This month’s Green Line is not particularly green—it’s more black and white and read all over, but it’s a worthy topic, our fine church library. The library is appropriately named after the inimitable Don Gall, a legendary preacher, a thought-provoking theologian and minister to many, and a fond friend and mentor to even more. Rev. Don Gall died in 2024 and is fondly remembered.

The Don Gall Memorial Library is organized and offers some fine reading and fine authors, including books by Don and other FCC members now deceased: Robert Clark and Opal Clark, parents of member Ginny Reich; David Kim, husband of member Nancy Kim; and books by current members, Faris Cassell, Robin Detmer, David Hazen, and Brenda Johnson. We also have local authors Carolyn Kortge and Lauren Kessler, and an Oregon favorite, Brian Doyle. These books can be found in the first column of books on the east wall.

The west wall of the library is populated with historic and modern Bibles, comparative religions, history, and theology. The east wall sports everything from Dakota, a beautiful spiritual geography by Kathleen Norris, to the revolutionary Our Bodies Ourselves, updated to a 1998 version. A poetry shelf includes Mary Oliver, Gertrude Stein, and Stanley Kunitz, who received in his lifetime nearly every award given an American poet. You’ll find everything from Reviving Ophelia to Atul Gawande’s Being Mortal and books on healing, prayer, and religion and science. Standouts are Parker Palmer’s A Hidden Wholeness, Pulitzer Prize winner Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste, and Project 562-Changing the Way We See Native America.

The library has no staff or overseer, no check-out desk or fines. FCC counts on patrons to return a book when finished and tuck it back on the shelf in the best location you find for it. Check out the library!

By Brenda Johnson Kame’enui