Teens and Faith: Three Final Reviews

These three short reviews by regular contributor Virginia Thomas mark the end of our 6 week series on books that reflect experiences of teens and faith.  We’d love to hear your suggestions about other books we didn’t review!

Title:  Ordinary Miracles

Author: Stephanie S. Tolan

Publisher: Harper Trophy Book

ISBN: 9780380733224

Audience: Ages 10 and up

Summary: Mark and Matt Filkins are identical twins, 8^th graders, whose lives are so closely intertwined  that they often have the same dreams. An equally strong bond is their conservative, evangelical faith. Their father is a minister in an independent church and they  are destined to be fourth generation ministers in a family of ministers.  Matthew is excited about this; Mark is having reservations. When he meets Dr. Colin Hendrick, a Nobel prize winner in science, his life takes a new direction.  Dr. Hendrick has been invited to help with the 8^th grade science class and Mark is completely enthralled by his exposure to new knowledge, including genetic engineering.  Mark’s father disapproves, saying that God is the creator, not man. As Mark  tries to reconcile his family’s faith with Colin’s lack of belief, he learns that Colin is dying of pancreatic cancer.  Now his belief about prayer is tested and when Colin dies he must re-think his faith and find a more independent relationship with Matthew.

Colin is a dedicated scientist who loves the world; he can only believe in what can be tested and proven.  Mark’s family, though generous and charitable in their dealings with others, has deep convictions.  Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life and Colin will not choose this way.  How do we know what to believe?  There is no scientific proof for the Christian faith.  Colin sees ordinary miracles all around him in the natural world.  Mark is looking for a different kind of miracle, that God will spare Mark’s life.  This is a sensitive, thoughtful book that faces the conflict that is often seen between science and religion.  The ordinary miracle that helps Mark after Colin’s death may not satisfy everyone but the total experience of living with sincere believers and a sincere agnostic is powerful.

Title:  The Boy Who Dared

Author:  Susann Campbell Bartoletti

Publisher: Scholastic Press

ISBN: 9780439680134

Audience: Ages 9 and up

Summary: Seventeen year old Helmuth Hubener was the youngest person executed for treason by the Third Reich. The story begins with the chilling words, “The Executioner works on Tuesday.” The ending is a foregone conclusion; this is, after all, fictionalized history but Helmuth’s memories of the events and the growing convictions that brought him to this place hold our interest..   He is convicted for listening to a shortwave BBC station that gives accurate news about the war and distributing this news through pamphlets that he and three friends distribute secretly. His testimony in court guarantees that his three friends will not be executed but seals his fate .  Helmuth was an active member of the Mormon Church, organized by American missionaries, and his trust in God sustains him through his trial and death.

The Boy Who Dared raises a number of issues that Christians as citizens should ponder.  Throughout the rise of the Third Reich many German Christians claim Hitler is a leader supplied by God; opposing this idea is at first difficult, then truly dangerous.  How do we decide what good citizenship is?  Helmuth’s brothers argue that his actions will harm the family, that to oppose the German government is a pointless act of folly. How and when does one choose between prudence and daring action? How does a government like the Third Reich rise to power?  What motivates Helmuth to risk his life?  At one point in the story Helmuth wonders about the purpose of his life in this situation.  His decisions make inspiring reading.

Title:  Caleb’s Wars

Author: Davis L. Dudley

Publisher: Clarion Books

ISBN:  9780547239972

Audience: Ages 14 and up

Summary:  The time: summer, 1944, prior to the Civil Rights movement. The place: rural Georgia. Caleb, a 15 year old African-American, is engaged in several wars: the war in Europe where his brother Randall is a prisoner of war; a war with his domineering, abusive father who wants Caleb to work in his carpenter shop; a war with the white culture which limits and demeans him; and a war that centers on his faith and God’s call.  The book begins with Caleb’s baptism in which he hears God name him as his servant.  The call has little meaning for him as blacks in the south have always been servants.  He knows he has heard a voice, externally and internally, but he tends to ignore it as he goes to work in the Dixie Belle restaurant, defying his father.  Andreas, a German prisoner of war is brought in from the prisoner of war camp to work in the restaurant and Caleb establishes a tentative friendship with his brother’s enemy.  Scattered through the book are incidents of physical conflict with bullying white boys, of verbal conflicts with a racist waitress and a patronizing white man.  Caleb is led to pray for two persons who need healing and, to his amazement, his prayers are answered. Is this what it means to be a servant? The answer seems to come when Caleb has the courage to demand to be served in the Dixie Belle in the name of his brother Randall.

Here is a picture of the South during World War II with all of its prejudices and injustice.  The author does a commendable job of showing what this culture does to a person who suppresses the anger the treatment creates.  Caleb’s father has no faith in a God who lets such conditions exist.  Caleb’s Ma makes a strong case for the failure of male violence to lead the world to peace. Caleb’s struggle with God’s call is a thread throughout the book.  He prays but hears nothing.  In the courage to oppose an injustice in the restaurant, Caleb seems to understand God’s call and to anticipate a continuing struggle to be a servant. In keeping with the times, African-Americans are referred to as “niggers” and “colored.”   This book has good possibilities for young people in confirmation classes. It could prompt a discussion on which is the greater gift-the ability to heal physically or the courage to oppose injustices?

