Review of Luke: Jesus and the Outsiders, Outcasts, and Outlaws, by Alan Hamilton

Luke

Jesus and the Outsiders, Outcasts, and Outlaws

by Alan Hamilton

Abingdon Press, 2022. 155 pages.
Review written April 5, 2023, from my own copy.
Starred Review

My church went through this book in our small groups (including the one I co-lead) as an all-church Lenten study. There are six chapters, one for each week of Lent, and there is a leader’s guide and videos to go along with it, as well as the sermons from our pastors on the same topics.

I’ve grown up in church and know the Bible well, so it’s always a challenge to set aside what I think I already know and gain new insights. That wasn’t a problem at all with this book. Although I think I’m very familiar with the book of Luke, I had never noticed the theme that Alan Hamilton brings out again and again — of Jesus lifting up the lowly.

Indeed, there’s a chapter on Jesus’ interactions with women, and I’d never noticed how very much Luke includes women in his gospel — much more than the other gospel writers.

Since there are 24 chapters of Luke, but only 6 weeks of Lent, the study is only loosely chronological. We start with a firm foundation of Jesus seeing and paying attention to outsiders, outcasts, and outlaws all through the book before traveling with Jesus to Jerusalem, looking at his final week, and then covering the crucifixion.

Even with the crucifixion, Adam Hamilton points out that the words on the cross that Luke chose to report fit with his theme of lifting up the lowly. This is where we read about Jesus’ forgiveness, his promise to the thief, and ultimately committing himself into his Father’s hands.

This paragraph is from the first chapter, looking at the Mary’s Magnificat:

It is on the lips of Mary that Luke lays out the theme of his Gospel, the theme of this book: God looks with favor on those of low status. God brings down the powerful from their thrones. God lifts up the lowly. God chooses the people others think are washed up or have no value. God values and uses those who have been pushed down, oppressed, or disdained. This one line captures Luke’s theme.

And here’s a paragraph from the chapter about Jesus’ crucifixion:

Regardless of what Luke was seeking to convey about Jesus’s death, he clearly sees this as the climax of the story he has been telling. Here, too, Jesus is lifting up the lowly. In Jesus’s death, we see his obedience to God (“not my will but thy will be done”), his innocent suffering, and, once again, his ministry with and for the outsiders, outcasts, and outlaws. We see his mercy and grace as he prays for his Father to forgive even those who tortured him. We see him reaching out to “seek and save the lost,” even from the cross. We see him as a King suffering for his people — a picture of selfless love. And we see Jesus absorbing evil, hate, sin, and death. As we will see in the postscript, Jesus ultimately triumphs over those things, and in the process brings salvation to the world.

Studying along with this book gave me a whole new appreciation for the gospel of Luke.

AdamHamilton.com
AbingdonPress.com

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Review of Book Bonding, by Megan Dowd Lambert

Book Bonding

Building Connections through Family Reading

by Megan Dowd Lambert
illustrated by Mia Saine

Imagine! (Charlesbridge), 2023. 160 pages.
Review written December 4, 2023, from a library book.
Starred Review

Book Bonding is a collection of essays about the joy and wonder of reading to and with your kids, but especially about the powerful connections you can build that way. The author is a children’s literature professor and a mother of seven, so she has lots of experience with this topic.

Here’s an excerpt from the Preface that captures well what she’s doing in this book:

So how can I best bridge the distance that exists between my children and me, while I recognize and celebrate that they are their own human beings and not “mine”? How can other parents and caregivers do so, too? My multiracial, adoptive, queer, blended family life affirms that familial bonds are rooted not only in biology but in legal measures, choices, and above all, in shared experiences and love.

This is where “book bonding” comes in. I coined this phrase during my time as an educator at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in western Massachusetts. It highlights the social and emotional impact of shared reading in classrooms and libraries. It’s a happy truth that my work as an author, educator, and children’s-literature scholar is deeply enriched by my life as a mother. The books on my family’s bookshelves hold not just words and pictures but also memories of time spent together and of moments when reading and talking about reading have helped us better understand each other. In other words, books have helped us bond.

