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Blessing Same-Sex Unions: The Perils of Queer Romance and the Confusions of Christian Marriage
by Mark D. JordanAt most church weddings, the person presiding over the ritual is not a priest or a pastor, but the wedding planner, followed by the photographer, the florist, and the caterer. And in this day and age, more wedding theology is supplied by Modern Bride magazine or reality television than by any of the Christian treatises on holy matrimony. Indeed, church weddings have strayed long and far from distinctly Christian aspirations. The costumes and gestures might still be right, but the intentions are hardly religious. Why then, asks noted gay commentator Mark D. Jordan, are so many churches vehemently opposed to blessing same-sex unions? In this incisive work, Jordan shows how carefully selected ideals of Christian marriage have come to dominate recent debates over same-sex unions. Opponents of gay marriage, he reveals, too often confuse simplified ideals of matrimony with historical facts. They suppose, for instance, that there has been a stable Christian tradition of marriage across millennia, when in reality Christians have quarreled among themselves for centuries about even the most basic elements of marital theology, authorizing experiments like polygamy and divorce. Jordan also argues that no matter what the courts do, Christian churches will have to decide for themselves whether to bless same-sex unions. No civil compromise can settle the religious questions surrounding gay marriage. And queer Christians, he contends, will have to discover for themselves what they really want out of marriage. If they are not just after legal recognition as a couple or a place at the social table, do they really seek the blessing of God? Or just the garish melodrama of a white wedding? Posing trenchant questions such as these, Blessing Same-Sex Unions will be a must-read for both sides of the debate over gay marriage in America today.
Blessing Same-Sex Unions: The Perils of Queer Romance and the Confusions of Christian Marriage
by Mark D. JordanAt most church weddings, the person presiding over the ritual is not a priest or a pastor, but the wedding planner, followed by the photographer, the florist, and the caterer. And in this day and age, more wedding theology is supplied by Modern Bride magazine or reality television than by any of the Christian treatises on holy matrimony. Indeed, church weddings have strayed long and far from distinctly Christian aspirations. The costumes and gestures might still be right, but the intentions are hardly religious. Why then, asks noted gay commentator Mark D. Jordan, are so many churches vehemently opposed to blessing same-sex unions? In this incisive work, Jordan shows how carefully selected ideals of Christian marriage have come to dominate recent debates over same-sex unions. Opponents of gay marriage, he reveals, too often confuse simplified ideals of matrimony with historical facts. They suppose, for instance, that there has been a stable Christian tradition of marriage across millennia, when in reality Christians have quarreled among themselves for centuries about even the most basic elements of marital theology, authorizing experiments like polygamy and divorce. Jordan also argues that no matter what the courts do, Christian churches will have to decide for themselves whether to bless same-sex unions. No civil compromise can settle the religious questions surrounding gay marriage. And queer Christians, he contends, will have to discover for themselves what they really want out of marriage. If they are not just after legal recognition as a couple or a place at the social table, do they really seek the blessing of God? Or just the garish melodrama of a white wedding? Posing trenchant questions such as these, Blessing Same-Sex Unions will be a must-read for both sides of the debate over gay marriage in America today.
