![\"\"](\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/ecx.images-amazon.com\/images\/I\/41I0PLduuCL._BO2%2C204%2C203%2C200_PIsitb-sticker-arrow-click%2CTopRight%2C35%2C-76_AA300_SH20_OU01_.jpg?w=474\"){kind=icon}
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Ian Morgan Cron grew up <\/strong>with a deep, unsatisfied hunger for the love of his father. He tells the story of his struggle to understand and forgive in the memoir, Jesus, My Father, the CIA, and Me, A Memoir\u2026 Of Sorts<\/a><\/i>. His father was, when Ian was young, an executive with a motion picture company. The family lived in Europe and hobnobbed with movie stars and political figures.<\/p>\n Then his father\u2019s career crashed on the rock of his alcoholism. The family moved home to Greenwich, Connecticut, to a life of marginal poverty (sure, it wasn\u2019t Harlem, but the contrast of their own lives with those of their wealthy neighbors just made it harder for the kids). His mother made a new career in time that gave them some financial stability, but his father\u2019s continuing blackouts and rages left wounds Ian couldn\u2019t deal with.<\/p>\n In his religious life, Ian went from an innocent, youthful love of Jesus to bitterness and atheism, when Jesus failed to give him the one thing he asked for\u2014a sober father. He experimented with drinking, was scared by his own reaction, and settled into drugs for a while before taking up drinking again.<\/p>\n It was only after many years that Ian learned his father\u2019s great secret\u2014he\u2019d been a CIA agent. Many spies are alcoholics and narcissists, he learned. They\u2019re suited to the life.<\/p>\n Only the realization that he was himself turning into his father drove Ian to seek counseling, and finally to reconcile with God.<\/p>\n Ian Cron writes with a light touch and the kind of mordant humor you\u2019re familiar with if you\u2019ve read authors who suffered child abuse (and believe me, you have). His account of his journey back to faith is in many places touching and moving. The personal revelation that reconciles him to Christ at one point is one that some Christians may have trouble with. I\u2019m not sure about it myself, but I generally try not to judge another Christian\u2019s deepest confidence.<\/p>\n Hints in the course of the story suggest to me that Cron\u2019s final faith road brings him closer to Tony Campolo than to James Dobson, but those hints are lightly touched on and need not spoil the story for those of us who trust the Bible more than our hearts.<\/p>\n Recommended, especially for Christians who come from dysfunctional homes. Or those who want to understand them better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ian Morgan Cron grew up with a deep, unsatisfied hunger for the love of his father. He tells the story of his struggle to understand and forgive in the memoir, Jesus, My Father, the CIA, and Me, A Memoir\u2026 Of Sorts. His father was, when Ian was young, an executive with a motion picture company. … Continue reading Jesus, My Father, the CIA, and Me, by Ian Morgan Cron<\/span>