wmfinck wrote: But I still maintain that I cannot really recommend books that I believe lead people into serious errors such as sacramentalism or back-door universalism.
That's a given when the authors reputation precedes them. Occasionally, I make a mistake in buying a book, that turns out to be a real lemon. But, one can make lemonade and it's not a total waste. The perfect example is 'The Great Impersonation,' which turned out to be a cryptic autobiographical confession, rather than a standard Christian Identity text. But, I discovered back-door and front-door and side-door universalism within its $37 worth of pages. I tried to expose this subtle racial reconciliation of inclusion to Dual Seedliners at the time, but not one of them would listen to me because of what you rightly call the "cult of personality." Bill was the first DSLer to take note of the actual quotes I found and buttressed his own suspicions about the author.
But I have already explained the point I tried to make in my original answer. We are not going to agree on everything, but there are some things which in my opinion are errors, that I cannot recommend to people.
I think it's just common sense. I like E. Raymond Capt books, but one of his last books, 'Counterfeit Christianity,' reeked of advocating universalism, which should raise a red flag. A review doesn't have to be positive right? If some alleged CI writings are in error, they should be biblically corrected and a review in this forum would be a good place to give books a thumbs up or down.
This section of the forum was supposed to be for book reviews, but after many posts, there are still very few actual book reviews. We all must have attention deficit disorders, LOL.
Like, how many DSCI books come out every year? There probably aren't too many books per se, because they take time, money and effort... AND distribution. You can probably blame the internet for stealing a lot of the reading audience out there. I self publish little 30 page "booklets" on my little $150 Canon copier. It's not that fancy compared to a book with a slick color cover, but it's all information that counts. I have about 9 booklets on my website and there aren't a whole lot of sales per donations, because it's already freely given and received. I think we need this discussion in this forum Bill, to help you. If people are unaware, Bill has a number of things for sale to help make ends meet AND to promote Christogenea.
Perhaps there should be a sub-forum called "Christian Identity Book Reviews and Notes". I know it would take a lot of extra time to write out the salient points of each book one may read, but if there were an interest and people took the initiative, that would certainly help people new to CI, such as the original poster of this thread.
I think it would be a good idea to expand this forum to not only CI books, but articles and other literary works. It doesn't have to be an exhaustive review, but at least dissect the pertinent issues by quoting and referencing the subject in context of the authors work. Too often I get emails from nuts who are griping about something I wrote and give me no clue from what they read. The point of the forum, I assume, is the edification of our people and to encourage them to read (something that is becoming more and more scarce these days). As someone once said, "If you don't read, you don't have any advantage over those who cannot read."
Unfortunately, even among Identity Christians, the conventional ministry is built around a cult of personality, the dispensation of sacraments, the passage of certain rites to become a "member". Yeah, we need to stick a fork in all that, and call it done.
Or stick one of those turkey thermometers in it and call it overcooked! And to pacify Nayto, being that he's chomping at the bit, I have started my new sermon for Sunday called 'Overcomers of What?'
Mark
