thesoulpurposedotorg

I’m about half way through a series of novels by Phil Rickman featuring an Anglican priest by the name of Merrily Watkins. Although these are mystery novels, they are also well researched in areas of mystical Christianity versus New Age religions, paganism, Pentecostalism and much more. The main character being an ordained woman and single parent of a teenage young woman is especially intriguing and more than a little close to my own history. I am enjoying them immensely and learning various historical nuances of New Age and other religious practices. For example, I did not know that Wicca arose in the 1960’s as a conglomeration of celtic pagan practices.
An older set of novels by Susan Howatch have long been be my favorite. The series on the Church of England and various ministries of healing and deliverance are probably the only books I have read two or three times. These novels are set in the 1920’s through the end of that century and therefore do not deal with more recent challenges to the ways of Christ. However, the quotes at the beginning of each chapter and some sections of the novels themselves are so profound and challenging that I re-read them as spiritual food.