Is persecution part of the believer's life? Yes, says Ajith Fernando, and the Old Testament contains a book devoted to helping believers cope with it. It's the Book of Daniel. Fernando's _Spiritual Living in a Secular World_ does much to rescue the Book of Daniel from its imprisonment in the children's section of the Church.

Fernando engagingly shows that Daniel is not just a bunch of "Bible stories," but is compellingly relevant to the life-and-death matters that Christians face. As is now well-documented by Paul Marshall's award-winning book, _Their Blood Cries Out_ (Dallas: Word, 1997), Christianity is the most persecuted religion on earth. That fact makes Fernando's _Spiritual Living_ even more important for study in these times.

Ajith Fernando is well-qualified to write this book. He is a Sri Lankan pastor with plenty of experience in facing opposition because of his Christian faith. Sri Lanka, formerly known as Ceylon, is an Indian Ocean island of mixed peoples, including Tamils and Hindis, and mixed faiths as well, including Muslims, Hindus and Christians. Sri Lanka has also experienced more than its fair share of violence, as seen in the years-long warfare between government troops and the Tamil separatist guerillas. Confine all of these diversities and tensions onto one island, produce an outstanding Christian pastor-writer from that background, and such a person is likely to provide the rest of the Christian church good guidance for dealing with adversity. That's what this book does.

How ought believers to live in the midst of persecution? It's a relevant question for Christians, in all times and circumstances. After all, it was no less than the Apostle Paul who wrote, "everyone who wants to live a godly life in Jesus Christ will be persecuted" (2 Timothy 3.12). And it was Jesus Christ himself who said, "Servants aren't greater than their Master: if they have persecuted me, they will percecute you" (John 15.20)

Originally written for Jews in their dispersions after the Babylonian exile, the stories reported in the Book of Daniel now give Christians a set of role models in disarming the powers of hate, befriending opponents, de-fusing confrontation, cooperating with hostile authority when possible, and--when necessary-- suffering willingly for the principles of Biblical faith. Fernando explains the Daniel stories clearly and compellingly. And he illumines the Book of Daniel's message by using similar stories from his own experience, from the church in Sri Lanka and from Christians around the world. One pastor-friend of mine says that Fernando's illustrative stories alone are worth the price of the book.

Chapters 1 through 6 of Daniel provide models of various strategies in dealing with opposition from other human beings, especially from government. Fernando's at his best here. This material makes up the bulk of the book, and is exceedingly well-done.

The author does not devote as much attention to the difficult second half of the Book of Daniel. But he helpfully explains that Daniel 7 through 12 raise the same issue of persecution, but now on the cosmic scale, in apocalyptic images of ultimate evil, and in even more exalted images of the righteous rule of God which--according to the dreams and visions of the book--shall ultimately triumph in the contest of history.

Not intended to be a scholarly treatise,this book is recommended highly for Bible study groups, Sunday school classes for adult or high school ages, and for serious Christians of all sorts who face social pressure or (yes) the threat of physical violence against their practice of the Christian faith.

The Squash History · Folklore · Ancient Recipes

Celebrated in Recipes from Ancient Times to the Present Introduction by Alberto Capatti Accompanying Wines selected by Giuseppe Vaccarini

By Arneo Nizzoli

Reviewed by Liz Waters Copyright 1999, all rights reserved

This beautifully illustrated book is the first book in this History-Folklore-Ancient Recipes series by Konemann which takes a food and traces its history and uses through ages. This volume, of course, deals with the squash, a ubiquitous vegetable numerous varieties. These books focus more on the European preparations and traditions of the foods selected, and therefore bring a new spin on them for the American audience.

Nizzoli presents ancient and modern recipes that are appropriate for today's kitchens. The recipes are easy to follow and include nutritional data on each one as well as excellent wine suggestions of Giuseppe Vaccarini.

Here is a recipe for you to try from the book:

Rigatoni with Squash

1 lb. 5 oz. /600 g of rigatoni 1 lb./450 g of onions, sliced the heart of 1 celery, chopped 3 lb. 5 oz./1.5 kg of squash, diced 2/3 cup/150 g of butter 6 ripe tomatoes salt pepper grated parmesan

Serves 6

Method 1.Into a wide saucepan put ½ cup/ 120 g of butter, the onion, the celery and the squash and let them cook, without the lid and on a high heat, until the squash has softened. Add the peeled and chopped tomatoes, salt and pepper and cook on a low heat. 2. Meanwhile boil the rigatoni in plenty of salted water.

