This is one of 6 books I have finished over the Christmas/New Year holiday, and the one I enjoyed the most. Stanley Hauerwas was described by Time magazine as 'the best theologian in America', so I thought I'd better read this to get an idea of what he's all about.
It's a fascinating, inspiring and at times disturbing autobiography. Hauerwas is brutally honest about his life, including his difficult marriage to his first wife who suffered severe mental illness, and about his relationships with his colleagues at the academic institutions he has worked in. It is also great to watch his journey into academia, and how he gradually realised that he was a Christian, and all that entailed.
I really enjoyed the challenge of reading someone from a very different church background to my own. At one point he nearly converts to Catholicism, and is very much into high churchmanship - liturgy, the Eucharist - but he sees a real beauty there that is eye-opening at times, and something I had not considered before.
The other main thing I was impacted by was the story of his friendship with John Howard Yoder, and his subsequent developing of firm pacifist views as a result of this. His thoughts on how Jesus' teaching of non-violence should affect the whole of our lives and not just our views on war are potentially life-changing.
The biggest problem I had with this book was the amount of other books he referred to, which has made my Amazon basket reach ridiculous proportions!
All in all, a highly recommended book - it's led me to buy two of his other books already!
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Hannahs-Child-Theologians-Stanley-Hauerwas/dp/0334043689/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1294175002&sr=8-1
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