From “World of Wonders: A Spirituality of Reading” by Jeff Crosby
“I believe reading is worship,” Byron Borger boldly writes in an essay on reading. “God tells us that we are called to love Him with all our minds. So the mandate to use our mind is not just for intellectuals or scholarly types or philosophers, it’s a mandate to all of us to use the gray matter God has given us to think well and read well to His glory. It’s an act of worship and an act of love. Reading is a way to love God with our minds and therefore reading can become an act of worship and an act of love. Reading is a way to love God with our minds and therefore reading can become an act of worship.
As we talk about a spirituality of reading, this foundational idea about the relationship between worship and reading will serve us well. In the New Testament Gospel we read, “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength” (Mark 12:30). In Luke’s Gospel (10:27), we read a similar message when Jesus says, “You will love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself.” The cultivation of the life of the mind, the affections of the heart, and a corresponding love of God and of our neighbor as ourself is not done only through reading, of course. There are many other avenues that are a part of such cultivation, including service, giving, prayer, and the pursuit of justice where injustice is present. But for centuries, reading has been a key aspect of the cultivation of these virtues.