Kate Bowler – författare

Kate är trettiofem år och älskar sitt liv. Hon är mitt uppe i karriären, har gett ut en bok och börjat undervisa i teologi på ett prestigefyllt universitet. Dessutom har hon äntligen blivit mamma till en efterlängtad son. Hon känner sig välsignad på så många sätt, men sedan kommer diagnosen som slår sönder allt. Kate får veta att hon har drabbats av en aggressiv cancer som redan hunnit sprida sig till stora delar av kroppen.

I sin nya verklighet, där hon inte vet om hon kommer att få se sin son växa upp, behöver hon ompröva allt hon lärt sig om Gud, livet och tron.

Kate Bowler är teolog och författare, född i Kanada men bosatt i USA där hon är verksam vid Duke Divinity School i Durham. Svensk översättning av Maria Store.

Det finns en mening med allt som sker är en rasande bok: rasande sorglig, rasande arg, rasande oväntad och oförutsägbar och inte minst – rasande rolig. Kanske är det just det som drar in mig i berättelsen; att den förhåller sig till den sorg den skildrar med en distans som gör att man orkar läsa fast själva historien är blytung. Språket, vändningarna, frispråkigheten, absurditeterna och skildringarna av kärleken borrar sig ner i de stora existentiella, teologiska och filosofiska frågorna nästan utan att man märker det. Snittet är så fint. Men det räcker för att frilägga. Författaren går hårt åt den framgångsteologi hon kan på sina fem fingrar, men aldrig på ett kärlekslöst sätt. Inte genom att gå till attack, bara genom att berätta.

Ur Tomas Sjödins förord.

From the New York Times bestselling author of Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I''ve Loved, a fascinating look at the world of Christian women celebritiesSince the 1970s, an important new figure has appeared on the center stage of American evangelicalism—the celebrity preacher''s wife. Although most evangelical traditions bar women from ordained ministry, many women have carved out unofficial positions of power in their husbands'' spiritual empires or their own ministries. The biggest stars—such as Beth Moore, Joyce Meyer, and Victoria Osteen—write bestselling books, grab high ratings on Christian television, and even preach. In this engaging book, Kate Bowler, an acclaimed historian of religion and the author of the bestselling memoir Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I''ve Loved, offers a sympathetic and revealing portrait of megachurch women celebrities, showing how they must balance the demands of celebrity culture and conservative, male-dominated faiths.Whether standing alone or next to their husbands, the leading women of megaministry play many parts: the preacher, the homemaker, the talent, the counselor, and the beauty. Boxed in by the high expectations of modern Christian womanhood, they follow and occasionally subvert the visible and invisible rules that govern the lives of evangelical women, earning handsome rewards or incurring harsh penalties. They must be pretty, but not immodest; exemplary, but not fake; vulnerable to sin, but not deviant. And black celebrity preachers'' wives carry a special burden of respectability. But despite their influence and wealth, these women are denied the most important symbol of spiritual power—the pulpit.The story of women who most often started off as somebody''s wife and ended up as everyone''s almost-pastor, The Preacher''s Wife is a compelling account of women''s search for spiritual authority in the age of celebrity.

Brought to you by Penguin. Life is a chronic condition. We all know, intellectually, that our time on earth is limited. But what would we change if we knew it viscerally?Hailed by Glennon Doyle as ''the Christian Joan Didion'', Kate Bowler was thirty-five when she was diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer. Before she got sick, she''d accepted the modern idea that life was an endless horizon of possibilities, a series of choices which if made correctly, would lead to a rewarding existence. But now she has to ask one of the most fundamental questions of all: How do we create meaning in our lives as we race against the clock?In No Cure for Being Human, Kate looks at the ways she has tried to wring purpose from her remaining time. She explores both the comically absurd and the profound, from attempting to remove bestsellers by hollow self-help gurus from the hospital gift shop while still attached to a drip, to crawling into bed with a four-year-old dragon after his birthday party, as mere minutes transform into a transcendent moment, hovering outside of time. Kate discovers how to live bravely and make sense of it all, even when she''s told it could come to an end at any moment.Frank and funny, dark and wise, Kate''s irreverent, hard-won observations on dying in No Cure For Being Human chart a bold path toward learning new ways to live.© Kate Bowler 2021 (P) Penguin Audio 2021

Brought to you by Penguin.We begin to feel less alone, more loved and less judged when good is . . . enough.In this collection of 40ish short spiritual devotionals, Good Enough reveals the small things we can do to inch toward a deeper, richer, truer kind of faith. Through blessings, prayers and human truths, learn to live with imperfection in a culture of self-help that promotes endless progress, and discover a companion for when you want to stop feeling guilty that you''re not living your best life now.Hailed by Glennon Doyle as ''the Christian Joan Didion'', in these gorgeously written reflections Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie proffer fresh imagination for how truth, beauty, and meaning can be discovered amidst the chaos of life. Their words celebrate kindness, honesty and interdependence in a culture that rewards ruthless individualism and blind optimism. Ultimately, in these pages we can rest in the encouragement to strive for what is possible today - while recognising that though we are finite, the life in front of us can still be beautiful.© Kate Bowler & Jessica Richie 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022