Questions & Answers

General

What is Renovaré?

Found­ed by Cel­e­bra­tion of Dis­ci­pline author Richard J. Fos­ter, Ren­o­varé is a Chris­t­ian non­prof­it that cre­ates resources and kin­dles com­mu­ni­ties which help peo­ple become more like Jesus. Learn more about Ren­o­varé.

What are the benefits of Membership?

Mem­ber­ship includes read­ing sched­ule with email reminders, study guides, pod­casts, essays and a mem­bers-only dis­cus­sion forum where you can inter­act with oth­er mem­bers and the Ren­o­varé team mem­bers lead­ing the ses­sions. Mem­ber­ship also includes access to vol­un­teer-led meet-up groups — vir­tu­al or in-per­son (when safe) — in select areas.

Timing (Start Date, Ship Dates)

When does the Book Club begin? Can I join anytime?

Reg­is­tra­tion is cur­rent­ly open.

Our 2020 – 21 sea­son began on Sep­tem­ber 21, 2020. You may join any time dur­ing the sea­son and have access to the bonus fea­tures of all four books (arti­cles and pod­casts, as well as dis­cus­sion board conversations). 

Due to the event-like nature of the Book Club, mem­ber­ships are not returnable/​refundable. Thanks for your under­stand­ing and for your sup­port of the work of Renovaré.

I purchased a "with-book" membership before September 14. When will my book come?

Thank you for your order. Books are ship­ping out as we receive them. You should receive an email noti­fi­ca­tion with track­ing infor­ma­tion once your book ships, and it should arrive with­in a 2‑week win­dow. If you’ve been wait­ing longer than 2 weeks after your email noti­fi­ca­tion, please con­tact [email protected]​renovare.​org so that Jus­tine can investigate.

How long will I have access to the Book Club resources and discussions?

Once you join, you will have per­pet­u­al access to this sea­son’s resources and access to the dis­cus­sion forums through­out the sum­mer. We leave every­thing acces­si­ble on the Book Club dash­board through ear­ly September. 

Once we archive all of the resources, we send mem­bers a link to access them going for­ward. We do not pre­serve the dis­cus­sion boards past the summer.

Books

Are books included with Membership?

Mem­ber­ships that include the first book are no longer avail­able. Mem­bers who chose this option must still pur­chase or oth­er­wise obtain the final three books of the season.

Books may be bor­rowed from your local library, pur­chased at your local book­seller, or pur­chased using Ama­zon or CBD links on the Book Club pur­chase page (links sup­port Ren­o­varé). All of this sea­son’s books are avail­able in e‑book for­mat through online retail­ers as well.

Does it matter which editions of the books I use?

Yes, read­ers often find it eas­i­er to use the rec­om­mend­ed edi­tions, as page num­bers and oth­er details can be edi­tion-spe­cif­ic. If you use an edi­tion oth­er than the one rec­om­mend­ed, you may need to do some adap­ta­tion. Note: We are also aware that our read­ers are increas­ing­ly using eBook ver­sions of the texts, and we will do our best to make the read­ing assign­ments make sense for the dig­i­tal ver­sions of our cho­sen edi­tions as well.

Tell me more about shipping books ...

With-book mem­ber­ships only include the first book. All copies of Pete Greig’s How to Pray have been shipped for the sea­son. You will receive an email noti­fi­ca­tion with a track­ing num­ber enclosed when your book ships and a con­fir­ma­tion email from [email protected]​renovare.​org once it is deliv­ered.

Your book, espe­cial­ly to inter­na­tion­al address­es, can take 14+ busi­ness days to arrive. Most US address­es will receive their books with­in 7 – 10 days. We ship via USPS. We have noticed that ship­ping times seem to have increased dur­ing this COVID-19 sea­son, so we appre­ci­ate your patience.

All oth­er books of the sea­son must be sourced by mem­bers. Please vis­it your local book­seller or library to obtain Jesus and the Dis­in­her­it­ed, Prayer in the Night, and A Seri­ous Call to a Devout and Holy Life or see our books page to learn more about order­ing books online: https://​ren​o​vare​.org/​b​o​o​k​c​l​u​b​-​g​e​t​books Thanks!

Local Meet Ups

Virtual and in-person groups: How do they work? When do they meet? Does Renovaré facilitate them?

We have been great­ly encour­aged by the local com­mu­ni­ties, led by our won­der­ful, ded­i­cat­ed mem­ber-vol­un­teers, that have formed with­in our larg­er Book Club uni­verse over the past three seasons. 

This year, due to Covid-19 and the restric­tions and guide­lines many local­i­ties have put into place regard­ing in-per­son gath­er­ings, we are offer­ing our vol­un­teer hosts the option of host­ing an online-only meet-up (open to mem­bers across the globe) or a local in-per­son meet-up (these may begin online and move to in-per­son once it is safe to do so). Ren­o­varé pub­lish­es the list of vol­un­teers and the meet-up times and days but does not have a direct role in host­ing the groups.

