Saturday, April 28, 2012

Next up: Two books about food

You are invited to a feast for the senses and the spirit! In The Spirit of Food, 34 adventurous writers open their kitchens, their recipe files, and their hearts to illustrate the many unexpected ways that food draws us closer to God, to community, and to creation. All bring a keen eye and palette to the larger questions of the role of food—both its presence and its absence—in the life of our bodies and spirits. Their essays take us to a Canadian wheat farm, a backyard tomato garden in Cincinnati, an organic farm in Maine; into a kosher kitchen, a line of Hurricane Katrina survivors as they wait to be fed, a church basement for a thirty-hour fast; inside the translucent layers of an onion that transport us to a meditation on heaven, to a church potluck, and to many other places and ways we can experience sacramental eating. In a time of great interest and equal confusion over the place of food in our lives, this rich collection, which includes personal recipes, will delight the senses, feed the spirit, enlarge our understanding, and deepen our ability to "eat and drink to the glory of God." Contributors include Lauren Winner, Luci Shaw, and Wendell Berry. Edited by Leslie Leyland Fields.

Our other selection -- from what is likely to be a completely different perspective -- is Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert. The Los Angeles Times' reviewer said: “Gilbert’s journey is full of mystical dreams, visions and uncanny coincidences…Yet for every ounce of self-absorption her classical New-Age journey demands, Gilbert is ready with an equal measure of intelligence, humor and self-deprecation…Gilbert’s wry, unfettered account of her extraordinary journey makes even the most cynical reader dare to dream of someday finding God deep within a meditation cave in India, or perhaps over a transcendent slice of pizza.”

In honor of the subject matter, we intend to meet at a restaurant for our May meeting. What shall it be -- Italian, Indian, or Indonesian?

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