Blessing Same-Sex Unions: The Perils of Queer Romance and the Confusions of Christian Marriage
by Mark D. JordanAt most church weddings, the person presiding over the ritual is not a priest or a pastor, but the wedding planner, followed by the photographer, the florist, and the caterer. And in this day and age, more wedding theology is supplied by Modern Bride magazine or reality television than by any of the Christian treatises on holy matrimony. Indeed, church weddings have strayed long and far from distinctly Christian aspirations. The costumes and gestures might still be right, but the intentions are hardly religious. Why then, asks noted gay commentator Mark D. Jordan, are so many churches vehemently opposed to blessing same-sex unions? In this incisive work, Jordan shows how carefully selected ideals of Christian marriage have come to dominate recent debates over same-sex unions. Opponents of gay marriage, he reveals, too often confuse simplified ideals of matrimony with historical facts. They suppose, for instance, that there has been a stable Christian tradition of marriage across millennia, when in reality Christians have quarreled among themselves for centuries about even the most basic elements of marital theology, authorizing experiments like polygamy and divorce. Jordan also argues that no matter what the courts do, Christian churches will have to decide for themselves whether to bless same-sex unions. No civil compromise can settle the religious questions surrounding gay marriage. And queer Christians, he contends, will have to discover for themselves what they really want out of marriage. If they are not just after legal recognition as a couple or a place at the social table, do they really seek the blessing of God? Or just the garish melodrama of a white wedding? Posing trenchant questions such as these, Blessing Same-Sex Unions will be a must-read for both sides of the debate over gay marriage in America today.
Blessing the Next Generation: Creating a Lasting Family Legacy with the Help of a Loving God
by Marilyn Hickey Sarah BowlingThe mother and daughter team of Marilyn Hickey and Sarah Bowling explain the significance of generational curses and blessings and how readers have the power to have an impact on the spiritual heritage they hand to their children.
Blessings: ‘A sublime coming-of-age tale’ Guardian
by Chukwuebuka Ibeh'Chukwuebuka Ibeh's writing has a certain delicacy to it, so wonderfully observant, and so beautiful' Chimamanda Ngozi AdichieWhen Obiefuna's father witnesses an intimate moment between his teenage son and the family's apprentice, newly arrived from the nearby village, he banishes Obiefuna to a Christian boarding school marked by strict hierarchy and routine, devastating violence. Utterly alienated from the people he loves, Obiefuna begins a journey of self-discovery and blossoming desire, while his mother Uzoamaka grapples to hold onto her favourite son, her truest friend.Interweaving the perspectives of Obiefuna and his mother Uzoamaka, as they reach towards a future that will hold them both, BLESSINGS is an elegant and exquisitely moving story of love and loneliness. Asking how we can live freely when politics reaches into our hearts and lives, as well as deep into our consciousness, it is a stunning, searing debut.'A moving debut about love and loneliness ' Sunday Times
The Blessings
by Elise JuskaAn extraordinary novel about an ordinary family from the award-winning author Elise Juska The Blessings rally around one another in times of celebration and those of sorrow, coming together for departures and arrivals, while its members harbor private struggles and moments of personal joy. College student Abby ponders homesickness in her first semester away from her Philadelphia home, while her cousin Stephen commits a petty act of violence that takes a surprising turn, and their aunt Lauren faces a crisis in her storybook marriage she could never have foreseen. Through the lens of one unforgettable family, this beautifully moving novel explores how our families define us and how we shape them in return."Bursting with wise observations."-J. Courtney Sullivan, New York Times bestselling author of Saints for All Occasions"Stunning. . . Unique and unforgettable."-Glamour
The Blessings
by Elise Juska"Bursting with wise observations." -- J. Courtney Sullivan, author of The Engagements and Maine "Gleams like a jewel." -- The Philadelphia Inquirer "Stunning. . . Unique and unforgettable." -- Glamour Hailed as one of the best books of 2014 by The Philadelphia Inquirer, Elise Juska's The Blessings is a moving novel about a tight-knit Irish Catholic clan over the course of twenty years.The Blessings rally around one another in times of celebration and those of sorrow, coming together for departures and arrivals, while its members harbor private struggles and moments of personal joy. College student Abby ponders homesickness in her first semester away from her Philadelphia home, while her cousin Stephen commits a petty act of violence that takes a surprising turn, and their aunt Lauren faces a crisis in her storybook marriage she could never have foreseen. Through the lens of one unforgettable family, this beautifully moving novel explores how our families define us and how we shape them in return.
