Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas. Bonhoeffer is a hero of mine. He was a Lutheran minister in Germany who joined up with the plot to assassinate Hitler and was executed for it. This assassination plot was famously depicted in the Tom Cruise movie Valkyrie. Because he was a minister and theologian he had to justify /wrestle with assassination while being a pastor who teaches “Thou Shalt Not Murder,” so he ended up dealing with these deep issues of the responsibility on a human being to try to do what you genuinely believe is right even when it is not clear or seems contradictory to what is written. Trying to stand for justice must be risky and requires humility. He doesn't know if assassination is truly just in the long run or will have evil consequences, but he knows he has to make a decision now about what he can do to stand for justice. He realizes that what is required of him is to act honestly. It will be up to God to decide whether he was right or wrong.
The Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien. It is my 3rd time reading the philosophical fantasy, The Lord of the Rings. It is my comfort food—my one abject fandom (I’m collecting ugly LOTR Christmas sweaters). The world building in Lord of the Rings is unmatched and the hero’s journey is almost definitive of the idea of “hero’s journey.” The movie adaptions are probably some of the best movie adaptions every put to screen (not the Hobbit—the original trilogy). All modern fantasy owes a debt to Tolkien as it was he and C.S. Lewis who succeeded in bringing the deep Celt, Gaelic, Norse, and Germanic, mythologies to life through the 20th century novel.
Professor Jones teaches Political Science and History at the Ridgecrest/IWV campus and online.
There are few things more beautifully human than the acquisition and sharing of knowledge, and putting that knowledge down on a page connects libraries to thousands of years of that beautiful human history in a way that mere characters on an electronic screen never will. Libraries contain one of the most important and beautiful aspects of human history in their very existence.
Deanna Ing Campbell
Cliff Davis
Tyrone Ledford
Melanie Jeffrey & Debilyn Kinzler
