A reading and listening list for believers and unbelievers

I've been talking with friends on Twitter lately, where one of the hot topics is always religion. Some of the conversation gets pretty heated and, although I try to avoid that, people obviously have very strong feelings on the subject, but I try to remember that "Your virtue is not measured by what you believe, but by what you do."

Every now and then, someone mentions some book, article or podcast that they feel illuminates the playing field, so I propose to keep a consolidated list of these here, for the use of anyone interested.

I invite you all to add reading/listening/viewing suggestions in the comments below, and I will continue to integrate all of these into this list.

Let me get things started:

• C.S Lewis' Narnia series (esp The Magician's Nephew; The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe; The Last Battle). Much-loved children's fantasy, re-telling the great Christian story.
• Ted Dekker's Circle Trilogy (Black; Red; White). A recent "young persons' fantasy" also re-imagining the Christian tale.
• Hoftstadter and Dennett (eds), The Mind's I. A wonderful collection of philosophical essays and allegories on the subject of self and soul. An excellent and non-intimidating introduction to the philosophy of mind, and cognitive science.
• The radio show and podcast This American Life, episode 290: "Godless America" A wonderful episode of a wonderful series.
• White Wine In The Sun, a cheeky but lovely description of secular Christmas in Australia. Written by Tim Minchin, sung by Kate Miller-Heidke.
• The Worthing Saga by Orson Scott Card, a very famous, and Mormon, science fiction writer. A sci-fi examination of god and suffering.
• Hell is the Absence of God, a short story by Ted Chiang.
• Monty Python's The Meaning Of Life, a film of sketches with a theme.
• Monty Python's The Life Of Brian, classic film about Jesus Christ's neighbour. Touhces on religion.
• Ian McEwan’s novel Enduring Love, about a man of Science; a rational thinker, perhaps to the point of naivety and even ultimately to his own detriment.
• Dante Alighieri's The Divine Comedy. A guided tour through hell, limbo and heaven, in wondrous poetry.
• John Milton's Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, poetic retelling of the great Christian story.
• Roger Penrose' the Emperor's New Mind.
• Bill Bryson's A Brief History Of Nearly Everything.
• Steven Pinker's How the Mind Works.
• The Nature of Personal Reality, Jane Roberts
• John Gribbin's In Search of Schrodinger's Cat
• A User's Guide To the Universe by Dave Goldberg and Jeff Blomquist
• The End of Time by Julian Barbour
• Your Inner Fish by Neil Shubin
• The Universe In A Nutshell by Stephen Hawking
• Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy. The anti-Narnia?
• Kanye West's song Jesus Walks.
• God Actually by Roy Williams. A pro-faith book that raised some eyebrows among the believers too.
• Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. The great children's author is also the best known Christian "apologist".
• Faith of Millions: the credentials of the Catholic religion by John A. O'Brien.
• The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning. Former Catholic priest retells the gospel.
• John Irving's A Prayer For Own Meany. Irving's greatest novel, a brilliant read, with faith as its central theme. And armadillos.
• The Sins of Scripture: Exposing the Bible's Texts of Hate to Reveal the God of Love by Bishop John Shelby Spong. The title says it all.
• John Lennon's song God, which is about his loss of faith and his discovery of hope. A mild, non-confrontational, personal tale, that causes surprising levels of heat in the Twitterverse.
• John Safran suggests Picture Stories From The Bible. Thanks, John.
• Ben Pobjie's wonderful article Atheist Myths Debunked.

So, there... that's my starting list. I hope to get recommendations for Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, etc, but I also want to see the faith side putting its very best foot forward.

Please add your (polite) suggestions in the blog comments

Thank you very much,

Lee.

http://twitter.com/#!/leeborkman