Time and again, shared reading has forged a common ground for my children and me as we reach toward each other across the distances between us. Witnessing my children’s minds and hearts in action when we read together — or when we discuss books we read separately — gives me a greater appreciation for their individuality. This, in turn, helps me be a better parent, attuned to my kids’ specific needs, strengths, and interests….

I’m convinced that the sort of book bonding that my family experiences is similar to that of anyone who reaches out to the children in their life with a book in hand. I hope my essays will enrich your family’s reading and perhaps inspire you to write down some of the book-bonding memories and connections you’ve created when you and a child have met in the pages of a book.

The essays themselves are beautiful. Yes, they will inspire you to read with kids.

This book is a good defense against book banners, too. In her multiracial family, she talks about reading and discussing books with her white kids and her Black kids and talking with all of them about how diversity is portrayed in books. Diverse books get adults and kids thinking and talking.

She talks about specific books that inspired her kids and tells stories about their interactions with books. Yes, you’ll learn about specific wonderful children’s books here — and there’s a list of books mentioned at the back.

I also love the way she models talking with kids about books. She gets the kids’ perspectives on how books are mirrors and windows for them, and gets insights from the kids that she wouldn’t have noticed on her own.

I read this book too slowly — an essay now and then as I had time, and I didn’t have much time because I was reading for the Morris Award. But whenever I did dip into it, I was reminded of the power, beauty, and joy of reading with kids, and this made my children’s librarian heart happy.

megandowdlambert.com
agoodson.com/illustrator/mia-saine
imaginebooks.net

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Review of Burn the Page, by Danica Roem

Burn the Page

A True Story of Torching Doubts, Blazing Trails, and Igniting Change

by Danica Roem

Viking, 2022. 296 pages.
Review written November 12, 2022, from a library book

Note: I wrote this review a year ago and didn’t get it posted, but now Danica Roem has just been elected Virginia’s first transgender state senator.

I couldn’t resist reading Danica Roem’s story. She’s the first transgender delegate in Virginia, and she represents a district right next door to me, so she’s a local political force. With a transgender daughter myself, I’m always interested in stories of transgender people, and am proud of how Danica Roem is representing our region.

So I did enjoy this book for those reasons. Mind you, there’s a lot in the book about her love for heavy metal and leading a metal band which I didn’t relate to at all and started to gloss over. She’s also from a different generation than me, so the story of her growing up years didn’t hit any common threads.

But I like hearing about her work first as a local reporter and then as a political leader. She gets to know her constituents and honestly wants to bring their concerns to Richmond to make a difference. And I also like hearing about her joy in living as the woman she’s always known herself to be, and finally daring to make that public.

In all, she’s got an inspiring story. And a refreshing voice in politics. Here’s how she finishes the last chapter before the Epilogue:

For all of that, your most honest internal default setting, in which you don’t trip over yourself and stumble over how you think people want you to be, is to just be authentic. You don’t have to keep track of who you are to some people and who you are to others. I say this as someone who inherently wants to be liked: If they don’t respect you, they’re not worth your time. If they do, though, let ’em know who you are, not who you think they want you to be.

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Review of Yes, And . . ., by Richard Rohr

Yes, And . . .

Daily Meditations

by Richard Rohr

Franciscan Media, 2019. 412 pages.
Review written March 21, 2023, from my own copy.
Starred Review

I purchased this book when I was looking for a new devotional book to read through in 2022. Well, there are 366 “Meditations” in this book, but they are not dated. So I took my time. Sometimes I read a page a couple days in a row. And I ended up finishing it a few months into 2023. The advantage, of course, is that you can start reading it at any time.

I chose a book by Richard Rohr because I love his email meditations which I read daily, sent out from the Center for Action and Contemplation. It was nice to have a set I could hold in my hands, because sometimes when I use my phone to read the email meditation, I get distracted.

