The New Adventures of Jesus

The New Adventures of Jesus is a new collection of flash fiction by 2025 Grawemeyer Award in Religion nominee, William H. McCann, Jr., whose book God Hires Gardeners (Finishing Line Press, 2023) this one follows. The 36 flash fiction stories in this collection find Jesus traveling across America. Indeed, whether visiting a small church in rural Kentucky or driving to Damascus, Virginia, or being on a podcast in Philadelphia, or appearing on Reverend Maloney's "Lord of Hosts Ministries" show, or, heck, even attending a custom car show in Mt. Angel, Oregon-Jesus meets people where they are living their lives, asking questions of those he meets and, in turn, answering questions of both the faithful and the faithless. This is not a book of satire (which God Hires Gardeners often is) or humor. It was not written to be funny, though it does contain some humor. It is a book meant to pull people up short, to make them consider the exemplary life of Jesus as a life that is relevant today. Despite the fact that many of the stories that fill this book are ones that mirror in some way the Bible story that may have inspired them, these are original works of flash fiction, not works based in either biblical scholarship or of biblical archaeology. Rather, they are American stories, with American characters interacting with the Jewish, homeless, immigrant of color from the Middle East that Jesus Christ would be, were he seen wandering around twenty-first century America.