Hunting Magic Eels: Recovering an Enchanted Faith in a Skeptical Age

We live in a secular age, a world dominated by science and technology. Increasing numbers of us don't believe in God anymore. We don't expect miracles. We've grown up and left those fairy tales behind, culturally and personally.

Yet five hundred years ago the world was very much enchanted. It was a world where God existed and the devil was real. It was a world full of angels and demons. It was a world of holy wells and magical eels. But since the Protestant Reformation and the beginning of the Enlightenment, the world--in the West, at least--has become increasingly disenchanted.

While this might be taken as evidence of a crisis of belief, Richard Beck argues that it's actually a crisis of attention. God hasn't gone anywhere, but we've lost our capacity to see God.

The rising tide of disenchantment has profoundly changed our religious imaginations and led to a loss of the holy expectation that we can be interrupted by the sacred and divine. But it doesn't have to be this way. Hunting Magic Eels shows us that with attention and an intentional, cultivated capacity to experience God as a living, vital presence in our lives, we can cultivate an enchanted faith in a skeptical age. This new paperback edition includes a foreword from Sean Palmer as well as four new, additional chapters, including "Why Good People Need God," "Live Your Beautiful Life," and "The Primacy of the Invisible."

Richard Beck is professor of psychology at Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas, where he also lives. He is a popular blogger and speaker and the author of several books, most recently Hunting Magic Eels: Recovering an Enchanted Faith in a Skeptical Age. His published research also covers topics as diverse as the psychology of profanity and why Christian bookstore art is so bad. Beck leads a Bible study each week for inmates at a maximum-security prison.

Sean Palmer is the author of Speaking by the Numbers: Enneagram Wisdom for Teachers, Pastors, and Communicators (IVP 2022) and 40 Days on Being a Three (Enneagram Daily Reflections). He is also the Teaching Pastor at Ecclesia Houston, one of America's most innovative and vibrant multi-site churches, serving a predominance of Millennials and young adults. Sean and his wife, Rochelle, have been married for over 24-years and live in Houston, TX with their two teenage daughters.