Becoming a Blessed Church: Resources

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Recommended Readings by Standish

• Discovering the Narrow Path: A Guide for Spiritual Balance. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2002
This book explores how to move beyond today’s simplistic responses to the struggles of faith, and guides people on how to walk the unclear path of faith that requires trust and commitment to God. It explores themes such as the mystical approach to faith; the role of healing; living in balance; forming a Trinitarian faith and spirituality; serving Christ in a balanced way; integrating theology, religion, and spirituality; and understanding the different approaches to faith in modern Christianity.

• Paradoxes for Living: Cultivating Faith in Confusing Times. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox Press, 2001
This book explores the importance of paradoxes in the process of forming faith and growing spiritually. It looks at scriptural paradoxes such as: to be strong we have to be weak; to live we have to die; to be mature we have to be like children; to save ourselves we have to lose ourselves; to receive we have to give; and to know God we have to know ourselves. By exploring these paradoxes, the book reveals a new way of living our our faith in a way that opens us spiritually and enables us to sense God's guidance and direction more clearly, while also showing us how to live the Christian life more fully.

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Recommended Alban Books

• Tell It Like It Is: Reclaiming the Practice of Testimony
When a study group at the seemingly traditional Church of the Redeemer in New Haven, Connecticut, read about the practice of testimony, members approached the descriptions of people sharing their faith as if they were reading an anthropology article—an intriguing account about what other people from some entirely different culture did.
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• A Praying Congregation: The Art of Teaching Spiritual Practice
“I believe that God is calling all of us into deeper prayer and is longing for our congregations to become places of prayer,” writes Jane E. Vennard. Pastors and others who want to develop their skills as teachers of prayer and spiritual practices will find in this book not only wisdom for themselves but easily accessible lesson plans, so that they can share Vennard’s insights with others while infusing the activities with their own spirit and creative ideas.
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• The Practicing Congregation: Imaging a New Old Church
The conventional wisdom about mainline Protestantism maintains that it is a dying tradition, irrelevant to a postmodern society, unresponsive to change, and increasingly disconnected from its core faith tenets. In her provocative new book, historian and researcher Diana Butler Bass argues that there are signs that mainline Protestant churches are indeed changing, finding a new vitality intentionally grounded in Christian practices and laying the groundwork for a new type of congregation.
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• What’s Theology Got to Do With It?
Theology can be a loaded word for mainline Protestant congregations. It often suggests the dogmatic or implies fault lines for conflict. But when unleashed from its narrow academic sense, “theology” offers a powerful way to get at many of the issues that impact the health and vitality of congregations.
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• From Nomads to Pilgrims: Stories from Practicing Congregations
In The Practicing Congregation (Alban, 2004), Diana Butler Bass explored the phenomenon of “intentional congregations,” an emerging style of congregational vitality in which churches creatively and intentionally re-appropriate traditional Christian practices such as hospitality, discernment, contemplative prayer, and testimony. Against the steady flow of stories highlighting “mainline decline,” The Practicing Congregation suggested that there is a new and often overlooked renaissance occurring in mainline Protestant churches.
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