Book Discussion Group
Wednesdays, 7:00-8:15pm, Zoom
These gatherings are a connective time to engage books and one another on various spiritual topics. Our goal is to support one another as we each discover and express God’s Love.
Journey to Eloheh: How Indigenous Values Lead Us to Harmony and Well-Being by Randy and Edith Woodley.
Current Discussion:
Rooted in ten Indigenous values, this thoughtful, holistic book―written by Randy Woodley, a Cherokee descendant recognized by the Keetoowah Band, and Edith Woodley, an Eastern Shoshone tribal member―helps readers learn lifeways that lead to true wholeness, well-being, justice, and harmony.
The pursuit of happiness, as defined by settlers and enshrined in the American Dream, has brought us to the brink: emotionally, spiritually, socially, and as a species. We stand on a precipice, the future unknown. But Indigenous people carry forward the values that humans need to survive and thrive. In Journey to Eloheh, Randy and Edith Woodley help readers transform their worldviews and lifestyles by learning the ten values of the Harmony Way. These ten values, held in common across at least forty-five Indigenous tribes and nations, can lead us toward true well-being: harmony, respect, accountability, history, humor, authenticity, equality, friendship, generosity, and balance. By learning, converting to, and cultivating everyday practices of Eloheh--a Cherokee word meaning harmony and peace--we have a chance at building well-being and a sustainable culture.
In this riveting account of their own journeys toward deepening their indigeneity and embodying harmony, Edith, an activist-farmer, and Randy, a scholar, author, teacher, and wisdom-keeper, help readers learn the lifeways of the Harmony Way. The journey to Eloheh holds promise for all of us, Indigenous or not.
We know the Western worldview is at odds with a sustainable Earth, a just common life, and personal well-being. Together we can convert to another way of living--one that recognizes the Earth as sacred, sees all creation as related, and offers ancestral values as the way forward to a shared future.
Meeting ID: 886 2715 7442 Passcode: 845069
Tentative Reading Schedule:
Dec 4 // Intro and Ch. 1
Dec 11 // Ch. 2
Dec 18 // Ch. 3
(Break)
Jan 8 // Ch. 4
Jan 15 // Ch. 5
Jan 22 // Ch. 6
Jan 29 // Ch. 7-8
Feb 5 // Ch. 9-10
Feb 12 // Ch. 11-12
Feb 19 // Ch. 13-14
Feb 26 // Ch. 15-16 & Epilogue
Our Most Recent (and Recommended) Books
Danya Ruttenberg’s On Repentance and Repair: Making Amends in an Unapologetic World
Mark Russ’s Quaker Shaped Christianity: How the Jesus Story and the Quaker Way Fit Together
Ayana Elizabeth Johnson and Katherine K. Wilkinson’s All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis
Amy Kenny’s My Body is Not a Prayer Request
Cherice Bock’s A Quaker Ecology: Meditations on the Future of Friends
Brian McLaren’s Should I Stay Christian? A Guide for the Doubters, the Disappointed, and the Disillusioned
Kristen Kobes Du Mez’s Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation
Richard Rohr’s The Universal Christ: How a Forgotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, Hope For, and Believe
Howard Thurman’s Jesus and the Disinherited
Thich Nhat Hanh’s Living Buddha, Living Christ
Melissa Florer-Bixler’s How to Have an Enemy: Righteous Anger & the Work of Peace
Joan Chittister’s The Time is Now: A Call to Uncommon Courage
Phuc Luu’s Jesus of the East: Reclaiming the Gospel for the Wounded
Walter Brueggemann’s Materiality as Resistance: Five Elements for Moral Action in the Real World
Kaitlin Curtice’s Native: Identity, Belonging, and Rediscovering God
Marcelle Martin’s Our Life is Love: The Quaker Spiritual Journey
Jemar Tisby’s The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism
Rachel Held Evans’ Inspired: Slaying Giants, Walking on Water, and Loving the Bible Again
Robin Wall Kimmerer’s Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge, and the Teachings of Plants
Barbara Brown Taylor’s Holy Envy: Finding God in the Faith of Others
Nadia Bolz-Weber’s Shameless: A Sexual Reformation
Matt Boswell’s The Way to Love: Reimagining Christian Spiritual Growth as the Hopeful Path of Virtue
Richard Rohr’s Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life
Reza Aslan’s Zealot: The Life and Times of Jesus of Nazareth
Lisa Sharon Harper’s The Very Good Gospel: How Everything Wrong Can Be Made Right