It’s hard for me to do justice to this book in a summary. The entries were gathered by others from Richard Rohr’s many writings. Action and contemplation, like the name of the Center he founded, is maybe a good way to sum them up. We see thoughts about a life of faith, thoughts about how that looks and how it’s experienced, and what it means to you and to others around you.

I will put a link to my Sonderquotes blog with quotations from Richard Rohr to give you a taste. I also recommend signing up for the daily emails in the link above, and if you like what you read, this book is a way to get more.

Richard Rohr’s writings leave me inspired and encouraged, with my eyes opened to more of the beautiful things God has placed in this life.

cac.org

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Review of Solito, by Javier Zamora, read by the author

Solito

A Memoir

by Javier Zamora
read by the author

Random House Audio, 2022. 17 hours, 8 minutes.
Review written May 2, 2023, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review
2023 Alex Award winner

The Alex Award is for books written for adults that will appeal to teens. Solito is a worthy winner, since in the entire memoir the author is nine years old. It’s the intense subject matter that put this book into the adult market.

Solito is a memoir — and the story of the author’s journey from El Salvador to the United States all by himself in 1999 when he was nine years old. His grandfather took him on the first leg to Guatemala. But then Javier was entrusted to a “coyote,” supposed to be taken safely to Mexico and then the USA to be reunited at last with his parents.

The trip was supposed to be relatively simple, taking a maximum of two weeks. Pretty early on, the plans got messed up. I won’t tell you how many weeks or how many tries it took before he was reunited with his parents, because I don’t want to mess up the suspense — but it was more than one try and much more than two weeks.

The journey was harrowing. In boats, in cars, buses and vans, and on foot through the desert. The author remembers details from a child’s perspective, doing what people told him, and making up names for the desert plants and animals. He is especially grateful to the adults who took him under their wing when plans went terribly awry, pretending he was part of their family to get him safely past officials.

The author doesn’t tell you what to think about the journey. But my reaction is that this is terrible. No child should have to go through such an arduous journey just to have to be with his parents.

But no matter what you conclude, this amazing story will have you riveted and will touch your heart.

javierzamora.net

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Review of Be the Bus: The Lost & Profound Wisdom of The Pigeon, as told to Mo Willems

Be the Bus

The Lost & Profound Wisdom of the Pigeon

as told to Mo Willems
with an introduction by The Bus Driver

Union Square & Co., 2023. 80 pages.
Review written June 21, 2023, from a library book.
Starred Review

Okay this book is completely silly and takes only five minutes to read — but it did make me laugh and compel me to read pages aloud to the other people in the office.

What we’ve got is a book of silly things that The Pigeon would say, with each page illustrated by Mo Willems.

For example:

Genius is seldom recognized.
THAT is why I wear a name tag.

DRIVE! like no one is watching.
HONK! like no one is listening.
DREAM! like no one is thwarting.

Also, better to say:
“I love you more than ever.”
than
“I used to love you less.”

There are lots of clever bits even in the front and back matter. I love the part where The Bus Driver explains that profound question, “WHY can’t The Pigeon drive the bus?”

It is a question that echoes through the ages like the long, loud honk of a horn being leaned on too enthusiastically by an irresponsible blue bird. The answers are many and almost philosophical in their complexity as they touch upon issues of safety, insurance, proper licensing, union requirements, and, of course, feet being able to reach the pedals.

My favorite pages are probably where The Pigeon compares apples and oranges. In many ways. After all, they both can be juggled.

But I suppose best of all — and the reason I really did have to post a review — is this page:

Teachers and Librarians
are too brilliant & lovely & insightful & kind & effervescent & devoted & joyful to EVER be pandered to.