That said, here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Your mem­ber­ship fee cov­ers the study guide, pod­casts, essays, week­ly reminders, and access to a online com­mu­ni­ty. Meet-ups, whether vir­tu­al or in-per­son, are a free bonus to the Book Club made pos­si­ble by vol­un­teers. Because of that, Ren­o­varé can­not accept respon­si­bil­i­ty for indi­vid­u­als’ expe­ri­ences — whether as host or par­tic­i­pant — in a Book Club group.

• You must be a mem­ber of the Book Club to con­nect with a local host. We have assured our hosts that their infor­ma­tion will only be made avail­able to those who belong to the Book Club. Once you join, you will receive a spe­cial link to the coor­di­na­tors’ names and email address­es so you can con­nect with them.

• Dates and times of meet-ups are set by hosts and are pub­lished on the Book Club web­site for your convenience.

New vol­un­teers are sign­ing up to lead all the time, so do con­tin­ue to check the list­ings as we draw near­er to the start date. If you would like to vol­un­teer to lead a group online or in-per­son, please use this Group Coor­di­na­tor Appli­ca­tion Form.

We expect our Book Club mem­bers to treat one anoth­er as Jesus would, with the high­est lev­el of hon­or and respect. Any sort of abuse or harass­ment will not be tol­er­at­ed — whether in-per­son or online.

Thank you!

How The Book Club Works

Who are the moderators of the Book Club? Can I interact with them online?

Each ses­sion has a facil­i­ta­tor (either the author or an expert on the book) who will help you grow as you read each title. They pro­vide bonus arti­cles and pod­cast mes­sages about the book, but they do not engage on the dis­cus­sion forums. You will have an oppor­tu­ni­ty to post a ques­tion for the facil­i­ta­tor that might be includ­ed in each ses­sion’s third and final podcast/​webcast, which is dri­ven by mem­bers’ questions.

Our Ren­o­varé staff work togeth­er to mod­er­ate the dis­cus­sion board and engage as they are able. Ren­o­varé team mem­bers will be host­ing one mem­ber-wide video meet-up for each book. Infor­ma­tion on these will be post­ed once we launch the Club offi­cial­ly in September.

Final­ly, our region­al vir­tu­al and in-per­son meet-up groups are coor­di­nat­ed by vol­un­teer Book Club members.

How do I access downloads and participate in the discussions?

All resources and dis­cus­sion are through a spe­cial Book Club mem­bers web­site. Mem­bers receive their login infor­ma­tion via email a few days pri­or to the open­ing day of the Book Club (date com­ing soon).

Who chooses the books?

The lead­er­ship at Ren­o­varé meets every spring and maps out the sched­ule for the year.

What is the time commitment when I join the Book Club? Do I have to participate at a certain time or day of the week?

The Ren­o­varé Book Club can fit just about any sched­ule. We read each book over six weeks but include a prep week at the start and a wrap-up week at the end, so there is plen­ty of cush­ion. The read­ing ​“assign­ments” are not more than 50 pages per week.

At the begin­ning of each book, our mem­bers receive an out­line of the pro­posed read­ing sched­ule. Every Mon­day, we send out an update that includes: 

• A reminder of that week’s read­ing assignment 
• A sup­ple­men­tary resource (usu­al­ly an arti­cle or a pod­cast) from that book’s facilitator 
• (Some­times) option­al bonus resources for mem­bers who want to go deeper 
• A dis­cus­sion ques­tion for those who wish to engage in online discussion.

All of the resources, once post­ed, are avail­able all sea­son. There are no ​“live” online dis­cus­sions (mem­bers can post at any time), and you may engage as much or as lit­tle as you would like online.

Mem­bers who par­tic­i­pate in a vir­tu­al or in-per­son meet-up led by a vol­un­teer coor­di­na­tor will gath­er once-a-month at a time and day deter­mined by the vol­un­teer. See the list of vol­un­teer times here.

Can I use the Club for my pre-existing book club or small group?

We do not have a flat-fee licens­ing sys­tem for our cur­rent Book Club. We will soon be offer­ing Book Club mate­ri­als for pre­vi­ous Book Club books that you may pur­chase for your group. We will post more infor­ma­tion when that is available.

That said, we’d also love it if any or all of your group were to join the 2020 – 21 sea­son, and we can cer­tain­ly set up your own online dis­cus­sion forum group if you do.

Other Questions

Can I purchase a Book Club Membership as a gift for someone else?

Yes. Thank you for want­i­ng to give a mem­ber­ship to the Ren­o­varé Book Club!

In the mean­time, if you would like to give a gift mem­ber­ship to the Book Club, please use the reg­u­lar ​“Join” link at ren​o​vare​.org/​b​o​o​kclub and enter their infor­ma­tion (name and email) with your infor­ma­tion for billing. 

I have another question.

Jus­tine Olawsky is glad to help. Email her at [email protected]​renovare.​org.