Blessings (Charnwood Large Print Ser.)
by Anna QuindlenOne night a young couple sneak onto the estate of wealthy Lydia Blessing and leave a box in the driveway. In the box is a baby and Skip Cuddy, the caretaker who finds her decides secretly to keep her. When Lydia Blessing discovers this she has choices to make, as she had many years before.
Blessings (Blessings in Disguise #1)
by Lois RicherA thriving medical practice and three rambunctious daughters have Joshua Darling looking heavenward for help. The harried widower' s prayers are answered when a young surgeon accepts a temporary position in his small-town practice.
Blessings for the Hands (Phoenix Poets)
by Matthew SchwartzFrom The Sky Inside the Shaking Tree What you feel reveals you. Watch for the sustenance inclined to a source, enamored of singularity, quickly here and quickly gone, shadow from which the body's courage comes. Fireflies apparently stumbling. I slapped one on my leg. Its blood glowed. Blessings for the Hands follows various speakers—often disabled speakers, who never once figure themselves as objects of complaint or self-pity—through the haunted dreamscape of “normalcy.” Indeed, dreams are continuous presences in this unusually subtle and elegant debut collection that juxtaposes physical circumstances with the vast interior life of the imagination. The subjects of Blessings for the Hands are real and imagined confrontations—and reconciliations—between family members, friends, strangers, and animals. Matthew Schwartz’s quasi-autobiographical verse complicates and clarifies the emotions waiting just underneath the patterns and expectations of the speakers’ daylight lives, where anger, joy, corporeality, and mortality all seem to collide. For Schwartz, poetry is a sleight of hand that keeps the reader guessing through nearly imperceptible shifts between present vision and absent reality. Blessings for the Hands is a lyric reckoning of the tension between the life we are given and the life we are determined to lead. “Blessings for the Hands is emotionally strong and imaginatively wild, distinctive, deeply moving, without an ort of self-pity, and pervaded by ‘compassion down to your fingertips’ (which Chekhov said is ‘the only method’ both to write and to live). This angle of vision is sharp enough to unify much disparate material. The poems are clear and musical and consequently a pleasure to read and reread despite their gravity. I think this may be lasting work.”—Michael Ryan
Blessings for the Hands (Phoenix Poets)
by Matthew SchwartzFrom The Sky Inside the Shaking Tree What you feel reveals you. Watch for the sustenance inclined to a source, enamored of singularity, quickly here and quickly gone, shadow from which the body's courage comes. Fireflies apparently stumbling. I slapped one on my leg. Its blood glowed. Blessings for the Hands follows various speakers—often disabled speakers, who never once figure themselves as objects of complaint or self-pity—through the haunted dreamscape of “normalcy.” Indeed, dreams are continuous presences in this unusually subtle and elegant debut collection that juxtaposes physical circumstances with the vast interior life of the imagination. The subjects of Blessings for the Hands are real and imagined confrontations—and reconciliations—between family members, friends, strangers, and animals. Matthew Schwartz’s quasi-autobiographical verse complicates and clarifies the emotions waiting just underneath the patterns and expectations of the speakers’ daylight lives, where anger, joy, corporeality, and mortality all seem to collide. For Schwartz, poetry is a sleight of hand that keeps the reader guessing through nearly imperceptible shifts between present vision and absent reality. Blessings for the Hands is a lyric reckoning of the tension between the life we are given and the life we are determined to lead. “Blessings for the Hands is emotionally strong and imaginatively wild, distinctive, deeply moving, without an ort of self-pity, and pervaded by ‘compassion down to your fingertips’ (which Chekhov said is ‘the only method’ both to write and to live). This angle of vision is sharp enough to unify much disparate material. The poems are clear and musical and consequently a pleasure to read and reread despite their gravity. I think this may be lasting work.”—Michael Ryan
Blessings for the Hands (Phoenix Poets)