I bet you know a teacher or librarian who would love this book!

mowillemsworkshop.com

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Review of The Lives We Actually Have, by Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie

The Lives We Actually Have

100 Blessings for Imperfect Days

by Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie

Convergent Books, 2023. 229 pages.
Review written September 8, 2023, from my own copy, purchased via Amazon.com.
Starred Review

I purchased this book because of a recommendation on Sarah Bessey’s Substack and was absolutely delighted with it. And then I discovered this is the same author who wrote the wonderful book Everything Happens For a Reason (And Other Lies I’ve Loved). And I sat down and ordered a couple more of her books before writing this review.

What I found in this book is a perfect addition to my morning devotional time. I’d read one blessing on one spread. The next day, I’d read the previous day’s blessing over again and then move on to the next one. Lots of profound wisdom, solidarity — and blessing — was the result.

The situations in the book feel real, not sanitized. This makes sense when I realize this is the same author who wrote about getting terminal cancer at 35 years of age.

Here are some examples of some of the headings for these blessings:

“for this ordinary day”
“for when you just need to put one foot in front of the other”
“for when you are looking for love (and it’s complicated)”
“for this tired day”
“for when you’re running on fumes”
“for when you’re hanging on by a thread”
“for friends who hold us up”
“for when it’s been a great day”
“for when the unthinkable happens”
“for collective grief”
“for all the firsts without a loved one”
“for this overwhelming day”
“for when you can’t catch a break”
“for the gift of doubt”
“for this painful day (and our bodies feel like the enemy)”
“for when your family disappoints you”
“for when you can’t love yourself”
“for when you’re not getting any better”
“for this beautiful, limited day”
“for learning to delight again”
“for the life you didn’t choose”

And there’s so much more! But just listing so many situations doesn’t show you how beautifully these authors deal with them. Let me show a few examples.

Here’s the beginning of the first one: “for this ordinary day”:

Lord, here I am.

How strange it is,
that some days feel like hurricanes
and others like glassy seas
and others like nothing much at all.

Today is a cosmic shrug.

My day planner says,
rather conveniently,
that I will not need you,
cry for you, reach for you.

Ordinarily, I might not think of you at all.

Except, if you don’t mind,
let me notice you.

Show up in the small necessities
and everyday graces.

God, be bread.
Be water.
Be laundry.

This is from “for feeling it all“:

So, you beautiful creature,
here is your permission slip to feel it all.
To feel the joy and delight and excitement.
And the sorrow and fear and despair.

All the yellows and pinks, and violets and grays.

Because you are the whole damn sky.

From “for what makes us us“:

Blessed are you, the strange duck.
You with the very intense hobbies.
Or the collection of movies or mugs or sneakers.
You with the hometown or home team
that makes you very, very proud.

Not everyone will get it,
but these are the things that bring you delight,
that let you swim around in the weeds
of who you are.

Sometimes the words gave me lovely reminders, like this bit from “for this lovely day”:

Refresh me, oh God.
Remind me of the loveliness found in today.
Surprise me with the details I have lost
the eyes to see.

Blessed are we, awakening from the
boredom of routine,
desiring to drink in from the beauty
around us once again,
full of the love you have given us,
the joy that is hidden among
the reeds of the ordinary.

Or this beginning of “for learning to love yourself”:

When I don’t feel worth loving,
God, help me remember
that you made me on purpose.

God, let me look through your eyes
to see the way you look at me
with pride and tenderness,
deep joy and love.

There are many that are about tough days, that are honest in turning to God in an incredibly bad time, like this from “for collective grief”:

Remind us that you, oh God,
are our home and our refuge.
When life’s unthinkable fragility
is too difficult to hold,
take my hands.

This part from “for others” resonated with me:

God, I will openly admit
that my plan was to rescue us all.
Pry this out of my hands.
Absolve my guilt.
Calm my spirit.
Let me allow you to do the impossible
and bear up the weight of the world
I am determined to carry alone.

And the section that especially spoke to me was “bless this beautiful, limited life,” including this part from “for an unfinishable day”:

In this culture of more, more, more,
make me less.

Less tidy and afraid,
less polished and buttoned up,
less prideful and judgmental.

