There’s not much more improving literature than the Bible, and one benefit of spending years as a Catholic Charismatic and Pentecostal is a familiarity with the New Testament.
As far as Ayn Rand, I’m going to have to get the Cliff Notes version so I can get a handle on our new Vice Pres candidate, Paul Ryan.
Some of my best friends are atheists, and some are Christians, and some are Unitarians which gives you the option of following Christian principles while being atheist– not as strange in practice at that might sound to the devout.
I have a harder time picturing how you can be Christian while following a philosophy of extreme individualism.
Here’s Jesus speaking to the multitude, Gospel of Luke, KJV…
10: And the people asked him, saying, What shall we do then?
11: He answereth and saith unto them, He that hath two coats, let him impart to him that hath none; and he that hath meat, let him do likewise.
There’s a pretty consistent message in the Gospels of sharing with those in need rather than building up wealth– and a promise that the future is in God’s hands.
This is very far from the world, and nowhere in the Gospels does Jesus disparage the poor.
It’s not realistic to expect any of our politicians to follow these principles– Jesus set a very high bar and most of us just try to do a little better than we would without these words to nudge our conscience.
But how do you reconcile Ayn Rand and Jesus? That’s what I want to ask Paul Ryan.
Kmareka.com 
It’s really worse than you think. Ayn herself was pretty much thoroughly opposed to religion in general, and Christianity (iirc) in particular. Probably b/c it’s the culture with which she was most familiar?
And I read both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead. AS was easily the worst book I’ve ever read. It’s like 1000+ pages, but pretty much the whole course of the book was obvious by about page 10.
And I can’t imagine how anyone over the age of 12 could take anything in it seriously. It is written at such a ridiculously low level. I’d call it childish or cartoonish, but those would be insults to Dr Seuss and Bugs Bunny, both of which have way more insight into the real world.
Here’s my new business idea: conservatives should start offering vacations in Conservative Land, where men are men, and Good Always Triumphs, and the steely-eyed captains of industry stare down the slavering hoards, and life is simple, all questions have simple answers, and there is never any doubt.
As for the current crop of CEOs? Ayn would spit on them. They’re not titans holding up the world. They’re bureaucrats, not a lot different from the Soviet functionaries she so despised. If Jack Welch and Jaime Dimon and a few other disappeared, no one would miss them in the least. So, Go Galt! Go Galt! All of them!
Rand was Jewish by background,so maybe she was familiar with Christianity in some negative way?I never read her work.She was born in Russia.I did read Camus-he had an interesting,if bleak take on things.
WHY would you bother to slog through 1000 page book that was so bad?Course requirement?