Articles Books

The Thirty-nine Articles of Religion probably stood the English Church in good stead until the late nineteenth century. There are so many interpretations of these Articles that my head spins. The Broad Church folks argue the Articles were never intended to be the Church's Confession in the way that the Augsburg Confession or the Westminster Confession function for Lutherans and the Reformed respectively. The High Church Anglicans began to read the Articles as if they were in agreement with the Council of Trent since John Henry Newman's famous Tract Number 90. The Low Church Anglicans have sought to read the Articles in their historically intended sense as being indicative of a very Reformed Catholic tradition inside a very Protestant tradition.
J.I. Packer is certainly in the last category and argues that the Articles must be revived for today. His argument strikes me as quixotic since it is highly unlikely that the Broad and High Church traditions are going to turn back the clock and become Low Church Protestants. That said, I found it helpful to find out W.H. Griffith Thomas's exposition of the Articles is Low Church Protestant while Gibson's is liberal Catholic. Packer was most helpful in helping me get a better grasp of the three major traditions inside Anglicanism.

Packer's book on the Articles of Religion is not a study of the articles themselves but a lament over their disuse and the attitude of indifference toward them that seems to pervade Anglicanism. The result as Anglicanism has developed over the last 175 years or so is an increasing pluralism of beliefs within Anglicanism and a doctrinal "incoherence" unparalleled in mainline protestantism.

The book begins by simply reprinting the Articles without comment. Packer then speaks of the "silence" of the Articles in present Anglican life. They have simply been muffled and shunted aside. He recounts their history briefly, grounding the 39 Articles solidly in the Reformation. He makes mention of the erosion of the need for subscription to the articles, the various ways they have been "interpreted" in latitudinarian and Anglo-Catholic circles and laments that fewer and fewer Anglican provinces pay any significant attention to what was once a doctrinal statement which held what Packer refers to as essentially creedal status within the church of England.

Packer insists that doctrinal statements and creeds are necessary because we live in a divided Christendom - that is - churches need statements which identify where they stand. Failing to lay out a clear theology, in Packer's view, actually works against ecumenical dialogue and not for it. Lack of clarity only breeds confusion, not unity. Anglicanism, as stated by the Articles of Religion, is firmly committed to both the authority of scripture and the three creeds of Christendom. As such, the articles state a Christianity that is both reformed and historical, and as such the articles express a rich heritage.

Where the Anglican communion has drifted is in its commitment to Scripture as the final authority and its commitment to salvation by faith alone. Roger Beckwith's appendix articulates a few recent clarifications that might supplement the Articles regarding historic and evangelical Anglican belief. Packer and Beckwith both stand against the view that sacraments operate apart from faith, as one example of a creeping reinterpretation of a central Anglican principle. One wonders if Packer's stinging critique of recent moves toward a catholic and semi-sacrificial view of the Eucharist raised much attention when the book was written decades ago. Roger Beckwith's contribution suggests that such a sacrificial understanding of the Eucharist overturns the very foundations of Christianity, a stinging rebuke to many liturgical alterations in recent decades.

Anglicanism has become a broad tent with Evangelicals in the minority, liberal revisionists attempting to steer the entire communion toward a humanistic relativism and those sympathetic to more Catholic beliefs pulling the communion in a third direction. Most Anglicans seem to float between the three views oblivious to the differences between them. Both of the latter seem to be willing to discard, reinterpret or ignore the 39 Articles of Religion as a doctrinal statement and advance a particular agenda in spite of them. The result is no consistent or coherent theology that can lay claim to being the official Anglican position on many, many issues. Packer's case is that the Articles need to be returned to their status as a statement of faith Anglicans should subscribe to. It makes sense, because the alternative is the dissaray that Anglicanism is currently experiencing.

Philip M. Parker has done it again - seamlessly! The action takes place in the world's most exotic capitals. Benefiting from Parker's tightly woven plot and well-suited characters, it is a book that can't be button holed. It's one part export manual, one part comedy. While the comedy bits left me in stitches, I have one caveat, however: if you did not get through reading the entire title, let me forewarn you. . .He leaves Hosiery out to dry.