Turn down the volume of my expectations,
and let me hear the birds sing
another lovely truth:

I am deeply and wholly loved.
I am beautiful and somehow delightful
even as I am unfinished.

That should give you the idea! In these blessings, you’ll find raw honesty. But you’ll also find comfort, beauty, encouragement, and the reminder that you’re not alone.

I think that now I’ve finished, I very well may start over at the beginning and go through this book again immediately, but at the very least, I’m going to pull it out for Advent and Lent. She’s got guides in the book and on her website for using the book in those seasons.

In whatever way you choose to use this book, I promise it will indeed bring blessings.

katebowler.com
convergentbooks.com

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Review of I Swear, by Katie Porter

I Swear

Politics Is Messier Than My Minivan

by Katie Porter

Crown, 2023. 284 pages.
Review written August 8, 2023, from a library book.
Starred Review

Okay, reading Katie Porter’s book made me a Katie Porter fan, similar to the way reading Elizabeth Warren’s book years ago made me an Elizabeth Warren fan. What both women have in common? They have both studied bankruptcy and fully understand that financial trouble does not imply moral failing.

One of her early stories is of studying mortgage law — and learning that banks were breaking laws, to the detriment of consumers, when they foreclosed, time and time again.

As a mortgage holder, you do what the banks tell you. You assume they’re following the law. Well, Katie Porter checked. And they weren’t. She began to get attention on that as a professor.

While I had started to change minds and get people in power to see that mortgage companies made mistakes and misbehaved, I did not want to be right. I wanted things to be right. Banks used the law to try to collect every penny; we should expect them to follow every rule.

And she decided to run for office to try to make things right.

This book has plenty about running for office and the challenges of being a single mom in Congress and commuting to the other side of the country. (She and her kids tried living in Virginia, but it didn’t work out.) It tells about her background growing up on a farm and the difficult end of her marriage. But my favorite part was where she describes her work in Congress.

As I see it, the real work of Congress is civic education. Democracy only functions if voters know what’s going on in their government and elected representatives know what’s going on in their communities. As a congressmember, that means teaching and learning, respectively.

The American people set the nation’s agenda every two years with House elections, and every four years with presidential elections. They cannot decide if they support a government policy without first knowing what the government is doing (or not doing). Representatives should be teachers, with constituents as our students.

At the same time, we should also be students, learning from our constituents. Without knowing the challenges and ideas of the people we represent, congressmembers can only substitute their own views for voters’ views. While that may happen, it is not how representative democracy is supposed to work. Getting the facts, doing the research, and gaining experience are moments of learning that help me make the best votes for my community.

Teaching and learning are the exact work I did as a law professor, before I ran for Congress. I loved that, and so not surprisingly, I love Congress work.

And yes, using a white board is a fundamental approach to teaching. Visual aids always help!

This concern for people — trying to make government better for actual people — can’t be faked. May Katie Porter continue to serve in this way for many years to come.

Oh and Hooray! When I checked her Twitter account (@katieporteroc), I see that she’s running for Senate in 2024. And she’s got a tagline on her profile: “I did not go to Washington to learn how to play by the rules. I went to Washington to rewrite them.” This book goes into the reasons why she cares about people and wants to make lives better by making government better.

katieporter.com

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Review of Prayers from the Heart, by Lorna Byrne

Prayers from the Heart

Prayers for help and blessings
Prayers of thankfulness and love

by Lorna Byrne

Coronet, 2019. First published in Great Britain in 2018. 278 pages.
Review written August 13, 2023, from my own copy, purchased via Amazon.com
Starred Review

Here’s another book by the wonderful Lorna Byrne, who writes her story in Angels in My Hair, telling how all her life she’s been able to see angels.

In this book, she gives us guidance for praying and fills the book with example prayers for specific situations. The examples are all simple and heartfelt, and reinforce that you really can pray about anything.

