How to Be a Perfect Stranger: The Essential Religious Etiquette Handbook, 3rd Edition

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Summary: The essentials of religious etiquette for most faiths
Review: "How to Be a Perfect Stranger" is the ultimate reference on how to act and what to expect when attending a religious service at any of the most common religions in America. Would you know what to do if a Hindu invited you to their infant's naming ceremony? What if a Christian Scientist family had a death in the family and you were invited to the funeral? Or what if you were invited to a Latter Day Saint, African American Methodist Episcopal, Lutheran, or Mennonite service, would you know the appropriate dress and order of service? All these questions and more are answered in this book.

The section on each faith has a short history of the faith, appropriate dress for service, ritual objects used in the service, parts of the sanctuary, appropriate conduct during the service, what to expect after the service, a section on dogma and ideology, celebrated holy days and festivals, various ceremonies related to the life cycle (births, marriage, initiation, funerals, mourning) and what to expect at those ceremonies. If you are seeking understanding of others of a different faith then this is an important place to start.

Faiths examined include African American Methodist Churches, Assemblies of God, Baha'i, Baptist, Buddhist, Christian Church, Christian Science, Churches of Christ, Episcopalian and Anglican, Hindu, Islam, Jehovah's Witness, Jewish, Lutheran, Mennonite/Amish, Methodist, Mormon (Latter Day Saints), Native American/First Nations, Orthodox Churches, Pentecostal Church of God, Presbyterian, Quaker (Religious Society of Friends), Reformed Church in America/Canada, Roman Catholic, Seventh-day Adventist, Sikh, Unitarian Universalist, United Church of Canada, and United Church of Christ.

Filled with clear information that will allow anyone to feel perfectly comfortable visiting any one of these faiths whether for curiosity, courtesy, or whatever reason, it is a very highly recommended read that should be on the shelf of anyone sensitive to the faiths of others.