The Firm and the Ephemeral: New Music From Mexico
by John de Clef Piñeiro

"Agua y Piedra - (Water and Stone: Recent Music from Mexico)": Lilia Vázquez Kuntze: Estudio #1 (2001) ~~ Georgina Derbez Roque: Cuatro Piezas en Seis Sonidos (1993) ~~ Ramón Montes de Oca Téllez: Dos Estampas (1993) ~~ Horacio Uribe Duarte: Preludio y Toccata (2001) ~~ Federico Ibarra Groth: Sonata No. 3 "Madre Juana" (1988) ~~ Marcela Rodríguez: Como El Agua en el Agua (1985) ~~ Arturo Márquez: Días de Mar y Rio (1997). Ana Cervantes, piano. PRODISC SDL00147 (72:46)

In this collection of solo piano works by seven present-day Mexican composers, new music champion Ana Cervantes presents us with a fascinating sampling of contemporary musical thought from the other side of the Rio Grande. Taking our cue from the title of this new CD, which was made possible through the joint financial support of the National Fund for Culture and the Arts of México (Conaculta-Fonca) and the Institute of Culture of the State of Guanajuato, we might correctly surmise that the distinct characteristics of water and stone are in some way a clue to the contrasting musical offerings on this fine CD. Indeed, these tastefully programmed works provide a quite satisfying alternation between the firm and the ephemeral in musical expression.

Beginning with Lilia Vázquez Kuntze's Estudio #1, one of the three works by women composers on this CD, Ms. Cervantes executes a series of challenging repeated rhythmic patterns as she progresses through a refreshing variety of chord changes. A Webern-like angularity and spareness is reflected in Georgina Derbez Roque's Cuatro Piezas, a set of four short pieces. The latter two pieces, especially, are at times imbued with a more ponderous and dark spacious quality that seems to require a deft sense of timing, amply possessed by Ms. Cervantes, to hold together the long attenuated notes and preserve their mood.

In Ramón Montes de Oca Téllez's Dos Estampas (subtitled Two Scenes ), a Scriabinesque delicacy of line introduces and suffuses each of these two substantial essays of surpassing abstract beauty, the first entitled Vestiges of Shadows (in translation), and the second Toward the Mist . In the Preludio y Toccata by Horacio Uribe Duarte, a rhythmic pattern of repeated notes, having a twilight-zone etherealness, introduces and pervades throughout the prelude. About a third of the way into the recording of the extraordinarily and rhythmically challenging Toccata, the sound recordist or the piano, or a combination of both, managed to introduce into the track the thumping sound of the pedaling. But the listener can overlook this, given Ms. Cervantes's most effective performance of the piece. Whether or not one believes that any composer in any generation is entitled to redefine the shape and tenor of any earlier musical form to meet his own standards and imagination, this is what the listener should expect, beginning with the first Lento movement of Federico Ibarra Groth's Sonata No. 3 "Madre Juana," so named because the composer utilizes material from his opera by the same name. Noticeably, but to good effect, the second Lento movement reflects the unmistakable coloristic influence of Debussy. In the closing Allegro movement, there is an uncharacteristic frenetic and dramatic declamatory quality with a brusque stentorian ending that will certainly upend anyone's comfortable notion of what an allegro "should" sound like.

Mimicking in sound its very title, Marcela Rodríguez's Como El Agua en el Agua (Like Water in Water), very effectively conjures and engagingly sustains the image of raindrops falling on a still body of water. In a fitting flowing finale to the CD's aquatic co-theme, Arturo Márquez's Días de Mar y Rio concludes with a stylistically impressionistic, romantic and rhapsodic work of effusive lyricism and traditionalist danza-like rhythms and themes.

Admittedly, the composers on this CD are "new" to this reviewer, but given the quality of their work, they shouldn't be. So, correcting this seems to be a laudable major objective of this recording project for Ms. Cervantes and her sponsors. And, on the whole, Ms. Cervantes has successfully presented a subtle and sensitively performed compilation of sensuous and abstract new works that are delightful, surprising and rich in their formal and rhythmic variety, and that impressively showcase her technical virtuosity and interpretative prowess.

