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10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Publisher's Weekly Review, March 18, 2009
Enough: Commitment in an Age of Excess
Will Samson. David C. Cook, $14.99 paper (256p) ISBN 978-0-7814-4542-9
Tailor-made for an age of anxiety, this volume, written particularly for Christians, attempts to address and answer the author's question: "What would it be like to be formed by communities consumed by God and God's vision for the world?" The author, a Ph.D. candidate in sociology at the University of Kentucky, indicts Christians for supporting a cultural obsession with consumption, a constrictive view of morality and a narrow view of God. Threading his own conservative evangelical background and his family's present experiences as part of an intentional community throughout the book, the author also uses Scripture to delineate an alternative vision: countercultural "Eucharistic Communities" that offer their resources to the world. The first chapters of the book include cultural, sociological and theological analysis of the dilemmas of consumption and contrasts them with the writer's vision of God's call to abundant life in Christ. In the second part, Samson offers detailed, practical ideas on how believers can make lifestyle changes aimed at embracing wholeness in connecting belief and practice as the people of God. (Mar.)
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
What Consumes Us?, April 10, 2009
[ This review originally appeared on englewoodreview.org ]
There are any number of books being written at present about economics; many of these that have been on my reading list have to do with the sorry state of the global food economy. Take, for instance, The End of Food, a thorough and necessary account of food economies, but one that commonly assumes a default of "a food economy...defined by scarcity." Indeed, the buzzwords of current economic discourse all seem to connote doom and gloom: "economic downturn," "recession anxiety," etc. So how welcome is Will Samson's new book Enough: Contentment in an Age of Excess, which goes right to the heart of modern economics, namely that "we are people consumed by stuff" (notably, this point is missing from almost all conversation about "the economy"). Further, as Samson goes out of his way to make clear that he understands this problem to be theological as much (or more) than just cultural, he posits that "we are not consumed by an incarnational God the same way we are consumed by stuff."
To begin to address the question of consumerism, the "way of thinking about stuff that believes the consumption of things...is what will...make us content," Samson makes some general remarks that guide the rest of the book, and that I hope will inform an even broader conversation:
"Is there enough for everyone? This is an economic question, and in our discussion here I am certainly going to try and address the question from an economic perspective. But it is not just an economic question, is it? In fact, the question of whether there are sufficient resources in this world may be one of the most important theological questions of our time. How we answer it reveals much regarding our belief about the character of God: who we think God is, how we think God provides for the creation, and what role humans play in that work - this all relates directly to our understanding of God."
Samson's understanding of the kingdom of God is first of all radically incarnational; it is played out in every facet of the world, "the Word became flesh and dwelt among us." Secondly, it is communal, realized most fully in the gathered body, what Samson names the "Eucharistic community."
The Eucharist meal is the common image of abundance throughout Enough, and seems particularly appropriate this Easter week. Samson reminds that this meal is the model for the church: "the bread and wine are made of other elements but are no longer able to be described as a simple composite of these elements: they have become new creations. In the same way, we are called to give of ourselves to our communities and to the world. But, we are called as communities to do so" (emphasis added). Additionally, the elements are "given graciously," the meal is sensual and physical, and it "provides an alternative telling of the other stories that have come to dominate the church in modernity."
The flesh and blood of the Eucharist meal, then, is the image of the abundance of God, embodied in Christ crucified and risen, and offered for participation to the church, that it be "one body," incarnate in the world. Samson offers a rich understanding of the ways we have failed to embody this sacrificial calling, turning instead to a fascination with stuff - commodities of both the free market, and a commodified religion.
Enough is told through much of Will's own narrative, from early formational experiences of the church and American capitalism, to the present, as members with his family of an intentional community in Lexington, Kentucky. Much of the book is a large theological framework to understand an economics based on the kingdom of God, perhaps similar to what Wendell Berry has called "the Great Economy." And for all of the thoughtful theology, Will remains easy to read and funny (he is perhaps the first to use language like "mac daddy" with regards to eschatology.)
Several chapters in the second half are devoted to specific practices that would give shape to a "Eucharistic Community," such as eating together, seeing the local neighborhood by walking or biking, investing in people rather than corporations, and spending locally; all of these are suggestions being made by many today, but for Samson these practices are tied to larger telos: "we must find ourselves in a broader story, namely the very presence of God that occurs within the gathered community of Jesus followers." Conversion, a continuous process, wholeness and gratitude are also at the heart of this community.
Enough is an encouragement that the gathered body of the church need not worry "what we will eat..." if we begin to embrace a Eucharistic understanding of the abundance of resources given. Particularly as the use of this world's resources are being called into question at every turn, Samson reminds that perhaps the question is not Is there enough?, but rather, how shall we use what has been given?