Teens and Faith: Three Short Reviews

Regular contributor Virginia Thomas offers three shorter reviews of books related to ways that teens engage questions of faith.

Title:  Preacher’s Boy

Author:  Katherine Paterson

Publisher: Harper Trophy

ISBN: 0064472337

Audience: Ages 10 and up

Summary: Robbie Hewitt decides to give up believing in God. He’s heard the visiting minister condemn wicked thoughts and deeds and suggest that the world will end in 1900.  He’s in trouble because he has disrupted church and, as the preacher’s boy, the congregation holds him to an unreasonably high standard.  If the world’s coming to an end he wants to get in a lot of living before then; he wants especially to ride in a motor car.  Robbie’s oldest brother is severely handicapped physically and mentally and Robbie envies the time and attention Elliot gets from his father.  He also fights with the rich Weston boys who make fun of Elliot. His life is complicated by two drifters who camp in his hideout, Violet and her alcoholic father , and a fake kidnapping plot.  Finally a ride in a motor car restores Robbie’s faith and the new century begins with a joyous ringing of the church bells.

Giving up faith and doubting God are familiar themes for adolescents.  Robbie’s choice of “apeism,” a conflation of evolution and lack of faith, is chosen honestly; God interferes with the lifestyle he thinks he wants.  But what happens when you give up God?  When you need prayer? When you have to make a choice?  When you want to give thanks? When an answer to your deepest yearning can only be a miracle? Robbie’s father is a Christian minister seldom seen in fiction: gentle, modest, open to new ideas, strong in conviction and charitable in relationships.  Robbie is one of Katherine Paterson’s most appealing characters.  Through his voice she examines a young person’s developing faith and understanding.

Title:  Armageddon Summer

Author: Jane Yolen, Bruce Coville

Publisher: Harcourt, Brace & Col.

ISBN: 0152022686 pb.

Audience: Ages 12 years and up

Summary:  Reverend Beelson is taking 144 believers to the top of  Mt. Weeupcut to await the End on July 27, 2000 when God will destroy the world and begin anew.  Fourteen-year old Marina’s mother insists that Marina and her four brothers join her there to prevent their destruction.  Marina’s father stays behind.  Sixteen-year old Jed follows his father to the mountain to look after him. He has been less than stable since his wife left him for another man.  In alternating voices, Marina and Jed tell their stories of the month on the mountain interspersed with county sheriff’s reports, Rev. Beelson’s sermons, the rules for Weeupcut’s camping facilities, and a physchologist on a radio talk show. Marina wants desperately to believe; Jed is firmly skeptical.  Events play out in a violent, dramatic climax as outsiders try to force their way into the camp to be safe with the believers. “Did we do wrong in believing? Asks Marina’s mother. “Never in believing, “ answers Marina, “just in what we believed.”

With the Left Behind series in the movies and news, Christians are prompted to ask what we do believe about eschatology or end times. This is a thought provoking, gripping book about belief, the search for belief, what happens when belief fails. Jed and Marina are well drawn, appealing young persons who survive the summer and begin to search for faith anew.  Before tackling this book is is well to know at least one basic fact about biblical eschatology: Acts 1:6,7.

Title:  The Heavenly Village

Author: Cynthia Rylant

Publisher: Scholastic Press

ISBN: 0439231493

Audience: Ages 9 years and up

Summary: The Heavenly Village is a place of peace and beauty with flowers, a river, trees, small houses and shops.  It is a stopping place for spirits who are not quite ready for heaven, for those who need to finish their stories. People are always arriving or leaving, something or someone is always being mended.  Here you will find Everett, a bank teller who needs time to see beauty he ignored on earth.   There is Violet Rose, a baker, who is still concerned for her cats. Dr. Blake was so busy on earth that he never had time for his family or to listen to his patients.  Now since no one is really ill, he listens to his patients for hours (and they think they are in heaven) and visits his home each evening, unseen by his family. And there’s Fortune, the rescue dog, who was a nuisance in Heaven but is quite useful in Heavenly Village.  There is some provocative idea on almost every page.  For example, God is surprised that no one wants to lose weight in Friendly Village.  Since they are not worried about what others think about their looks, they decide they look just fine. Or God usually sends a messenger or loved one to welcome a new spirit to Heaven.  He has learned that most people like to get a little unpacked before they meet the Creator.  This is a short, delightful, beautifully written plotless collection of characters and incidents.

What happens after death?  The Heavenly Village will stimulate discussion but not provide any answers.  The Bible gives us few details (and it’s well to know 1 Cor. 15, 1 Thes., Rev. 22, John 14 before you discuss  this book) but we can’t seem to get beyond time and space, beyond golden streets and gates of pearl and white robes. Rylant frees our imaginations. The book has more to say about life than the hereafter, about how we fail and how we grow.  God is depicted as gentle, wise, meeting the needs of all of his children but rather limited on earth. (Rylant is not concerned with sexist pronouns.)  Each chapter has a Bible verse introducing it and it’s worth some time to think about why a verse was chosen for a particular chapter. This is by no means a book of theology but it does stimulate theological thinking and it is fun.