[The reviewer is an Editorial Contributor of the periodical New Music Connoisseur, and this review is available on the periodical's website.]

Whatever others may say or think, Alexandra Kollontai is still relevant. Perhaps some of her ideas on women's rights and fundamental equality of the sexes were not fleshed out with empirical research as much as they could have been. Her thoughts on family life and sex and child rearing were also revolutionary for the time in which she wrote about them, but again, she did not have the background to dig deeply into and analyze these issues as well as could be done (her knowledge of sociology and psychology being limited, for example). Kollontai did, though, raise controversial issues, and what makes them relevant today is that most of the issues she discussed in the early part of the 20th century are still just as relevant. The landscape has changed, the framework in which we deal with the issues she addressed is different, but there are still fundamental economic inequalities everywhere. Many issues are still daily concerns throughout the world. The part that is not as relevant, of course, is that Kollontai fervently believed that communism would eradicate these inequalities and sex/relationship/family problems. Because she perhaps naively believed so strongly in this system she did not examine reality as critically as she could have (not to mention that if she had tried to do so, she would have met opposition from within the Soviet government.)

Kollontai's views on gender and gender equality were of interest, but because the "class struggle" was more important to her (and indeed she believed the abolishment of "class" would free women from the boundaries imposed on them in society, she neglected some important underlying issues about feminism, women and society. She does, however, make it clear that women (as well as all people) need to be actively engaged in the politics of their country. The importance of this issue is still felt today, as many people turn against political involvement, feeling it is hopeless. If nothing else, people need to be informed. How, indeed, are women to have equal representation if they don't get involved, she argued? The same is true today, although it applies to all citizens of a democratic society. In the United States today, civil rights, for example, are violated freely by institutions "in the name of security", but this is diversionary and keeps people from really questioning what is happening in their society.

On a related matter, an issue Kollontai addressed with particularly fervent passion is World War I: is in fact the issue of nations lying to their people to garner support for unjust wars ethical or acceptable? Could that be irrelevant? No, in fact, reading Kollontai's words today (the book is largely a collection of her speeches), the passion and reason with which she argued against the war could just as well have been a modern speech about the current situation in Iraq. She writes (keep in mind this is all in translation), "People talk of the `right of each people to self-defence'. Each state naturally tries to present itself as having begun the war in order to preserve and defend its culture, and not in order to fill the purses of the capitalists." (We could perhaps substitute "preserve and defend its culture" to "preserve and defend `democracy' everywhere" to imitate what might be said in present day. Meanwhile, the real reasons are capitalist ones.)

"Culture! Yes, culture is indeed man's most precious possession. But is it not war that threatens the very existence of culture? Is it not because of war that magnificent old forests are ruthlessly destroyed? Is it not war that destroys the best historical monuments and works of art? Finally, are there any `cultural values' which are worth the cost of hundreds of thousands, even millions, of human lives?"

"Ask any soldier, be he Russian or German, what were they fighting for? For what did they shed the blood of their brothers, the workers and peasants of their neighboring country? For what did they cripple people? They will not tell you, they will not answer, because they themselves do not really know."

Kollontai points out the hypocrisies that lie at the heart of most wars, and her passion is evident. It is abundantly clear how she rose to such esteem in the Communist party and why she was so well respected as someone who could rouse the passions of the people. At the same time, her focus, so admired by her peers, was the same focus and passion that made her unable to form more sophisticated analyses and effect real change. Nevertheless, her ideas remain highly relevant and deserve further exploration from a modern audience. For all her ideas lacked, the passion with which she delivered her ideas, is ardent and even so apparent it virtually jumps off the pages.

