After extensive reading and study of the scriptures as shared in modern scholarship of recent years, I became aware of their dating, authorship, reasons why they were written, along with many other varied cultures in which they were constructed. This all made me aware of the cultural, political, religious and language difference that, when we read the Bible, we are not always aware of how different those times were from ours today. The Gospel, the good news, came alive anew as I grasped their faith, struggling and comparing it with our faith and struggles today. The Reason for This Book: In this 21st century, I felt the need to express my continuing experience of Jesus the Christ, for myself and others, through our modern understanding of words and the verity of today's knowledge and understanding utilizing verifiable facts. This resulted in the presentation of 14 chapters called Transitioning to New Life - Now and Beyond with the hope that we can translate the faith and enthusiasm of those who follow Jesus in our lives today. I saw in the stories of Jesus and his understanding of the Good News to be: transformation not conversion, compassion not control, behavior not beliefs; this was his teaching and practice in word and deed. Even in his earth centric world Jesus seemed to understand a larger view of all life, animate and inanimate, that change, diversity, and equality were essential parts of the Creative Presence he knew and experienced daily.
About the Author: About the Author: Rev. Gerard A. Pisani, Jr. grew up in an Evangelical Christian family in northern New Jersey. After a twelve-year traditional education in the Butler Public Schools, he followed up with college. His first year was at Wheaton College in Wheaton, IL and continued in the following summer at the Wheaton College Science Station in Big Bend, SD, where his interest in science grew enormously. His second and third years of college were at Taylor University in Upland, IN. The Gospel Quartet, for which he was the accompanist, was invited to travel several years with the Word Of Life Fellowship which had nationwide radio and television broadcasts and youth rallies in the USA and other countries. During his travels, Jerry, as he became known, finished his academic studies, between home and travel, at Nyack Missionary College, Nyack, NY, graduating in 1964 with a B.S. in Theology. During graduate studies Jerry was ordained as a Conservative Baptist Minister and founded a Mission Church in Milton/Oak Ridge, NJ. He eventually became interested in the Episcopal Church and became a postulant to the ordained ministry and continued studies at the General Theological Seminary in NYC. The mission in Oak Ridge, the Milton Bible Church, became St. Gabriel's Episcopal Church and Jerry became their first Vicar. He then served as the Rector of Christ Church in Pompton Lakes in the Episcopal Diocese of Newark, NJ, followed by 34 years as Rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Bayonne, NJ. Besides his normal responsibilities as Rector, he helped begin a program called Windmill Alliance, a sub-corporation under Trinity Parish, to serve others as did Jesus in Galilee. It continues to this day as a successful ministry to those with special needs, in work activity and housing, along with serving many disenfranchised persons with work, housing, food, clothing and training in a program called HIGHWAYS. Jerry has always enjoyed reading and studying, especially in the field of the science of Quantum Physics. As he became familiar with modern theological scholarship, he began to bring Science and Religion together by incorporating outward and visible signs of science with the inward and invisible graces of his faith as a follower of the historic Jesus.