by Stanley Hauerwas
First sentence: “Ten years and counting.”
It’s out of print, so you can’t support your local independent bookstore (unless they can procure used books, like ours does), but you should buy it at Alibris, instead of Amazon.
Content: It’s super academic. It’d be in the theology section of the bookstore if it wasn’t out of print.

On the 10th anniversary of 9/11 and the War in Iraq, religious and political philosopher Hauerwas (my husband’s read some of his other stuff!) published a collection of essays/papers/speeches about the connection between war and American Christianity. 

But Melissa, you say, this is not your usual reading. And you’d be right. I usually don’t tackle works of religious and political philosophy; I leave that to the professor in the house. However, I’ve started following Pastor Ben Cremer on Instagram and signed up for his weekly newsletter/sermons. There was one a while back (maybe around the 4th of July?) about why the idea that Americans worship war is wrong, especially as Christians, and he recommended this book. As someone who at the very least is uncomfortable with the idea of war, I thought I’d give it a shot. 

I’ll admit a lot of this book was over my head. That said, the parts I was able to grasp/understand, I found fascinating. Hauwerwas talks about the need for local churches, involved in the work of building the kingdom. He talks about rejecting the idea that countries are only meant to conquer. He laments that Christianity became connected to the Roman empire, and on down to the founding of America. He talks about how America’s true “religion” (in the absence of a state religion) is war and the sacrifice that war brings. And that if we truly believe that Christ has conquered death, we would be more willing to be killed than to kill others. All things to think about. And his conclusion is probably the most striking: “Let the Christians of the world agree that they will not kill each other.”

So, no, I probably didn’t get everything I could have out of this book, but it did make me think. Which is something I appreciate.