I've just finished reading an interesting book--Where God was Born, A Journey by Land to the Roots of Religion, by Bruce Feiler. It's a wonderful journey in words through modern Israel, Iraq, and Iran with all their terrorisms and fighting factions to see and understand ancient sites sacred to the three Abrahamic faiths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam), or important to their development. We are led on the journey by a faith-seeking, risk-taking American Reform Jew with seven books on the New York Times best seller list. He has a particular viewpoint, believing "that at the birth of Western religion, all faiths drew from one another and were open to coexistence." It's an informative and enjoyable summer read, available in the church library.
Summer reading & study
For the computer minded--iTunes now features a section it calls iTunes U (accessed, for now at least, in the iTunes Store list in the upper left corner of the opening screen). Sixteen universities from Duke to Stanford, and Concordia Seminary to Otis College of Art and Design have posted podcasts (video and audio) which you may download to your computer for free. Several university level courses are offered, including some which I intend to listen to (or in some cases watch). Stanford offers one on the "Historical Jesus" (in the Arts and Humanities section). It's a very secular and challenging look at what we know about the human Jesus. Concordia Seminary offers a course in its Lay Bible Institute called "Which Jesus?". This is a video course which takes a strong faith view of Jesus, as one would expect from this Missouri Synod Lutheran school. Many other courses are offered from theoretical physics to Lit2Go for grades K-12. All for free! iTunes is a free download for PC and Mac at http://www.apple.com/itunes/download/