by Matthew SchwartzFrom The Sky Inside the Shaking Tree What you feel reveals you. Watch for the sustenance inclined to a source, enamored of singularity, quickly here and quickly gone, shadow from which the body's courage comes. Fireflies apparently stumbling. I slapped one on my leg. Its blood glowed. Blessings for the Hands follows various speakers—often disabled speakers, who never once figure themselves as objects of complaint or self-pity—through the haunted dreamscape of “normalcy.” Indeed, dreams are continuous presences in this unusually subtle and elegant debut collection that juxtaposes physical circumstances with the vast interior life of the imagination. The subjects of Blessings for the Hands are real and imagined confrontations—and reconciliations—between family members, friends, strangers, and animals. Matthew Schwartz’s quasi-autobiographical verse complicates and clarifies the emotions waiting just underneath the patterns and expectations of the speakers’ daylight lives, where anger, joy, corporeality, and mortality all seem to collide. For Schwartz, poetry is a sleight of hand that keeps the reader guessing through nearly imperceptible shifts between present vision and absent reality. Blessings for the Hands is a lyric reckoning of the tension between the life we are given and the life we are determined to lead. “Blessings for the Hands is emotionally strong and imaginatively wild, distinctive, deeply moving, without an ort of self-pity, and pervaded by ‘compassion down to your fingertips’ (which Chekhov said is ‘the only method’ both to write and to live). This angle of vision is sharp enough to unify much disparate material. The poems are clear and musical and consequently a pleasure to read and reread despite their gravity. I think this may be lasting work.”—Michael Ryan
Blessings in Disguise
by Jessica StirlingGlasgow is a city teeming with immigrants, rich and poor, schemers and victims alike. And the McKennas, fresh from Ireland, have no intention of being victims. When Nolan McKenna and his sisters arrived unannounced on Cissie Cassidy's doorstep claiming to be her late husband's long-lost relatives, the lonely widow is all too willing to be taken in and trusting enough to help them find them a foothold in the city. While Nolan wields a shovel for twelve back-breaking hours a day, the beautiful, trusting Clare takes up with the wrong man instead of the collection agent who yearns to make her his bride. Sharp-witted and pretty, Evie is made of more ambitious stuff and uses her job behind the bar of the Harp of Erin to attract the attentions of Russell Blackstock, builder and land-speculator, who owns half the tenements on Clydeside - and plans to own still more. The worlds of the wealthy Blackstocks and the penniless McKennas are set on a collision course that will mean huge changes for them, and for the city they live in.
The Blessings of a Good Thick Skirt: Women Travellers And Their World
by Mary RussellFor the first time in ebook format.
The Blessings of Business: How Corporations Shaped Conservative Christianity
by Darren E. GremThe Book of Matthew cautions readers that "Ye cannot serve God and mammon." But for at least a century conservative American Protestants have been trying to prove that adage wrong. In The Blessings of Business, Darren E. Grem argues that while preachers, activists, and politicians have all helped spread the gospel, American evangelicalism owes its enduring strength in a large part to private enterprise. Grem argues for a new history of American evangelicalism, demonstrating how its adherents strategically used corporate America--its leaders, businesses, money, ideas, and values--to advance their religious, cultural, and political movement. Beginning before the First World War, conservative evangelicals were able to use businessmen and business methods to retain and expand their public influence in a secularizing, diversifying, and liberalizing age. In the process they became beholden to pro-business stances on matters of theology, race, gender, taxation, trade, and the state, transforming evangelicalism itself into as much of an economic movement as a religious one. The Blessings of Business tells the story of unlikely partnerships between well-known champions of the evangelical movement such as Billy Graham and largely forgotten businessmen like Herbert Taylor, J. Howard Pew, and R.G. LeTourneau. Grem also shows how evangelicals set up their own pro-business organizations and linked the quarterly and yearly growth of "Christian" businesses to their social, religious, and political aspirations. Fascinating and provocative, The Blessings of Business uncovers the strong ties that conservative Christians have forged between the Almighty and the almighty dollar.
