What books have helped you deconstruct?
Crowdsourced recommendation list inside!
I have a confession.
I haven’t been reading a ton these last few years.
If you read my Sunday edition of After Faith you know I’m passionate about making sure our quest for information is always tempered by discernment and personal experience, and this is my personal story as well.
After going to a Christian college and reading SO MUCh about spirituality for the first few decades of my life, it’s sometimes still a little off-putting to me to read a book about spirituality.
It has been important in recent years of deconstruction to prioritize experience and ideas over the external input of others, which means… very selective reading being done over here.
But, I’m ready to broaden the scope of thoughtful words into my life. Thankfully, when I asked for book recommendations, you all delivered!!
Here are the top few books I have read that changed things for me, and I’m also adding a link to the exhaustive list of books you recommended as well!
Oh—and thanks for all the love and encouragement to keep these Wednesday emails coming!
Three books that impacted me the most:
Untamed by Glennon Doyle - helped me see the value of my own discernment and how to access it.
How the Bible Actually Works by Pete Enns - broke me from having to believe in the Bible as the authoritative word of God and saw it instead as a collection of stories of people trying to figure God out.
The Book of Longings by Sue Monk Kidd - helped me reimagine Jesus as a human and realize that all we’ve ever been doing is “imagining” Jesus in the first place.
And here’s what your fellow followers recommended!
Have any to add? Reply back or comment and let me know!
I’m loving getting to support people with spiritual coaching. If you could use a safe companion to help you untangle your thoughts and help you trust your own discernment again, let’s talk.
Thank you for the list! Looking forward to digging in. I recommend anything by Kate Bowler--Everything Happens for a Reason. Love Matters More by Jared Byas. The following is not a book--but the Eat Right Now program has a great practice of learning to find your own wisdom through experience--not just learning things with your mind--an in-depth mindfulness practice. That along with yoga have been so so helpful.
Anything by Rachel Held Evans, all of Peter Enns (the sin of certainty in particular and the Bible tells me so), love wins by rob bell, torn (can’t remember the author), Jesus and John Wayne. I could go on and on. I want to read When God Was a Woman this year. It’s the first book on faith/religion that’s peaked my interest in a while.