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I have been an ardent reader of mysteries based on religion, books on religion paradoxes. Certain books I've read in the past has completely shifted my beliefs from religious to spiritual and also directed few towards science.

I've been influenced greatly by these books:
1. The Sign by Thomas de Wesselow
2. The Rozabal Line by Ashwin Sanghi
3. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
4. Jesus lived in India by Holger Kersten
and a couple more.

Have you been influenced?

I have not, but I have acquired more knowledge regarding the topic.

No I haven't but it has opened my mind to other views

I consider myself very lucky although I didn't know this for years. One was that I received a solid and widespread religious education while attending a big Episcopal church that had a superb school. So I learned not only about being an Episcopalian and Christian, but also about other religions. And the education was not biased or prejudiced. So from an early age I had tolerance and respect for other religions.

And therefore, as I read books that had religious themes or touched somehow on religion, I was never persuaded differently but, as crazy says, my views were enlarged considerably.

Not that I agreed with all the books. I found, for example, Dan Brown's "DaVinci Code" rude and quite hateful toward Roman Catholics and even libelous toward Opus Dei.

And I write reviews for a mystery website, and one book I reviewed was scandalous toward Judaism, essentially perverting one of the most sacred tenets of the Jewish religion. I therefore hammered the book. So be it.

So no, my religious views haven't been changed but enlarged. Good topic, by the way.

I agree that Da Vinci Code was really harsh towards the Roman Catholic Church. While these books did change my religious views, but did not make me someone who doesn't believe in the sanctity of the institution of religion, it just touched the curious spot in my brain. It made want to read extensively on the topic of religion and god, spirituality, how our mind works, which I think was a life changing experience.

That's the beauty of these books on controversial topics, makes you Sherlock of the literary world!

Agreed --- books always have a way of sending us off on journeys, don't they?

Totally. A different journey with every book we read!

I speak strictly for myself, sometime reading a nice book is better than taking a holiday!
I've seen the whole of Tuscany by just reading "Under the Tuscan Sun"!

I recently read More Than Just a Good Bible Study Girl by Lisa Terkuest and I wouldn't say it changed my view of religion as much as it changed my view of relationship with God.

jagarg_29 wrote:Totally. A different journey with every book we read!

I speak strictly for myself, sometime reading a nice book is better than taking a holiday!
I've seen the whole of Tuscany by just reading "Under the Tuscan Sun"!

Mmm... I'll respectfully disagree on that point. Visiting the Tuscan area was one of the great travel delights of my life. Just sayin'...

moderntimes wrote:I consider myself very lucky although I didn't know this for years. One was that I received a solid and widespread religious education while attending a big Episcopal church that had a superb school. So I learned not only about being an Episcopalian and Christian, but also about other religions. And the education was not biased or prejudiced. So from an early age I had tolerance and respect for other religions.

And therefore, as I read books that had religious themes or touched somehow on religion, I was never persuaded differently but, as crazy says, my views were enlarged considerably.

Not that I agreed with all the books. I found, for example, Dan Brown's "DaVinci Code" rude and quite hateful toward Roman Catholics and even libelous toward Opus Dei.

And I write reviews for a mystery website, and one book I reviewed was scandalous toward Judaism, essentially perverting one of the most sacred tenets of the Jewish religion. I therefore hammered the book. So be it.

So no, my religious views haven't been changed but enlarged. Good topic, by the way.

Well said! Like you, I was never persuaded differently, but my views were enlarged.

I appreciate people like you who have tolerance and respect for other religions. Not many do.

Books have expanded my view on religion while I have read Dan Brown's "DaVinci Code" I consider it a thriller and not a book that have expand my religious belief in anyway. It was just a good thrilling book with some twist and turns. Maybe a book on Metaphysic might change my views on religion. I have a strong religious background having been gone to catholic school all my life except for college.

I'm not a Roman Catholic but I was offended by DaVinci Code, how it demeaned the Roman Catholic church and made Opus Dei seem like a crazy bunch of thugs.

I was raise in the Roman Catholic beliefs and still consider myself a Catholic but I was not offended at all by the DaVinci Code... to me it was just a book. Dan Brown's thriller does not represent the truth about the religion not the people leading the church. Personally I felt that it was a book that the author center around religion to make it more believable and insert some facts that happened to be true but essentially it is a fictional book. In no way would such a book change my view. I did not read any of the other book mentioned.

I have definitely had some books that have given me pause to consider the things about theology that I had not considered, both fictional and non fictional. The one thing that I have to keep in mind though is the credibility of the research done by the author or the opinion or bias slant the author may be writing from. One non-fiction book which comes to mind is the book "Stranger in the Valley of the Kings" by Ahmed Osman. I have done my own research on this subject to bring credibility to his subject, but I find that it is a rather controversial subject and is all more a matter of conjecture than hard proven fact. So reader, beware. lol

Interestingly, I've had a semi-religious "lesson" from a superb classic SF novel by the great Robert Silverberg, "Downward to the Earth".