BLESSINGS OF BUSINESS C: How Corporations Shaped Conservative Christianity
by Darren E. GremThe Book of Matthew cautions readers that "Ye cannot serve God and mammon." But for at least a century conservative American Protestants have been trying to prove that adage wrong. In The Blessings of Business, Darren E. Grem argues that while preachers, activists, and politicians have all helped spread the gospel, American evangelicalism owes its enduring strength in a large part to private enterprise. Grem argues for a new history of American evangelicalism, demonstrating how its adherents strategically used corporate America--its leaders, businesses, money, ideas, and values--to advance their religious, cultural, and political movement. Beginning before the First World War, conservative evangelicals were able to use businessmen and business methods to retain and expand their public influence in a secularizing, diversifying, and liberalizing age. In the process they became beholden to pro-business stances on matters of theology, race, gender, taxation, trade, and the state, transforming evangelicalism itself into as much of an economic movement as a religious one. The Blessings of Business tells the story of unlikely partnerships between well-known champions of the evangelical movement such as Billy Graham and largely forgotten businessmen like Herbert Taylor, J. Howard Pew, and R.G. LeTourneau. Grem also shows how evangelicals set up their own pro-business organizations and linked the quarterly and yearly growth of "Christian" businesses to their social, religious, and political aspirations. Fascinating and provocative, The Blessings of Business uncovers the strong ties that conservative Christians have forged between the Almighty and the almighty dollar.
Blessings of The Heart (Mills And Boon Love Inspired Ser. #No. 206)
by Valerie HansenWriter Brianna Walker had moved to the Arkansas hills for a little peace and quiet. But the stormy night a handsome man, two bedraggled boys and a scruffy dog washed up in her front yard, Bree' s peaceful and quiet life became a thing of the past.
Blessu (Colour Young Puffin Ser.)
by Dick King-SmithA classic animal story from master storyteller, Dick King-Smith.Blessu is a very small elephant who suffers from dreadful hay fever - and although he's very small, he has a very large sneeze! Blessu doesn't grow very fast, except for one part of him - his trunk. And every time he sneezes, his trunk grows even bigger.
The Bletchley Girls: War, secrecy, love and loss: the women of Bletchley Park tell their story (Extraordinary Lives, Extraordinary Stories of World War Two)
by Tessa Dunlop'Lively...in giving us the daily details of their lives in the women's own voices Dunlop does them and us a fine service' New Statesman'Dunlop is engaging in her personal approach. Her obvious feminine empathy with the venerable ladies she spoke to gives her book an immediacy and intimacy.' Daily Mail'An in-depth picture of life in Britain's wartime intelligence centre...The result is fascinating, and is made all the more touching by the developing friendships between Dunlop and her interviewees.' Financial TimesThe Bletchley Girls weaves together the lives of fifteen women who were all selected to work in Britain's most secret organisation - Bletchley Park. It is their story, told in their voices; Tessa met and talked to 15 veterans, often visiting them several times. Firm friendships were made as their epic journey unfolded on paper.The scale of female involvement in Britain during the Second World War wasn't matched in any other country. From 8 million working women just over 7000 were hand-picked to work at Bletchley Park and its outstations. There had always been girls at the Park but soon they outnumbered the men three to one.A refugee from Belgium, a Scottish debutante, a Jewish 14-year-old, and a factory worker from Northamptonshire - the Bletchley Girls confound stereotypes. But they all have one common bond, the war and their highly confidential part in it. In the middle of the night, hunched over meaningless pieces of paper, tending mind-blowing machines, sitting listening for hours on end, theirs was invariably confusing, monotonous and meticulous work, about which they could not breathe a word.By meeting and talking to these fascinating female secret-keepers who are still alive today, Tessa Dunlop captures their extraordinary journeys into an adult world of war, secrecy, love and loss. Through the voices of the women themselves, this is a portrait of life at Bletchley Park beyond the celebrated code-breakers, it's the story of the girls behind Britain's ability to consistently out-smart the enemy, and an insight into the women they have become.
