All That′s Holy: A Young Guy, an Old Car, and the Search for God in America - Hardcover

Levinson, Tom

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0787961663 ISBN 13: 9780787961664

Publisher: Jossey Bass, 2003

Synopsis

There's nothing more American than a road trip- and a spiritual road trip at that. From mosque to synagogue to chapel to coffee shop, Tom Levinson's entertaining and erudite stories of conversations with the faithful and the seeking get to the heart of religion in America today. All That's Holy is a fascinating conversational collage set against the backdrop of the author's deepening appreciation- both intellectually and spiritually- of his own religious roots. "Tom Levinson has given us a spiritual Odyssey, an extended adventure in the new meaning of faith and hope. Eloquent, heartfelt, and true, this is a book America needs." - James Carroll, author, Constantine's Sword: The Church and the Jews and American Requiem, winner of the National Book Award "Tom Levinson has written an engaging and lucid personal essay on a timely and timeless subject." - Joyce Carol Oates, author, A Garden of Earthly Delights, Big Mouth & Ugly Girl, and I'll Take You There

About this title

About the Author

Tom Levinson has written columns for Beliefnet, the popular Internet religion magazine, and is currently attending law school at the University of Chicago. He is a graduate of Harvard Divinity School and former development director for the National Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice in Chicago. Levinson lives with his wife in Chicago. He recently sold his 1994 Nissan to a friend.

From the Back Cover

"Tom Levinson has written an engaging and lucid personal essay on a timely and timeless subject"
?Joyce Carol Oates

A Road Trip Through the Highways and Backroads of American Spirituality

There?s nothing more American than a road trip?and a spiritual road trip at that. From mosque to synagogue to chapel to coffee shop, Tom Levinson?s entertaining and erudite stories of conversations with the faithful and the seeking get to the heart of religion in America today. All That?s Holy is a fascinating conversational collage set against the backdrop of the author?s deepening appreciation?both intellectually and spiritually?of his own religious roots.

"Tom Levinson has given us a spiritual Odyssey, an extended adventure in the new meaning of faith and hope. Eloquent, heartfelt, and true, this is a book America needs."
?James Carroll, author, Constantine?s Sword: The Church and the Jews and American Requiem, winner of the National Book Award

"I told everybody I know about this book. I love it!"
?Ruth Malina, the author's grandma

"This is the best introduction to what is really going on in the multicolored religious lives of our dappled population you can lay hands on today."
?From the Foreword by Harvey Cox, author, Common Prayers: Faith, Family, and a Christian?s Journey Through the Jewish Year

From the Inside Flap

Tom Levinson is a fourth-generation Jewish New Yorker who grew up a Christmas-tree-decorating, Judaism-heckling "doubting Thomas." As he got older he noticed that other people had different views, and he hungered to understand why.

All That?s Holy is a new twist on an age-old search?a spiritual road trip that chronicles both a personal pursuit of religious identity and meaning, and an outward-looking exploration of the varieties of American religious experience. From big cities to small towns, in prisons, monasteries, synagogues, and street corners, Tom both seeks out and stumbles upon people whose faith is more than it seems on the surface. Buddhists and Baptists, Muslims and Mormons, Pagans and Pentecostals?Tom?s conversations about faith and doubt weave together a poignant, memorable tapestry of American spirituality.

With the country as his classroom, Tom sketches a lively, funny, and evocative portrait of how people live?whether they see themselves as spiritual or religious, why they?ve left (or remained in) the religious communities of their upbringing, and how they negotiate the tensions of living in an American culture at once highly secular and deeply religious. By the end of the road trip, Tom learns there?s no place like home: a journey conceived to learn about the spiritual lives of others leads him to a newfound understanding of his own.

Edition details

• Publisher: Jossey Bass
• Publication date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0787961663
• ISBN 13: 9780787961664
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320