, and literary. There are also some great book lists for children which I am slowly working my way through.
What were some of your favorite books that you read this year? Please share in the comments!
Alexandria's Daughter 