Bletchley Park Brainteasers: The biggest selling quiz book of 2017
by Sinclair McKayBletchley Park Brainteasers was the runaway Christmas bestseller in 2017 and delighted hundreds of thousands of devoted puzzlers with its fiendish puzzles, riddles and enigmas. It's never to late to join the code breakers of Bletchley Park in their enjoyment of a devilish challenge!Would you love to master morse code? Could you have have outsmarted an enigma machine? Would your love of chess have seen you recruited into the history books?When scouring the land for top-level code breakers, the Bletchley Park recruiters left no stone unturned. As well as approaching the country's finest mathematicians, they cast their nets much wider, interviewing sixth-form music students who could read orchestral scores, chess masters, poets, linguists, hieroglyphics experts and high society debutantes fresh from finishing school. To assess these individuals they devised various ingenious mind-twisters - hidden codes, cryptic crosswords, secret languages, complex riddles - and it is puzzles such as these, together with the fascinating recruitment stories that surround them, that make up the backbone of this book. The code breakers of Bletchley Park were united in their love of a good puzzle. If you feel the same, why not dive in, put your mental agility to the test and discover: Would Bletchley Park have recruited YOU?
The Bletchley Park Codebreakers: How The Bletchley Park Codebreakers Helped Win The War (Dialogue Espionage Classics Ser.)
by Michael SmithThe British codebreakers at Bletchley Park are now believed to have shortened the duration of the Second World War by up to two years. During the dark days of 1941, as Britain stood almost alone against the the Nazis, this remarkable achievement seemed impossible. This extraordinary book, originally published as Action This Day, includes descriptions by some of Britain s foremost historians of the work of Bletchley Park, from the breaking ofEnigma and other wartime codes to the invention of modern computing, and its influence on Cold War codebreaking. Crucially, it features personal reminiscences and very human stories of wartime codebreaking from former Bletchley Park codebreakers themselves. This edition includes new material from one of those who was there, making The Bletchley Park Codebreakers compulsive reading.
Bletchley Park Codebreaking Puzzles
by Arcturus PublishingThis collection of 140 intriguing and challenging codebreaking puzzles are produced in association with the Bletchley Park Trust. Follow in the footsteps of World War II codebreakers and decode the encrypted messages within. These puzzles include: • Anagrams • Logical reasoning • Encryption word problems • Logic grids •And more! ABOUT THE SERIES: This series of fun and stylish puzzle books are produced in association with the Bletchley Park Trust, a vibrant and fascinating heritage site celebrating the World War II codebreakers who were stationed there.
Bletchley Park IQ Puzzles
by Eric SaundersFollow in the footsteps of the Codebreakers and establish whether you have the puzzle solving skills needed to have worked at wartime Bletchley Park.This collection of challenging and satisfying IQ puzzles forms part of a series of books produced by the Bletchley Park Trust. During World War Two, Bletchley Park was the workplace for thousands of people whose job it was to read the encrypted messages of its enemies. Towards the end of 1941, a crossword puzzle competition was organised by The Daily Telegraph. The challenge was to complete the puzzle in under twelve minutes. A number of the competitors were subsequently invited to take part in intelligence work at Bletchley Park, and puzzles and codebreaking have been linked in the public mind ever since.
The Bletchley Women
by Patricia AdrianA stunning new historical novel perfect for fans of Kate Quinn and Dinah Jeffries!
Blewcoat Boy (Acorn Modern Classics Ser.)
by Leon GarfieldIn a cave on the wild side of St James's Park live two ragged children; young Nick and his nine-year-old sister Jubilee. Once they had a father, but now they are alone – and Nick knows it is his responsibility to find Jubilee a husband. But who would want to marry a girl who can neither cook nor sew, read nor write?