Mathematics and mathematicians can be the objects of public interest, if there are individuals capable of explaining those items in a form that the intelligent reader can follow. Keith Devlin is such a person and the editors of the British paper, The Manchester Guardian, were intelligent enough to understand that. The result is a mathematically simple-minded yet enjoyable collection of 143 brief vignettes covering mathematics and computer science.
Generally, only one and one-half pages in length, most articles earn the accolade, "touche." As many writers point out, the short piece is often the hardest to write, as every word must count. Devlin succeeds in the most difficult of arenas, in that enough background must be given so that the naïve reader can understand the topic and the point is resolved with sufficient clarity. And all this is done with a minimum of formulas. While sophisticated mathematicians and computer scientists will find the material limp, this work is capable of standing on its own as a piece of entertainment.
An existence proof that mathematics and computer science can be made understandable to an intelligent public that is interested, this book should be an element of every public library.

Published in Journal of Recreational Mathematics, reprinted with permission.

This is a collection of some of the best writings of Italian anarchist Errico Maltesta (1853-1932). But readers who find this volume valuable may also want to get the collection Errico Malatesta: Life and Ideas (compiled by Vernon Richards) - a book containing 200 pages of writings by Malatesta as well as a lengthy assessment of his importance by the editor.

The Anarchist Revolution makes available 25 polemical articles originally published in 1924-1931, including classics like A Project of Anarchist Organisation, Democracy and Anarchy, and Questions of Tactics. Although the articles are polemical in character, they are also more scholarly than the average anarchist tract. Readers who are looking for violent sloganeering will be disapointed.

Of particular interest are Malatestas insightful commentaries on the different varietes of anarchism - syndicalism, mutualism, individualism and communism. His own preferences are for communist anarchism, but he remains pragmatic and open-minded in the face of differing opinions. To quote from his 1929 essay Some Thoughts On the Post-Revolutionary Property System (reprinted in this collection, pages 113-119):

"Probably all possible forms of ownership, use of the means of production and all forms of distribution will be experimented with ... until practical experience identifies the best form or forms."

Malatesta comes across as an erudite anarchist journalist in the pages of this anthology, and I gladly recommend it to anyone who wants an introduction to libertarian communism.

Reviewed By SHANNON BAILES For Reader Views (9/06)

This book was a compilation of stories about the trials and tribulations of a woman at mid-life. There are many stories about searching for love at this time in a woman's life and what it really means to love someone. The question is asked many times, and in many ways, "Is it worth it to risk everything to fall in love again?"

Additionally, there are short stories about the love of the author's life, writing and reading. We learn much about her as she enlightens us with how she always loved writing and how she eventually wrote a book of short stories.

I enjoyed this book as I believe it was written for those of us who like short stories and of course, the mid-life of a woman and be ridiculously funny at times, and recklessly sad at other times. It is a book that puts many things in perspective for the woman at mid-life and makes clear to all that they are not alone in the journey that they are on.

I do have a recommendation as to the editing of this book. There are many punctuation errors in the context of this book, mainly dealing with question marks placed at inappropriate places in the text. Other than that, the book could be put together a bit better as to placement of stories so that it would flow a bit better.

Read and enjoy the light-hearted stories that are presented here, whether you are not at mid-life yet, in mid-life, or already past that stage of life. You will gain perspective from someone who has lived it! Perhaps even gain an appreciation for the journey that women must take to get to their "golden years"!

This book is a short look at each of the sixteen Articles of Faith of the Church of the Nazarene. Written by various authors, it's not intended as a comprehensive theology, but more of an introduction. For as concise as the book is, the depth of each short chapter is surprisingly insightful. It will certainly compel you to want to explore the doctrines of the church further. Reading through section 6 dealing with the Atonement written by Dr. Thomas Noble brought tears to my eyes.

Others cite anedotal accounts, but this is scientific evidence from 1000 samplings of 25% greater bacterial species richness and increased earthworm activity in terra preta anthrosols. The A horizon of pristine forest soil was only 1 centimeter compared to the terra preta 1 meter thick A horizon. The references given are also a valuable resource; this is a survey worth having.

Dr. Kanda has written an excellent article on this little explored topic. The text can easily be found online for free. I purchased this hoping that it might contain some of the images that must be crucial to a deeper understanding of the subject matter. Sadly, the article contains not a single image. Regardless, look it up online; it is essential reading to anyone interested in this topic.