What should I read today?

You can always infer what I'm thinking about, by looking at the book(s) on my coffee table. Right now, the stack is getting pretty high. You can see the influence of last quarter's VLI topics on evangelism and missions. In addition to the books for the current quarter of VLI, the following titles are also competing for my attention.

• The Complete Idiot's Guide to Hinduism
  
• Waging Peace on Islam
  
• The Sword of Constantine
  

I bought the Hinduism book to try to understand my co-workers better. But once I started planning my vacation to Turkey I wanted to prepare for that, so I bought the book on Islam. And most recently, my Jewish co-worker has suggested that I read The Sword of Constantine. It's such a pleasure to talk to him, because he goes beyond the slogans and the buzzwords and the political correctness. So I think I need to read that one first. I've only read about 50 pages so far (which focuses on the author's personal story), and it's kind of scary. The author (brought up Catholic) describes a current, pervasive foundation of anti-Semitism. I'm not sure whether he is over-generalizing based on his particular experience, or whether I am, but I'm pretty sure that one of us is! I'm also not sure whether the difference is simply Catholicism vs Protestantism. Or whether it is explainable as pre-Vatican II attitudes.

The book quotes a Rabbi as saying that every Christian child is taught that the Jews killed Christ. And then my reaction is to refute it because I was never taught that, but then I realize that I wasn't brought up as a Christian, so I'm not qualified to say what Christian children are taught. Sigh.