I especially enjoyed the first chapter, where she talks about how angels help us and the benefits of prayer:

We all need prayer. Now matter what you say — whether you believe in it or not — there will always be a time in your life when you need prayer. And we do all need it, though sometimes we are so cast down we feel unable to pray. That is why we should all pray for each other, because sometimes we simply cannot pray for ourselves. We may be in too much pain, physically and emotionally, and we cannot say the prayers we need to help us in our lives at that particular time.

It was when I had just read the first chapter and was thinking about how she teaches there are angels all around us that I had a lovely experience that convinced me to believe it.

After all, I believe God loves me. Why not believe that this loving God has servants all around, protecting and helping me and the world around me? This book uplifts me, encourages me, and reminds me to pray.

lornabyrne.com
hodder.co.uk

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Review of Cultish, by Amanda Montell

Cultish

The Language of Fanaticism

by Amanda Montell

Harper Wave, 2021. 310 pages.
Review written August 8, 2023, from my own copy, signed by the author.
Starred Review

Last September, I was asked to speak at the Fall for the Book Festival at George Mason University on a panel about book banning. After my panel, I went to hear Amanda Montell and another author speak about cults. The talk was fascinating, and I purchased both books and got them signed. I didn’t mean to take so lomg to read it, but I had lots of library books checked out, too, and have been reading for award committees, and, well, I finally finished reading it. This is not a reflection on the book — I’d often intend to read just one chapter and instead read two or three. This is just a reflection on how I read nonfiction and don’t give enough priority to books I own. The book was amazing, and got me thinking about so many things.

Amanda Montell has a background in linguistics, and she takes a look at cults from this angle — looking at the language cults use to bring in followers, which she calls “Cultish.”

Before I go any further, let me talk about what constitutes a cult. I thought I knew all about them, because I studied them for a semester at my Christian high school. We defined them as any group that doesn’t acknowledge that Jesus is God. Hmmm. Maybe that definition isn’t adequate? Especially in view of what I learned watching the “Shiny Happy People” documentary series (I blogged about my reactions to that series with “Shiny Happy Childhood” posts.), realizing that Bill Gothard’s “Institute in Basic Youth Conflicts” that I attended many times as a child ended up having more and more cult-like characteristics.

Amanda Montell’s intro tells stories of two people each heavily involved in a different kind of group. She asks, “What do Alyssa’s and Tasha’s stories have in common?”

The answer: They were both under cultish influence. If you’re skeptical of applying the same charged “cult” label to both 3HO and CrossFit, good. You should be. For now, let’s agree on this: Even though one of our protagonists ended up broke, friendless, and riddled with PTSD, and the other got herself a strained hamstring, a codependent friend with benefits, and a few too many pairs of overpriced leggings, what Tasha Samar and Alyssa Clarke irrefutably share is that one day, they woke up on different sides of Los Angeles and realized they were in so deep, they weren’t even speaking recognizable English anymore. Though the stakes and consequences of their respective affiliations differed considerably, the methods used to assert such power — to create community and solidarity, to establish an “us” and a “them,” to align collective values, to justify questionable behavior, to instill ideology and inspire fear — were uncannily, cultishly similar. And the most compelling techniques had little to do with drugs, sex, shaved heads, remote communes, drapey kaftans, or “Kool-Aid” . . . instead, they had everything to do with language.

You might think that a book on cultish language would have a definition of cults. The author indeed went looking for one, but it turned out that different people think of different things when they use the term. Academics don’t like to use the word because of the pejorative context. I like what the author ended up with — a sense that there’s a continuum of cultish behavior. All humans crave belonging, being part of a community. On the benign end of the cultish spectrum is simple community, being part of a close-knit group. And it’s not tremendously difficult to leave (though of course there are always emotions involved).

On the opposite end of the spectrum are groups like Jonestown and Heaven’s Gate where people can’t leave even if they want to and follow the cult leader to their deaths. But most groups are somewhere in the middle of those two extremes.

