I recently joined Speakeasy, a service that provides material for people who like to read and share comments about spirituality, among other things. Books are provided for free with the only stipulation being that you promise to write a review of what you've read within 30 days, and place some legal-speak at the end of the blog entry (yes, it's there - go look!). It seemed like a reasonable proposition to me, so I joined.
For my first book, I picked Jesus, Bread, and Chocolate: Crafting a Handmade Faith in a Mass-Market World, by John J. Thompson. Here's the review - enjoy!
Jesus, Bread, and Chocolate
It's just about always a privilege to share a portion of another person's spiritual journey. Like so many of the rest of us, Thompson is looking for a path that will allow him to drink from a deeper well. In Jesus, Bread, and Chocolate Thompson shares his thirst for God and describes for us the communities in which he has found that thirst slaked.
The harrowing tale of his early childhood segues to a series of vignettes that compare mass production with artisinal production. The vignettes about coffee, bread and chocolate, and the people who craft them, are interesting in their own right (reminding me a bit of John McPhee's work), but Thompson also uses them to compare different varieties of religious experience and expression with one another.
Though not a sworn enemy of large scale anything, Thompson seems to found the anonymity and cheapness of mass production and mega-whatevers inimical to the spirit of the Gospel. By no means a Luddite, Thompson states clearly, "No, the answer is not to eliminate automation and the cost advantages of industrialization; it is simply to be more mindful of the things we subject to that process." (p. 71).
An observation early in the book, that there's no such thing as cheap love (think Dietrich Bonhoeffer!), and that love always comes at a cost, provides Thompson with a touchstone that he uses to transform comparisons of commercial production into metaphors for the spiritual life. Love, the reader is drawn to conclude, can only be crafted, not mass-produced.
Music provides a unifying theme for the various threads woven in Thompson's book, and it's clear he's captivated by its power. His music business True Tones provided the vehicle he hoped, in his own words, "...Would turn people to a fresh (and I thought, new) understanding of who Jesus really is, and what he's all about. It wouldn't be about the duty word religion - at least not by my understanding of what religion was, It would be about a love so pure and so powerful it would pulse through broken, sinful people and bless the entire creation. It wouldn't be some utopian hippie love either. It would be a love that made big claims and then lived up to them. It would be a love with teeth." (p. 32).
The future Thompson envisioned for his music business ended up being quite different than what he expected, and you'll simply have to read the book to discover the details. Suffice it to say here that the experience led him to long all the more for artisinal rather than mass-marketed Christianity, practiced in local communities.
As a fellow sojourner, I wonder if there's a place in Thompson's spiritual journey for celebrating the music of silence (Psalm 37, 46, Mt 6:6, etc.), Same infinite possibilities, but lots more than twelve notes! Perhaps sometime he'll discover a place for stillness and contemplative prayer in his search for deeper waters.
I was struck with the quality of Thompson's faith. Even in his earliest recollections, Thompson described himself as a spiritual person. His sense of being in the presence of God had never left him, in good times as well as bad.
I suspect that the book would probably most likely appeal to evangelical Christians, particularly among the 33,000 or so different Christians sects, with whom the notion of hand-crafted faith would obviously resonate.
I liked the book, but I suspect that all reviewers feel somewhat remiss if they don't cast a shadow on at least a timy part of the sandbox, so here goes.... From my own experience I know that one of the majr perils of preaching is, well...preaching. Sometimes I find it's better just to lay things out and let folks draw their own conclusions. The book offers a lot of food for thought and a lighter preaching touch might be a compassionate thing to do.
On the mechanical side, Thompson might also want to consider dropping or cutting back on brand and personality references. They tend to date a book, pigeon-hole an author as a "this-ite" or "that-ite" and put off folks who aren't familiar with all or some of the references. A "superlatives-scan" is also a good idea, to avoid the trap of drawing readers into not-particularly-Christian judgments and comparisons between themselves, other folks and their capabilities and accomplishments.
Folks who enjoy this book and want to delve deeper into the central problems it describes might wish to begin by reading Max Weber's timeless Protestantism and the Rise of Capitalism.
Thank you, John Thompson, for sharing your journey thus far with us. Don't ever let go of the rope, and by all means keep it coming!
Disclosure of Material Connection: I received this book free from the author and/or publisher through the Speakeasy blogging book review network. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR,Part 255.
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