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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
I needed more., September 23, 2009
Will Samson's "Enough," ironically, left me longing for more.
There were a variety of different things happening in this book which, if each idea had been catalogued in a single book, could have been much more developed, poignant and persuasive; however, as Samson himself noted in a number of spots in the book, he is somewhat tangential which I feel muffled some of his more potent ideas. I know that he was trying to make this book palatable to his probable audience (those who are concerned with the effects of consumption who, stereotypically, reside on a specific arc of the political spectrum) but his subtle commentary with sarcastic references to political ideologies also kept me from fully engaging in the book and seemed to detract from the gravity of American and Christian consumption. And I think that the most difficult component of this is that he recognizes the significance of Christian consumption and, yet, neglected to really spell out the potentially cataclysmic effects.
So, that being said, here is my response to the book.
To begin, (again, as he notes) the structure of the book is "a bit more wonky" (27). This is me being nit-picky but had he structured his book the way he detailed it on the previous page (26) it would have presented a much more cogent argument with a more fluid transition from idea to idea.
There could have been much more time spent on chapter 2. At the core, the issue of Christian consumption is derived from a misinterpretation or misunderstanding of certain biblical narratives, it has become exacerbated by the American civil religion which has wed American ideologies (in all of its facets: war, good and evil, consumption, morality, etc.) with Christianity. Rightly stated, he notes that it often leads American Christians to "see what God is doing in the world and what America is doing in the world as the same thing" (44). While this is disturbing and depressing that American Christians sometimes feel that way, the most important effect of this is that "the actions of our churches interpret for the world the message of the gospel" (37). This is enormous and, in my view, should have been the primary message of the book and should serve as the primary impetus for American Christians when they consume.
One message that the American Church (and, of course, I don't mean all. I'm speaking in generalizations) is sending out to the world is that, "yes, we are aware that there is hunger, disease, strife, and death, all of which is in our financial purvey to alleviate; however, our homes and cars, our churches and stuff, come first. Charity is a secondary byproduct of our conversion/conviction. Not first." Recent studies has noted that the American Church (both Protestants and Catholics) make over $3 trillion dollars a year. With global organizations noting that it would take mere tens of billions of dollars to eradicate extreme hunger, poverty, and preventable diseases, what message is the world hearing is the "message of the gospel?"
Samson makes references to some of these ideas but, as stated earlier, doesn't spend enough time and doesn't include enough statistics to make the issue powerful.
I appreciate his discussion of prophetic voices and visions and the reactions of the American church in Chapters 3 and 5. People both in and outside of the church are voicing their concerns about our consumption and we don't appear to be listening. When eschatology is brought into the conversation, Samson, again, does an ok job of tying the two together but not "enough." As the "prophecies" of modern apocalyptic visionaries converge with political ideologies regarding consumption, the voraciousness of Christian appetites becomes seemingly insatiable. The ideas of "America's robustness is a result of faithfulness to God" and "the world will end soon" lead to words like Ann Coulter: "`Earth is yours. Take it. [...] It's yours. [...]Big gas-guzzling cars with phones and CD players and wet bars -- that's the Biblical view" (Ann Coulter, "If Democrats had brains, they'd be Republicans").
I really felt like the latter half of the book, starting with Chapter 6, had a good deal of great ideas that were spelled out well (but still left me wishing for more). The correlation to the mind-body-spirit crises was great. In a world that is hungry and sick, it is not only irresponsible of Christians to consume the way that we do, it is indicative of a mental dichotomy between a God who is sufficient, who calls us to consume well (not a lot but responsibly and good), who calls us to care for and nurture both the world and the people in it and a religion that appears to selectively ignore those passages of the Bible. Christian consumption on a physical and spiritual level is far more of an issue and a reflection of a cancerous ideology than some of the other seemingly insignificant issue of homosexuality, for example. There are 12 passages that make some sort of reference to homosexuality in the Bible each of which, when contextualized, could yield very different ideas than the interpretation people outside of the church assume we all think. Yet there are thousands of verses about caring the poor and I believe the life of Jesus reflects that as well.
So, in this review, I'm not trying to berate Samson's work. I enjoyed it. I really did. I do recommend this book. Read it. It's relatable. It's palatable. He does a fine job getting the conversation started. Start with him and then move towards books like "The Ethics of Consumption" or "Hot, Flat and Crowded" and read them as a concerned Christian.
I would give this book a three and a half. I just felt like I wanted more. Christian consumption (especially those of American Christians) affects our spiritual disposition, the global environment and the souls that God yearns to heal and draw close. If we as a church don't recognize the gravity of the issue and realign our priorities to be like that of Christ, we will continue to tell the world that our God is not enough.
[...]
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