I'm fascinated by nutrition and in the little I assessed Pursuing Health prior to reading it, I thought it might kind-of-sort-of be about that. It really wasn't. Instead it was about so much more. Vulnerability, death, community, humanity, compassion, caring for our neighbor, global health care, justice. It was a book rich with meat to chew on. There was simply so much there.
Thought-provoking. That's the word I would use to describe it. Each chapter gave me pause. Each chapter left me thinking and thinking about what I had read.
And each chapter made me appreciate the book more.
Here's how Bob Cutillo starts:
"[Health] is a good, one of our highest goods. But like most goods that are gifts, our efforts to insure, guarantee, or possess it will corrupt it. Like the intimate love of a spouse, the loyalty of a faithful friend, or the satisfaction of doing work well, health grows when we nurture it but diminishes when we try to control it. In the pages that follow, we will seek to renew our view of health in the hope that we can make better sense of the health we have, the sickness we experience, and the death we must inevitably face" (p. 27).
The book is divided into four sections. The first is "The Hope for Health," an explanation of the gift of health and our cultural fascination with and idolization of invulnerability. Health is not something to possess, to give us certainty in an uncertain world; it's a gift given in measures. The second section is "What You See Depends on How You Look," as Dr. Cutillo probes into how the medical profession views patients and sickness and how the gospel views them. This was utterly fascinating to me, especially the lengthy section on the incarnation.
The third section was "The Greatest Fear," and I'm guessing you won't be surprised that it's on death. Dr. Cutillo has just two chapters here, but they were in some ways the linchpin of the book. While the first chapter was a sober preparation for death, the second one was a hopeful cry called "Death Defanged and Defeated." The final section was "Reimagining the Good of Health." This was also fascinating to me. Dr. Cutillo dove into health in community and the cooperation of faith and medicine.
His conclusion was marvelous. It was "The Recovery of Wonder." What a beautiful idea to end a book on health care and medicine with a call to pursue wonder and mystery.
I would happily recommend this book to you. Honestly, I want you to read it and then go for tea with me so we can sit down and talk about it.
As a Canadian reading a book about health care by an American doctor, there were some obvious mental rifts in how I think about the medical system, but overall, I found Pursuing Health in an Anxious Age wonderfully helpful and relevant.
Buy the book here.
*I received a free copy of this book through Crossway's Beyond the Page review system and was not required to give a positive review.
Photo credit: Crossway