26/08/2020
Is Chicken Little alive and well in our COVID world? …and what can we do about the sky falling in?
Dr Natasha Moore, author of the Australian Christian Book of the Year, announced last night, in an online event, is today releasing another book.
Acorn Press is delighted to introduce you to the first two imprints of the Re:CONSIDERING series: The Pleasures of Pessimism by Natasha Moore and The Cost of Compassion by Tim Costello AO. Dr Moore and Rev Costello are both part of Centre for Public Christianity (CPX) which seeks to engage the public with a clear, balanced and surprising picture of the Christian faith.
Why Re:CONSIDERING? Natasha Moore believes there is a need to bring into focus some of the currents that we are swimming in, often without even noticing that the current or the water temperature have changed. These little books are aimed at challenging our thinking. To reconsider. Maybe even to ask questions about whether these currents represent how we want to do life together or whether we might want to change streams.
Moore believes that ‘cultural pessimism’ has crept into the predominant thinking of our society. As she writes, “Once we stop recognising ourselves as bound together in a common future, we lose much of the power we have to shape that future.”
“What is required, then – and what an enervating pessimism makes all the more difficult – is the constant renewal of energies for tasks that must be performed fresh in each generation, and repeatedly within each generation. Which means that what is required is the resistance of apathy, and the constant renewal of patience, and of hope.”
Like Natasha Moore, Tim Costello is not a pessimist. He has seen the best and worst of people, and for him, a world without compassion is a world that has totally lost its humanity. The Cost of Compassion seeks to challenge us about our own definition of compassion and what is the cost to us of becoming more compassionate.
Costello acknowledges his own contradictions when it comes to compassion. The dis-ease as he walks past a person begging on the street. The complexity of showing compassion to a person who might even be described as ‘your enemy’.
“The literal meaning of the word compassion is to suffer with,” Costello writes. “It means caring enough for someone to share in their suffering – to join them in it. It is costly.”
He also reminds us that all people can both demonstrate compassion and receive compassion.
“Human frailty and vulnerability are universal,” Costello says.
“It must be a two-way street.”
These beautiful little books, easily read in an afternoon, are packed with references to philosophers, academics, Chicken Little, social justice campaigners, killer jellyfish and even a morality tale or two. Come with an open mind ready to see the world from a different lens.
Find out more about the series at reconsidering.com.au or you can find your copy at all Koorong books stores and online at Koorong.
For more information or an interview with Dr Natasha Moore and/or Rev Tim Costello, please contact Sarah Poonan, sarah.poonan@biblesociety.org.au
Download the titles and access them using the passwords below:
Password to Natasha’s book: CPXTPOP2020
Password to Tim’s book: CPXTCOC2020
