I try to balance my reading between light, religious and political and so following on from Stevie G's autobiography, A Short history of Tractors in Ukrainian and Spirituality Revolution I'm now reading Heat- How to Stop the Planet Burning, by George Monbiot.
Monbiot closes his introduction by writing,
'I have one purpose in writing this book: to persuade you that climate change is worth fighting. I hope I have been able to demonstrate that it is not... too late. I hope to prompt you to...force our government to reverse their policies.
Failing all that, I have one last hope: that I might make people so depressed about the state of the planet that they stay in bed all day, thereby reducing their consumption of fossil fuels.'
The subsequent chapter is terrifying and if you are not that bothered about climate change or worse naively contest its existence, you need to read this chapter. Although my work is committed to the development sector I'm increasingly thinking that global warming should be the primary concern of humanity. Monbiot argues convincingly that unless greenhouse gases are cut by 90% by 2030 the planet will begin to shutdown; glaciers will disappear, lands will flood, essential crops will not grow, ecosystems will fail and disease will spread on an unprecedented scale.
The problem is that the negative effects of global warming are distant but the consequences of showing environmental concern are immediate (sacrificing those holidays, walking the extra mile etc) and people are simply not willing to make the sacrifice. For the first time in the history of humanity we (the west) have all the resources we need and do not need to search or fight for energy; why would we give all this up?
Anyway, the book is a really important read. Not only does Monbiot know his stuff, he also has a plan of action about where we should be headed and how we can realistically cut emissions by 90%, making this not just a good book, it's a manifesto!
One point which Tacey makes in his book is that there should be a decline in religion in the West. We should expect less people to go to church because church doesn't work for what Tacey calls 'youth spirituality'. Saying that, the growth of Pentecostalism is in some respects more worrying than the decline of traditional churches: while it may work for what is a very small percentage of the population, this model of spirituality alienates the majority of us and gives false hope to the rest of the church that if they shout/sing louder, revival is just round the corner and they can keep ignoring the metaphysical questions that young people are asking.
I've also just started 
The programme is interesting, especially Rod Liddle's critique of atheism, which he sees as something that is as religious as any theistic religion. The difficulty with the programme, as with Dawkins', is that it is so one sided. Liddle interviews Dawkins or other non-believers and then deconstructs their argument not to their face but to a believer (such as Alistair McGrath) or worse as the narrator. Channel 4 seem to be doing a lot of documentaries like this and I'm not a fan. It breeds frustration amongst those of the opposing viewpoint and ignorance amongst supporters.
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