3.shortly before serving, add the remaining butter to the sauce. Drain and add the rigatoni, and sprinkle with parmesan.

Per portion: 526 calories, fiber 0.29 oz/8.4 g

Wines - choose a young dry white wine, such as a Colli Orientali del Friuli Reisling, Colli di Luni, Falerio dei Colli Ascolani or Falanghina del Sannio.

Although this book did have some useful information regarding the steps required to start a restaurant, I was disappointed to find that a majority of the details centered around fine dining establishments. In fact, the author seems anti-children so if you are looking for a book about startng a small family friendly restaurant, look elsewhere. It has good, basic information on starting a small place. I would like to see an updated edition as the POS/Computer section was a little dated. This book was not what I was looking for, but if you want to open a small, classy cafe I'd give this book a shot. Overall it is a fairly quick read.

Highly recommended to any graduate student who wants to handle with discrete dependent variable in his statistical analysis. Authors explain probit, logit, log-linear model... very clearly with many examples supported by their web-site.

The journey Daniel Spurr recounts in his magnificently told travelogue-...-memoir is one the author himself hadn't planned on taking, yet he reaches deep within to share the emotionally resonant, beautiful tale of the seaman's life and of a father's love.

In this splendid, daunting, almost wicked book, Daniel O'Keefe gives us a work of unmatched scope and highly animated
scholarship about how magic operates in human societies and how it has colored history and culture from the Stone Age to the present. Drawing on
an enormous body of knowledge-sociology, anthropology, philosophy, religion, history, psychologyhe explains how magic works; describes the different categories
(medical, black, ceremonial, religious, occult, paranormal, and magical cults and sects); and demonstrates the way in which all magic, whether it be Egyptian theurgy,
Zande witchcraft, Western astrology, or the current rash of cults, is a means of the individual's defense against social pressures: against the socializing force of religion,
against collective morality-a challenge, through history, to all official versions of reality.

The book provides not only a conceptual framework, but also some methodology for enabling us to visualize the problems connected with the innovations. I think the people involved in the business of Higher EdAdmin will find this book very interesting and up-to-date tool for solving many problems associated with those innovations! The language of the book is very simple and this makes the book very interesting and accessible. I would wish to see more about presidency. I hope this will be improved in further editions of the book.

For impartial reviews of this book check:

- C.J. Spagnuolo, Journal of Medicinal Chemistry, 1999, 42:1113

- G. O'Sullivan, Synthesis, 1999, 6:1084

I respect the author's intentions to provide a form of consolation for troubled individuals like myself. However, the attempt falls short in the too-real context of inevitable aging and death. Assuming that personal efficacy in ordinary matters is self-evidently a cure simply loses sight of the fact that concentrating on mundane matters must be conducted without any form of external justification.

I recommend readers interested in this subject turn to different techniques of being resigned to the purposelessness and meaninglessness that scientific investigations continually reveal. In particular, I recommend the scientifically grounded "cosmic spirituality" as described by Milton Munitz in books such as The Question of Reality; Cosmic Understanding and Does Life Have A Meaning?. Owen Flanagan also provides comfort in his discussions, including The Problem of the Soul.

Having to face reality is always a difficult task. And Daniel Nettle courageously takes up this task with all good intention to alert troubled individuals to NOT indulge in nihilistic self-destruction for the sake of "art" or other means to attention and notoriety. This is sound advice. As is Nettle's advice to pursue robust health. These are all necessary but ultimately insufficient steps on the way to a comfortable avoidance of insanity. For a self-sufficient presence, one still must face one's personal orientation to the totality of reality.

The over-arching issue remains the absence of external justification of one's actions and one's presence. And for this there is no simple fix. Making oneself at home in the universe remains an extremely elusive destination...

It's very good book in structure ( I will never use best or perfect in my review ). It's not sophisticated and not too excessive for architecture student. After reading this book you will know that structure design is not difficult it seems though it's not easy anyway. For architecture student, if you need only one book in structure this is the right book especially in understanding rigid frame structure, explained in hundreds of pages !