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The Exiled Church

Oct 17, 2025 | 2025 - Winter - Free, Book Reviews

The Exiled Church

Author Martyn Percy
Publisher Canterbury £18.99
Format pbk
ISBN 9781786226273

There may be a collective noun for those of us who collect nativity sets. I suspect there are quite a few of us. But the individual noun for Richard Littledale, whose collection you will find in this book, is inspiration. The author has chosen 25 of his sets, enabling us to spend Advent engaging afresh with the birth of Jesus. He describes each pictured set, reflects on it, and links it with a reading and a prayer. We have 25 new ways of entering familiar territory; and the author didn’t use all his sets! What a variety! There is a nativity set to hang on a Christmas tree: do you mix the sacred and the secular? There is a set made from pencil rubbers: telling of Jesus who came to erase the world’s mistakes. There are sets from many cultures, all in rich diversity answering Jesus’ question ‘Who do you say that I am?’ And there is the budgerigar in a Peruvian set, as welcome in the stable as are absolutely all of us. Even though books are primarily verbal, this book encourages us to go beyond words: to look and to play as we enter the story with wonder and worship. So, definitely buy the book, but also make or buy a nativity set for yourself that you can handle as you re-enter Bethlehem this year.

Reviewed by MALCOLM DAWSON

Christianity and secular culture

 

Kingdom Buildings

Oct 17, 2025 | 2025 - Winter - Free, Book Reviews

Kingdom Buildings

Author Kenneth Padley
Publisher Canterbury £20
Format pbk
ISBN 9781786226235

This book will be warmly welcomed by ministry teams, including churchwardens, for it brilliantly fills a crucial gap in Christian life – between practical problems of our built heritage and the commission we have received to promote mission. Too often these are seen as separate issues, but they are both vital components of God’s kingdom. A cold, crumbling, damp building will not attract worshippers – it will deter them. As the author notes, ‘if Christians are in the eternity business, then churches that stand still will move backwards’. Having set out his theology, the author fills the book with practical church management, retaining always the need to see improvements as ‘building the kingdom’. I commend especially his chapter on relatively small projects that make a difference. He does not neglect the creative use of churchyards and the crucial importance of carbon reduction, reminding us of the fifth mark of mission. There is a useful chapter on making church halls attractive, enabling the promotion of mission through community-based actions. This is a valuable handbook to help transform Christian outreach through our buildings.

Reviewed by LEONARD RICKARD

Buildings for mission

 

Can We Imagine a Future Together?

Oct 17, 2025 | 2025 - Winter - Free, Book Reviews

Can We Imagine a Future Together?

Author Martyn Snow
Publisher CHP £4.99
Format pbk
ISBN 9781781405130

Bishop Martyn introduces his book by offering thoughts about the programme ‘Couples Therapy’ and counselling generally. Applying this method to LLF and the CofE, each party is encouraged to speak about differences and hurt as well as being open to hearing the other party. Then we may hope to see the questions of LLF differently, using a prayerful process of discerning ‘what is pleasing to the Lord’ – how each of us can reflect love to each other in the same way that God loves all of us in our diversity. There are questions for reflection and discussion: ‘What cultures have shaped you over the course of your life?’ ‘How have you managed to journey beyond confrontation?’ ‘How have you learnt to recognise the gifts received by other cultures?’ ‘How might we offer gifts to those with whom we disagree?’ ‘Are we prepared to be vulnerable when listening to/receiving gifts of another?’ The book concludes with ‘A love letter to the church’ showing Rublev’s Trinity icon, with a space for each of us to join, in all our diversity, in love of God and each other.

Reviewed by SUE PIPER

Living in Love and Faith (LLF)

 

Patriot

Oct 17, 2025 | 2025 - Winter - Free, Book Reviews

Patriot

Author Alexei Navalny
Publisher Penguin £10.99
Format pbk
ISBN 9781529933659

Every era has its heroes. Alexi Navalny is one of ours, but his heroism is of a particularly discomfiting kind. For most of us, his decision to return to Russia from Germany, after an almost-successful attempt on his life in 2020, lies somewhere on the line between bewildering and indefensible: the inducements to lead his opposition party from a distance were so strong, incarceration so certain, death so likely. And yet, Navalny’s determination not to abandon the people and country he loved holds out a stunningly Christian hope and promise. Atheist by birth and by intellectual persuasion, Navalny describes the moment when, in the face of his new-born daughter, his godless certainties tumbled, and faith arose. It is an almost Pauline conversion, told very simply. This is not a book about faith, but it is about a life whose outrageous altruism and courageous leadership are made possible by confidence in and connection to God who, in words smuggled out of the corrective colony where he died, is the one Alexei credits with ‘[taking] my punches for me’. This is a big, brave book. Read it!

Reviewed by DEE MOLTON

Autobiography

 

Evangelism in an Age of Despair

Oct 17, 2025 | 2025 - Winter - Free, Book Reviews

Evangelism in an Age of Despair

Author Andrew Root
Publisher Baker Academic £22.99
Format pbk
ISBN 978154096875

Andrew Root is based at Luther Seminary, USA. This book is an attempt to re-think evangelism, contextualising it in our late modern times where ‘anxious, stressed, angry people’ live ‘sad’ lives, over-committed to striving for happiness instead of seeking a consolation that feeds soul rather than self, rooted in the theology of the cross. There are two distinct strands to the book: firstly, the moving story of a fictional church that shows us how an evangelism of consolation might work in practice. Secondly, extensive discussion of philosophical and theological thought through past ages, centred around figures such as Montaigne, Pascal, Gregory of Nyssa, Jean Gerson, Johann von Staupitz and Martin Luther. This is a complex book and is most suitable for academics and theologians, yet its central argument is something I can endorse from my own journey – that people often connect (and evangelise) best through sharing and owning times of loss and struggle, ultimately finding meaning and hope in a God who suffers with and for us.

Reviewed by APRIL McINTYRE

Evangelism

 

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