Reading...

On the 10th of October I posted....

My favorite quote from Saints is found in the preface.  We are just getting started with our listening to the book.  The quote?  Every scene, character, and line of dialogue is founded in historical sources, which are cited at the end of the book.

The back of the book is filled with 71 pages of sources cited.  I love the word every.  Every line of dialogue!  Wow!

I also appreciated and enjoyed hearing the First Presidencies hope, for us that read it...We pray that this volume will enlarge your understanding of the past, strengthen your faith, and help you make and keep the covenants that lead to exaltation and eternal life.

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So....here it is the 2nd of November and we just finished reading Saints.  We started off reading one Chapter a day but our interest was so keen that we upped it to two a day. 

For me- it was quite the ride in reading...both rough at times and then smooth.  I found it interesting and informative....raw and real...very comfortable and very uncomfortable...soothing and disturbing...clarifying and confusing.  I found myself...understanding events and misunderstanding events... feeling tender and feeling disturbed... un-kinking mis-information I'd absorbed along the way and absorbing information I'd never even heard of.  At times I felt -What?!!!....Why?!!!...Really?!!...No Way!!!...You've got to be kidding!!!  Decisions were sometimes made and I'd feel/think...That is wrong!/That is right!  Often I judged people if I thought they didn't do it my way!!  There were liars mixed in with honest men.  Deceivers and righteous leaders.  It made my head spin!

For he- Kept things more in perspective of it being the History/doings of the Church being restored...the entire 1st Volume only covers 31 years and that was 203 years ago...this is a history and the Church has grown and developed to what it is today.  He was caught off guard sometimes and would say...I'll be darned.  Didn't know that.  Can you believe that?  Never heard of that before.

Both- We were horrified at the suffering.  Our hearts were sorrowful.  Then our hearts would be joyful.  and we'd teeter totter back and forth, with whatever was going on.  We admired the faith and testimony and determination and bravery of these early Saints.  We saw faith diminish in some and grow in others.  There was faithfulness and desire along with deceit and lies and slander.  We both marveled that they would hold on to their faith, in the midst of such persecution from the outside and then dealing with the newness of the Gospel and varied opinions, at times, on the inside.

Saints was not what I expected and I don't know why I thought it wouldn't be exactly as it is. It's a real History.  Every word taken from documents.  Remember that part that I said I loved?
Every scene, character, and line of dialogue is founded in historical sources, which are cited at the end of the book.  71 pages of footnotes. It can be a trusted read. 

It's a documented History.  Not a novel.  Perhaps I overlooked that?  Truth can be very painful at times.  Even with all of that being said...I guess I'm an optimist and maybe a believer in fairy tales mixed with when pigs fly.  I wanted that last page to wrap it all up with everyone living happily ever after.  I wanted that so bad that I read, on my own sans Terry, the last 3 Chapters...hoping hoping hoping for that ending and it just left me hanging!  Without giving me that path blazed with roses...it just left me sitting there rather dumbfounded.  This is a history of the Church, the Gospel that I love...why can't it be all pretty?  Why all of this stuff?  Perhaps in the next 172 years, that is left to tell about...at some point it will get into my comfort zone part that I'm familiar with...the Church that I joined years and years and years ago!  I need to wake up and just smell the roses for the reality of this book being the way it was.

Maybe I'm just not cut out for reality???  I came into this BookReading, telling Terry
...they say there will be 3 more Volumes and I wish they had them now.  I don't like to read a book series and be held up.  

Well, I'll eat those words and now I say
...I need a little breather to absorb what I just read before I read more of the same!  I'm glad the other Volumes aren't ready!

We decided to go back and re-read one chapter a day...starting tomorrow.  Stay tuned...I may do this 2nd reading and come out all on fire about it!

Hey!!  no judging.  not nice.  no judging me.