A spymaster’s apprentice, a warrior from the Lands of Ice, and a high priest of the goddess of the night. A wizardess who can tap the realm of magic, and three apprentices of notable power. A king suborned by an ancient god. With a dark power rising and the gods caught by surprise, can priest, apprentice and warrior save the lives of those sought for sacrifice by a deity from a near-forgotten pantheon?
An Honest, Hopeful Look at Christian Doubt and Disappointment Doubt often has less to do with the head than the heart. When Christians go through trials--from unmet personal expectations to the death of a loved one--they often feel like God has abandoned them, or maybe he never cared at all. Kluck and Martin walk readers through dark times in their own lives to reveal a God of love who never forsakes his children. Here is grace and hope for any believer struggling to believe.
A paradigm-shifting blend of science, religion, and philosophy for the agnostic, spiritual-but-not-religious, and scientifically minded reader Many people are fed up with the way traditional religion alienates them, perpetuates conflict, vilifies science, and undermines reason. Nancy Abrams—a philosopher of science, lawyer, and lifelong atheist—is among them, but she has also found freedom in imagining a higher power. In A God That Could Be Real, Abrams explores a radically new way of thinking about God. She dismantles several common assumptions about God and shows why an omniscient, omnipotent God that created the universe and plans what happens is incompatible with science—but that this doesn’t preclude a God that can comfort and empower us. Moving away from traditional arguments for God, Abrams finds something worthy of the name “God” in the new science of emergence: just as a complex ant hill emerges from the collective behavior of individually clueless ants, and just as the global economy emerges from the interactions of billions of individuals’ choices, God, she argues, is an “emergent phenomenon” that arises from the staggering complexity of humanity’s collective aspirations and is in dialogue with every individual. This God did not create the universe—it created the meaning of the universe. It’s not universal—it’s planetary. It can’t change the world, but it helps us change the world. A God that could be real, Abrams shows us, is what humanity needs to inspire us to collectively cooperate to protect our warming planet and create a long-term civilization.
Not since Betty Eadie’s Embraced by the Light has a personal account of a Near-Death Experience (NDE) been so utterly different from most others—or nearly as compelling. "This is a book you devour from cover to cover, and pass on to others. This is a book you will quote in your daily conversation. Storm was meant to write it and we were meant to read it." —from the foreword by Anne Rice In the thirty years since Raymond Moody’s Life After Life appeared, a familiar pattern of NDEs has emerged: suddenly floating over one’s own body, usually in a hospital setting, then a sudden hurtling through a tunnel of light toward a presence of love. Not so in Howard Storm’s case. Storm, an avowed atheist, was awaiting emergency surgery when he realized that he was at death’s door. Storm found himself out of his own body, looking down on the hospital room scene below. Next, rather than going “toward the light,” he found himself being torturously dragged to excruciating realms of darkness and death, where he was physically assaulted by monstrous beings of evil. His description of his pure terror and torture is unnerving in its utter originality and convincing detail. Finally, drawn away from death and transported to the realm of heaven, Storm met angelic beings as well as the God of Creation. In this fascinating account, Storm tells of his “life review,” his conversation with God, even answers to age-old questions such as why the Holocaust was allowed to take place. Storm was sent back to his body with a new knowledge of the purpose of life here on earth. This book is his message of hope.
Bestselling author of Geography of Bliss returns with this funny, illuminating chronicle of a globe-spanning spiritual quest to find a faith that fits. When a health scare puts him in the hospital, Eric Weiner-an agnostic by default-finds himself tangling with an unexpected question, posed to him by a well-meaning nurse. "Have you found your God yet?" The thought of it nags him, and prods him-and ultimately launches him on a far-flung journey to do just that. Weiner, a longtime "spiritual voyeur" and inveterate traveler, realizes that while he has been privy to a wide range of religious practices, he's never seriously considered these concepts in his own life. Face to face with his own mortality, and spurred on by the question of what spiritual principles to impart to his young daughter, he decides to correct this omission, undertaking a worldwide exploration of religions and hoping to come, if he can, to a personal understanding of the divine. The journey that results is rich in insight, humor, and heart. Willing to do anything to better understand faith, and to find the god or gods that speak to him, he travels to Nepal, where he meditates with Tibetan lamas and a guy named Wayne. He sojourns to Turkey, where he whirls (not so well, as it turns out) with Sufi dervishes. He heads to China, where he attempts to unblock his chi; to Israel, where he studies Kabbalah, sans Madonna; and to Las Vegas, where he has a close encounter with Raelians (followers of the world's largest UFO-based religion). At each stop along the way, Weiner tackles our most pressing spiritual questions: Where do we come from? What happens when we die? How should we live our lives? Where do all the missing socks go? With his trademark wit and warmth, he leaves no stone unturned. At a time when more Americans than ever are choosing a new faith, and when spiritual questions loom large in the modern age, Man Seeks God presents a perspective on religion that is sure to delight, inspire, and entertain.
A forthright but compassionate work that examines the problem of doubt thoroughly, in a way that will respond to people's questions, settle their fears and strengthen their faith.
In Divine Action, Keith Ward, a philosopher, theologian, and scholar, examines the role of Divine operation and Divine providence in a world of scientific law and intelligibility. Defending the Christian doctrine of the incarnation, Ward is equally concerned with the "big questions" in science and religion-those concerning existence, purpose, and inner process. He reflects on the recent resurgence of naturalism in philosophy alongside an analysis of freedom and necessity, the origins of suffering, constraints of creation, prayer as participation in Divine action, miracles as epiphanies of the spirit, Divine nature and human nature, and redemption. With rigorous scientific research and scholarship and attention to faith traditions in addition to Christianity, Keith Ward presents an intellectual counterpoint to today's antispirituality arguments. In studying what is involved in the idea of creation and particular Divine actions, he offers a rationale for Divine operation as a continuous conversation in the natural world. Book jacket.
A dark fantasy short story involving a cursed ghost, a queen—and her valet—haunted by more than memory, an assassin with a contract to fill, and a hidden truth. Can a queen find happiness when the needs of state demand she wed? And does destiny exist, when the underside of politics becomes involved?
Odyssey is everywhere and nowhere, a set of vigilante mercenaries masquerading as a cruise line company, they do their best to keep the worst of the elements in the universe in check. Whether it be protecting the original inhabitants of newly discovered worlds, rescuing kidnapped kids or assets, or stopping slave traders and world breakers in their tracks, the company does its best to bring justice to a universe where nothing’s ever as simple as it seems. Their agents come in many guises, and Delight is their most famous. These stories take us on a tour through the underside of life among the stars, revealing a little of the company’s dealings, its origins and operations and its people.
A science-fiction short story involving a werewolf child in crisis, anti-werewolf activists on the hunt, pizza, a lonely spacer, and an embarrassing request. When a schoolyard meltdown leads to his family’s true nature being revealed, Jervis heads to the spaceport, where the best pizza on Luna One comes with a side-order of spaceship crews…and the faintest chance he can get his family away before they fall victim to human intolerance. The only question is whether or not he can get them there in time.
