The Readings

[Publius]

We're starting an in person Book Club.

There's an event on the calendar detailing the event.

We're starting with The Bible.

There will be others after that, and the goal is to break things down into consumable portions. What's different about this particular book club is the diversity of backgrounds and approaches to each of the texts we'll be looking at. Most Bible studies usually consist of people who are of very much the same faith. Most discussions about the Constitution are going to be had among people with similar backgrounds.

That is definitely not what we're about.

We'll be sharing different thoughts and ideas from different backgrounds and belief systems. Hopefully we do so with enough diversity that each of hears something new and sees things in ways we never thought of before after every meeting.

Please join us. Your ideas make our ideas better.

[Publius]

This list is subject to additions, subtractions and modifications.

Items we are going to study:

The Bible (King James, NIB or NASB) - God only knows
The Age of Reason - Thomas Payne*
The God Delusion - Richard Dawkins*

True Believer - Eric Hoffer

Common Sense - Thomas Payne
The Declaration of Independence - Various
The Articles of Confederation - Various
The Constitution of the United States - Various
The Federalist Papers (all of them, they're not that long) - Various
The Ordinances of Secession (The Declaration of Causes of Seceding States)*
Exercise: Rewrite the Constitution*
How to convince someone when Facts Fail - Michael Shermer
How to Talk to a Science Denier - Lee McIntyre

The Wealth of Nations - Adam Smith
The Myth of Capitalism - Hearn & Tapper*
The Communist Manifesto - Marx and Engels
Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand*
The Jungle - Upton Sinclair
The Necessity of Politics - Christopher Beem*
Racism, Not Race - Joseph Graves and Alan Goodman*
The Address Book - Deirdre Mask
One Person, No Vote - Carol Anderson*
Forum Discussion Items

*Items that are not considered college level requirements to understanding our nation, but that have timely or cultural importance to our interests.




Items we have studied:

The Age of Reason - Thomas Payne*
True Believer - Eric Hoffer
Common Sense - Thomas Payne
The Declaration of Independence - Various
The Articles of Confederation - Various
The Constitution of the United States - Various
The Federalist Papers (all of them, they're not that long) - Various
The Ordinances of Secession (The Declaration of Causes of Seceding States)*
How to Talk to a Science Denier
The Communist Manifesto - Marx and Engels
Atlas Shrugged - Ayn Rand*
Racism, Not Race - Joseph Graves and Alan Goodman*
The Address Book - Deirdre Mask
One Person, No Vote - Carol Anderson*
Forum Discussion Items

*Items that are not considered college level requirements to understanding our nation, but that have timely or cultural importance to our interests.

[Kitsune9tails]

Should the reading assignment we need to have read before Sunday be posted here? Perhaps before Sunday? Asking for a friend.

[Publius]

Come to the first meeting prepared with the following:

1) Who you are
2) Why you got interested in this community (Dub's Pub)
3) Why specifically you wanted to be part of the Bible study
4) What your understanding of God is (define God)
5) Why you believe what you believe about God and The Bible
6) What you hope to get out of the club
7) Suggestion for best way to go about reading the Bible

If you have ideas as to how to approach the topics we will be covering, share those as well. If you have ideas for guidelines or areas of concern, please express those too.

[Publius]

Thanks to those who came out for the club last week, and for picking up the bill!

That was a wonderful surprise that hopefully baits encourages future participants to attend.

Anyone that wants to attend may do so. If someone wants to jump in where we're at, that's super. If someone wants to revisit something we already covered, that's okay too. If someone wants to talk about something that we will be covering in the future, please wait until we get to that part.

It's hard to say how much we will get through, but for the next reading we are supposed to all have reviewed the following items:

Discussion items for the next meeting:

1. "The Bible is the best tool for understanding God." This assertion was made, and if you have thoughts on it we'd like to hear them.

2. "Why do many people believe that they can 'game' God, for example by living a life of sin and repenting on their deathbed to get into heaven?"

3. For Wulfgar et al, "How do you determine which parts of The Bible are literal and which are not?"

4. Again for Wulfgar (or anyone else that wants to answer), "Which parts were divinely inspired by God, which were not? How can you tell?"

Readings:

Genesis 1-3
Joshua 1-5
Isaiah 1-5
Ruth
Mark 1-3
Romans 1-2

That seems like quite a lot. We'll see where that gets us. In all honesty, I don't see us getting through Genesis. I don't think the Bible study guide we got accounted for different faiths. It certainly did not account for two Atheists being in the group.

[Publius]

New Location!

Because of just horrible, horrible service and not for the first time, we'll be trying out a different spot this week:

Denny's
3580 S Wadsworth Blvd, Lakewood, CO 80235


Progress:
We got through half of Genesis 1. We're at Genesis 1:14.

Safe to say this is a very different experience doing it with people who are not in your denomination. It's a very different experience when there are atheists present.

We did agree to only go into things that The Bible actually says, rather than asking questions like, "Why did God make the Earth rotate and make the sun cause cancer?" We've chosen to stick strictly to the content of the book.

We all felt we did pretty well really, but we also all felt it could be made more efficient. The pace did pick up as we continued to build understandings of what each of our perspectives was.

Discussion items as we move forward:

1. "Why do many people believe that they can 'game' God, for example by living a life of sin and repenting on their deathbed to get into heaven?"

2. "How do we determine which parts of The Bible are literal and which are not?"

3. "Which parts of The Bible were divinely inspired by God, which were not? How can you tell?"

4. The dollar jar. We will have one. We just need to figure out how to use it. We definitely need to stay on topic and be more succinct. Expect to learn what the word "pettifogging" means.

5. Should we be inviting others?

6. What other religions exist that require a belief in them under threat of penalty, for example being condemned to Hell if one does not accept Christ in Christianity?

7. Was Jesus real?

Readings for next week:

Genesis 1-3
Joshua 1-5
Isaiah 1-5
Ruth
Mark 1-3
Romans 1-2

I would expect us to get to the end of Genesis 3 if we're lucky next week.