By Mary Pope Osborne
A slim photo-essay in which Mary Pope Osborne gives seven religions a chapter each and asks the same question of all of them: how do their people worship?
Seven short chapters, one religion apiece: Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, and the two Chinese traditions of Confucianism and Taoism. Osborne gives each one a little history and a sketch of what its followers believe, but the heart of every chapter is worship — the prayers, the holy days, the sacred books, the buildings where people gather. Photographs run alongside the text, so a synagogue, a mosque, a temple, and a church all show up as real rooms with real people in them. It's written for fourth through sixth graders, evenly and one faith at a time.
Building every chapter around worship gives a class a fair, concrete way to hold the faiths up against each other. Everyone prays, everyone marks holy days, everyone keeps sacred books, and here is how each tradition does each of those things. Osborne never ranks them or picks a favorite, and the photographs keep the religions from turning into abstractions, since a printed picture of a real service is something a student can actually study. Seven short chapters also make it a load an independent nine- to thirteen-year-old can carry alone or in a small group.