Books of the Quarter
The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert
Rosaria Champagne Butterfield
Crown and Covenant, 2012
154 pages
The author of The Secret Thoughts of an Unlikely Convert is Rosaria Champagne Butterfield, a woman married to a pastor in the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America, a denomination marked by its practice of singing only unaccompanied metrical psalms in worship. But that's not what makes this autobiography worth reading. What makes it so interesting is the author's career before marriage: she was a successful English literature professor at Syracuse University who specialized in Queer Theory and was herself a committed lesbian. The book is the story of how she came to be who and where she is now. This isn't your grandfather's biography! Providing rich insight of how gays and lesbians perceive Christianity and the ""comprehensive chaos"" of conversion, this page-turner provides stimulating analyses of both Christian and non-Christian culture. Though there are a few quibbles with what she says, I cannot recommend this book highly enough, and it ought to be required reading for the age in which we live.
- Stephen Chen