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The Worship of Mystery
Four chaplaincy students attend a mysterious alien ritual. Four lives are shattered beyond recognition…
Jun Battacharya’s final tour of duty sends him to a desolate planet where a mining accident forces him to launch his students into their work without any training.
An invitation arrives from an alien priest native to the planet, inviting Jun and his student to their most sacred ritual. Unable to decline, they attend the ritual—which shatters their lives, each in very different ways.
Jun struggles to keep his students safe, even as their lives descend into chaos, leading each of them to an encounter with Mystery that will heal them or kill them…or others.
In the tradition of Mary Doria Russell’s The Sparrow and Michael Faber’s The Book of Strange New Things, J.R. Mabry’s The Worship of Mystery goes to the farthest points of known space to explore the dark regions of the human heart.
390 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 12, 2018
11 people are currently reading
16 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
November 14, 2018
Have you ever had a moving experience that very much changed the way you saw and felt about thing - at a deep, visceral level?
This is that book that reaches inside you, and it speaks to the you that sheds its naivety, and embraces the new, different and transformed.
It echoes the destruction of what was before, and what may be to come.
The setting may be literally alien, but that is on point. New beginnings usually are. Moves are. Situations where you expect to be the teacher and find yourself learning so much more than ou feel you are sharing tend to be a bit foreign.
The students come from a wide variety of backgrounds, and each faces the unusual environment they find themselves in in very different ways.
They face death together - an not all survive it. Those that do are forever changed.
As a theo and philosophy geek, I was very much intrigued by the worship and meditations that were introduced here. As a history geek, my tail is wriggling.
I was very much reminded of Clinical Pastoral Education training, and other counselling classes.
This is where the students meet life and death, and where they stand beside those who face it - or where they run away.
Truly awesome and moving!
This is that book that reaches inside you, and it speaks to the you that sheds its naivety, and embraces the new, different and transformed.
It echoes the destruction of what was before, and what may be to come.
The setting may be literally alien, but that is on point. New beginnings usually are. Moves are. Situations where you expect to be the teacher and find yourself learning so much more than ou feel you are sharing tend to be a bit foreign.
The students come from a wide variety of backgrounds, and each faces the unusual environment they find themselves in in very different ways.
They face death together - an not all survive it. Those that do are forever changed.
As a theo and philosophy geek, I was very much intrigued by the worship and meditations that were introduced here. As a history geek, my tail is wriggling.
I was very much reminded of Clinical Pastoral Education training, and other counselling classes.
This is where the students meet life and death, and where they stand beside those who face it - or where they run away.
Truly awesome and moving!
February 16, 2020
At first, I wasn’t sure I was going to be into this book. I wasn’t entirely sure what I was getting myself into, even more so than with most books. However, I must say that I believe this book has changed my perspective on life in a profound way. This book isn’t preachy, it isn’t biased, and it’s just absolutely beautiful.
The protagonist is a chaplain in a futuristic society where it is his duty to teach and preach to not just one but many religions. Of course, there’s a catch. He’s not speaking with God, himself.
I’ll try not to give any spoilers away, but the way that this was written to approach multiple angles, multiple perspectives, and to personify God is just amazing. Some points brought up in this book are ideas that I have pondered before, and it’s amazing to see them so beautifully brought to life. There’s definitely a huge theme of acceptance, and as someone who struggles with intense anxiety, I found this book truly healing and helpful.
The protagonist is a chaplain in a futuristic society where it is his duty to teach and preach to not just one but many religions. Of course, there’s a catch. He’s not speaking with God, himself.
I’ll try not to give any spoilers away, but the way that this was written to approach multiple angles, multiple perspectives, and to personify God is just amazing. Some points brought up in this book are ideas that I have pondered before, and it’s amazing to see them so beautifully brought to life. There’s definitely a huge theme of acceptance, and as someone who struggles with intense anxiety, I found this book truly healing and helpful.
March 4, 2019
Wow.
WOW.
The Worship of Mystery is undeserving of its (appropriately) vague and banal title. This book is a fucking banger. The subtle, relentless character building. The needed humor. The rigorous philosophical and existential inquiry.
I was reminded often of Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow, in both good and unsettling ways. Obviously, they both concern faith and non-human species. But they also both touch on conversion, such as it is, and the knowability of the unknown. The Sparrow was considerably more unsettling, for those potentially turned off by the comparison.
WOW.
The Worship of Mystery is undeserving of its (appropriately) vague and banal title. This book is a fucking banger. The subtle, relentless character building. The needed humor. The rigorous philosophical and existential inquiry.
I was reminded often of Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow, in both good and unsettling ways. Obviously, they both concern faith and non-human species. But they also both touch on conversion, such as it is, and the knowability of the unknown. The Sparrow was considerably more unsettling, for those potentially turned off by the comparison.
March 9, 2019
An exciting, heartwarming, spiritually and philosophically expansive novel. I want a sequel! Chaplain Jun of the Temple of All Worlds is ready to retire, but instead is sent to a position on another planet, teaching the Chaplaincy Service. With little time to spare, he and Belle, a replacement social worker, are thrust into the midst of uproar: portions of a mine have collapsed and lives are lost, with many not yet accounted for. Jun and four brand-new students and Belle must exemplify compassion in the face of such grief. Then Jun discovers that there is also an indigenous species--aliens.
This first book in THE TEMPLE OF ALL WORLDS Series is a vivid exploration of the nature of humanity--and of aliens.
This first book in THE TEMPLE OF ALL WORLDS Series is a vivid exploration of the nature of humanity--and of aliens.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews