Can 500 paperbacks make a difference?

Three years ago, when I was enrolled at Liberty University as an undercover student – living, studying, and praying alongside thousands of conservative Christian college students – one thought kept me awake on more than a couple of nights:

I wish more people had chances like this.

Not chances to go undercover at a Christian school, necessarily. What I kept wondering was what our modern political climate would look like if every American had a chance to spend time with the people whose theological, social, and political beliefs were completely different from theirs.  What would happen if every Bible study group invited the local Secular Student Alliance chapter over for a monthly potluck? Would we be so polarized as a nation if conservative Lutheran churches visited liberal Jewish congregations once in a while? What if people made more deliberate, out-of-the-way attempts to leave their cultural bubbles and interact with people who disagree with them?

Fast forward to last month. I was meeting with Grand Central (my publisher) to discuss ideas for the June 3 release of the paperback edition of The Unlikely Disciple. When they told me that they’d be willing to give me up to 500 copies of the book to run some sort of book-related social media campaign, I had a crazy idea.

What if we gave away 500 paperbacks two at a time, to pairs of people who disagree on the biggest moral, social, religious, and political questions of our time?

After talking about it with them for an hour or two, I sketched out a basic plan.

I’d call it the Jonah Project (see why in the FAQ) and I’d start it with 500 books.  I’d give readers the chance to receive two free, signed copies of The Unlikely Disciple – one to keep, and one to give to the person in their life who disagrees with them on lots of important political and religious issues.  An MSNBC-watching liberal might sign up with his Tea Partying uncle. A pious Catholic might give a book to his Buddhist colleague. The more unlikely the pairing, the better.

Together, the pair would read the book, talk about it, and grapple with questions like “What will the culture wars look like 20 years from now?” and “How can religions coexist in peace?”  Argument and civil dispute would be encouraged, of course, but yelling and name-calling would be strictly prohibited.

Afterwards, the Jonah Project partners would capture the results of their meeting – either by making a recap video, writing a text summary, or finding another creative way to share – and post it on the Jonah Project blog for questions, comments, and follow-up.

Together, these videos and stories would represent a small, patchwork movement – one that would use my tiny, specific journey to Liberty University as an excuse to create 250 mini-summits about faith, politics, and the messy work of cross-cultural cooperation.  And who knows?  It might even be fun.

So, here’s how it works:

Once you identify your Jonah Project partner and get him/her to participate, you can sign up for two free, signed copies of The Unlikely Disciple here. (We’ll even ship them to you in a fancy mailer.  Sorry expats, U.S./Canada only for the time being.)

Discussion questions are available here, and the Jonah Project FAQ are here.

Guidelines for making and submitting blog-ready recaps to the site are here.

And you can contact me with any other questions or comments.

If you still have questions, here’s a video of a talk I gave at the Gel conference in April, where I talked about the Jonah Project and some of its underlying principles beginning at around the 11-minute mark.

What are you waiting for?  Find your partner, sign up for your free books, and let’s have a conversation.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 24th, 2010 at 6:16 am .