Alison Webster writes: “FLESHING OUT FAITH: A REFLECTION ON BODIES AND SPIRITUALITY, an SCM resource publication, follows in the innovative style and content for which SCM publications are known. Designed for students (and others) who enjoy a “no holds barred” exploratory approach to faith, this booklet (44 pages, A4) takes a look at bodies and embodiment. It’s imaginative and bold, tackling, amongst other themes, body image, health and disability. Bringing together contemporary scholarship, popular culture, visual images, meditative/liturgical material and explorations of history and Christian tradition, it’s an engaging and challenging read. Edited by Tim Woodcock (a regular contributor to SOF) and Irfan Merchant (who should be!).” £5 (inc p&p) from SCM, University of Birmingham Westhill, 14/16 Weoley Park Road, Selly Oak B29 6LL. ~~ SONGS FOR THE BETRAYED WORLD is a highly unusual CD of 21 musical settings by Bill Smith and Bim Sinclair of poems about the Holocaust and other atrocities by a range of international poets and writers including Tadeusz Borowski, Elie Wiesel and our own veteran protest-poet Adrian Mitchell. Sung by Angi Mariani and Herbie Flowers, accompanied by “The Life and Death Orchestra”, the effect is often moving, though the relentless horror of the subject matter allows little scope for musical variety. Best listened to in small doses! A brave, original, and, one suspects, wholly uncommercial project. Details from Excess Press, 020 7405 6226.
