Top Customer Reviews
By Ana Braga-Henebry VINE VOICE on February 4, 2016
Format: Paperback
Some books feel like they have been long-awaited. This is one of them for this reviewer. So many Christians wonder about the issue of evangelization. We are supposed to do it--nay, we are all called to do it by Jesus Christ himself--but how? How to go about something that seems so daunting? Karen Edmisten comes to our aid! She begins by sympathizing with our dumbfounded position, and opens the conversation by telling the reader of her own faith journey. I loved the fact that she talks of the love and kindness found in her atheistic upbringing--and of how some Christians almost turned her away from the Church. She is honest but kind, and the story she tells very interesting. For this cradle Catholic, it was fascinating to read about her first encounters with Catholics. Her chapters are a neat list of Dos and Don'ts and will be helpful to readers, giving ideas and showing perhaps that we have already done some good without even noticing! I'd like to offer this (lengthy) quote that I loved in the Introduction: "[We want to] say, “There’s something out there that’s bigger than we are, and Someone who cares about us, who wants us to band together.” When we lose a job, have a baby, investigate nursing homes for our parents, Someone is there. When we cradle a broken heart, are deployed, are left behind during deployment, volunteer at a homeless shelter, go to the movies, discuss Nietzsche, are ill, or become victims of violence, Someone is there. When we pray in a cold church on a Tuesday afternoon, wondering if anyone hears us, Someone is there. Someone who knows and cares about we’re wearing, and why we couldn’t sleep last night. When we see that truth, we know there’s no presumption in being an evangelist. It is a way of life. Like any life, it can be tiring, exciting, joyful, discouraging, and sometimes overwhelming, but the one thing it’s not is presumptuous. How can it be presumptuous to know you were given the gift of never-ending nourishment and, in return, hope you can help feed a hungry world? "
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