- Hardcover: 176 pages
- Publisher: Doubleday Canada; 1st Edition edition (Aug 18 2009)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0385666519
- ISBN-13: 978-0385666510
- Product Dimensions: 14.6 x 1.9 x 21.7 cm
- Shipping Weight: 318 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #112,434 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Product Description
In this invaluable contribution to the continuing debate about religious belief, David Adams Richards offers an exhilaratingly fresh perspective and a voice more impassioned, heartfelt, and sometimes furious, than anything written about God by an atheist.
David Adams Richards, one of Canada’s most beloved and celebrated authors, has been wrestling with questions of morality, faith, and religion ever since he was a child. They have always informed his fiction. Now he examines their role in his own life and spells out his own belief, in what is his most self-revealing work to date. With characteristic honesty, Richards charts his rocky relationship with his cradle Catholicism, his battles with personal demons, his encounters with men who were proud to be murderers, and the many times in his life when he has been witness to what he unapologetically calls miracles. In this subtly argued, highly personal polemic, David Adams Richards insists that the presence of God cannot be denied, and that many of those who espouse atheism also know that presence, though they would not admit it to anyone — including themselves. Every follower of today’s battle between faith and atheism, and every lover of David Adams Richards’ superb fiction, will find God Is revelatory.
“I believe that all of us, even those who are atheists, seek God — or at the very least not one of us would be unhappy if God appeared and told us that the universe was actually His creation. Oh, we might put Him on trial for making it so hard, and get angry at Him, too, but we would be very happy that He is here. Well, He is.”
Questions of faith, morality, the role of unseen forces in our destinies, have been central to the fiction of David Adams Richards. Now he directly addresses what these questions have meant to him in his own life, and what he has come firmly to believe. He has always been a courageous and uncompromisingly honest writer — but never more so than here.
David Adams Richards, one of Canada’s most beloved and celebrated authors, has been wrestling with questions of morality, faith, and religion ever since he was a child. They have always informed his fiction. Now he examines their role in his own life and spells out his own belief, in what is his most self-revealing work to date. With characteristic honesty, Richards charts his rocky relationship with his cradle Catholicism, his battles with personal demons, his encounters with men who were proud to be murderers, and the many times in his life when he has been witness to what he unapologetically calls miracles. In this subtly argued, highly personal polemic, David Adams Richards insists that the presence of God cannot be denied, and that many of those who espouse atheism also know that presence, though they would not admit it to anyone — including themselves. Every follower of today’s battle between faith and atheism, and every lover of David Adams Richards’ superb fiction, will find God Is revelatory.
“I believe that all of us, even those who are atheists, seek God — or at the very least not one of us would be unhappy if God appeared and told us that the universe was actually His creation. Oh, we might put Him on trial for making it so hard, and get angry at Him, too, but we would be very happy that He is here. Well, He is.”
Questions of faith, morality, the role of unseen forces in our destinies, have been central to the fiction of David Adams Richards. Now he directly addresses what these questions have meant to him in his own life, and what he has come firmly to believe. He has always been a courageous and uncompromisingly honest writer — but never more so than here.
About the Author
David Adams Richards has received numerous awards and prizes throughout his career, and is one of the few writers in the history of the Governor General’s Award to win in the categories of both fiction (Nights Below Station Street) and non-fiction (Lines on the Water). Mercy Among the Children won the Giller Prize in 2000 and was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award and the Trillium Award; it was a Canada Reads pick in 2009. The Friends of Meager Fortune (2006) won the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book (Canada and Caribbean). His most recent novel is The Lost Highway.
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Most helpful customer reviews
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Faith Today - A Unique Perspective,
By
This review is from: God Is.: My Search for Faith in a Secular World (Hardcover)
This book deals squarely with the critical issues around the concept of "faith" today in Western Society. Everyone with any interest in making a difference in a society where the moral ambiguities run all the way from lying politicians and venal business leaders to murderous drug dealers should read and ponder the ideas presented in this book.
The title God Is..indicates Richards's own belief, and although he sets out some of his personal reasons for this,he acknowledges that there is no way to prove it. The main theme of this book is that belief in God(or Something or Someone) who embodies and encourages goodness, simplicity and truth is the only weapon we have, as individuals and collectively, to fight evil and wrongdoing. He posits that everyone has a faith or belief of some kind that influences their choices in life. Richards has had experience observing many violent and evil criminals. He has just as astutely observed wrongdoing in academic, religious and literary circles. He draws on real contemporary life and classical literature to show the consistent pattern of escalating and destructive evil (or sin). Richards writes with passion and accurately points out the "cons" prevalent in our society. He is a Catholic who clearly sees the flaws, but also the goodness of his church. This book,which the author calls a "polemic", is unevenly written and would have benefited greatly from judicious editing. Overall, Richards brings a unique personal perspective to the concept of faith in today's secular world. This makes it a very worthwhile read.
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