I can’t stress enough how fascinating this book is. Amanda Montell covers religious cults, yes, but also multilevel marketing companies, fitness movements, political groups (yes, QAnon is mentioned), and so much more. It went so far beyond “groups who don’t agree with us about Jesus” and is just amazing to see how much these disparate groups have in common — particularly in their use of language.

One of the early chapters lays out the language tactics. Making people feel special and understood, often with love-bombing and inspirational buzzwords is how they begin. Conditioning follows, working over time, and the end result is coercion, convincing people to “act in ways that are completely in conflict with their former reality, ethics, and sense of self.”

She breaks down some of the techniques:

The first key element of cultish language? Creating an us-versus-them dichotomy…. The goal is to make your people feel like they have all the answers, while the rest of the world is not just foolish, but inferior. when you convince someone that they’re above everyone else, it helps you both distance them from outsiders and also abuse them, because you can paint anything from physical assault to unpaid labor to verbal attacks as “special treatment” reserved only for them.

This is part of why cults have their own jargon in the first place: elusive acronyms, insider-y mantras, even simple labels like “fiber-lab.” It all inspires a sense of intrigue, so potential recruits will want to know more; then, once they’re in, it creates camaraderie, such that they start to look down on people who aren’t privy to this exclusive code. The language can also highlight any potential troublemakers, who resist the new terms — a hint that they might not be fully on board with the ideology and should be watched.

Another technique came up over and over again:

There’s a companion tool to loaded language that can be found in every cultish leader’s repertoire: It’s called the thought-terminating cliché. Coined in 1961 by the psychiatrist Robert J. Lifton, this term refers to catchphrases aimed at halting an argument from moving forward by discouraging critical thought. Ever since I learned of the concept, I now hear it everywhere — in political debates, in the hashtag wisdom that clogs my Instagram feed. Cultish leaders often call on thought-terminating clichés, also known as sematic stop signs, to hastily dismiss dissent or rationalize flawed reasoning…. While loaded language is a cue to intensify emotions, semantic stop signs are a cue to discontinue thought. To put it most simply, when used in conjunction, a follower’s body screams “Do whatever the leader says,” while their brain whispers “Don’t think about what might happen next” — and that’s a deadly coercive combination.

But as when I learned to identify verbal abuse by reading Patricial Evans’ writing, identifying cultish language is more for yourself than it is for warning others:

Thought-terminating clichés are by no means exclusive to “cults.” Ironically, calling someone “brainwashed” can even serve as a semantic stop sign. You can’t engage in a dialogue with someone who says, “That person is brainwashed” or “You’re in a cult.” It’s just not effective. I know this because every time I witness it happen on social media, the argument comes to a standstill. Once these phrases are invoked, they choke the conversation, leaving no hope of figuring out what’s behind the drastic rift in belief.

So, this all gives you an idea of what you’ll find in this book. Along with this conversation about things cultish groups have in common, there are many, many case studies, examples from everywhere on the spectrum from innocent to harmful. Some extra time is given to Jonestown and Heaven’s Gate, but there are plenty of more everyday examples. She even talks about how social media is designed to “generate ideological sects, to pack people’s feeds with suggested content that only exaggerates what they already believe.”

After looking at so many types and degrees of cultish behavior and language, the author reminds us that we are made for community. We won’t avoid cult-like spaces altogether, nor do we want to.

Above all else, it’s important to maintain a vigilant twinkle in your eye — that tingle in your brain that tells you there’s some degree of metaphor and make-believe here, and that your identity comes not from one swami or single-minded ideology but from the vast amalgam of influences, experiences, and language that make up who you are. As long as you hang on to that, I think it’s possible to engage with certain cultish groups, knowing that at the end of the day, when you come home or close the app, strip off the group’s linguistic uniform, and start speaking like yourself again, you’re not all in.

So, yes, this is a valuable book. It gives perspective on how people get pulled into cultish groups and ways to check where the groups you’re part of (and we are all part of groups) fall on the health spectrum. But it can also give us compassion for those who find themselves in a difficult place. it’s not stupidity that gets them there, it’s design.

amandamontell.com

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