To start off our blog, here is a book recommended by MIP Guiding Councilor, Ann Carlson: Huston Smith’s, The World’s Religions.

Originally published in1958 and for many years the standard college textbook on world religions. While it covers the world’s largest and most predominant religions, it does not cover the multiplicity of religious traditions considered representative in today’s more diverse and global society. Yet, whatever the book lacks as a modern textbook, it more than makes up for as a timeless approach to thinking about religion.

Writing primarily from his own experience, Smith’s delightful perspective is not that of the standard scholar, nor of a typical believer or adherent trying to explain their belief. In each case, his is the attitude and enthusiasm of someone who has fallen deeply in love with that tradition and is enraptured by it. Not naïve about the pitfalls of religion, nor of the devastation of religious strife, Smith nevertheless recalls to us the profound wonder, wisdom, and power of faiths that have guided and sustained communities for millennia. What might happen if we could each learn to see our own and each other’s religions through the eyes of new love?