Books
by Father Bill
More Stories to
Inspire and Delight
Celebrating its 20th anniversary, The Gospel According to Sam is newly revised and updated with brand new stories of joy, love, and hope surrounding the Fearless Earless Airedale, Sam.
The Gospel According to Sam is a collection of “animal stories for the soul,” written by William Miller, a priest and storyteller with an earthy sense of humor and a southern sensibility that has you laughing out loud. Sam is Miller's Airedale, a lovable, "wounded healer" of a dog who survived a house fire that burned off his ears but couldn't extinguish his spirit. Sam becomes a vehicle for healing, humor, adventure, spiritual growth, and prayer for Miller and his friends, neighbors, and parishioners.
Heartwarming and thought-provoking, Miller’s meditations on life and faith aren't limited to Sam or even just dogs; birds, pigs, squirrels, rabbits, fish, bugs, and yaks feature in his stories. Twenty years after it first released, The Gospel According to Sam is still touching reader’s hearts. Featuring new stories of people who found God through Sam, dogs that have been rescued in his memory, and the sermons of him still being preached, the book brings people together in ways that only animals can.
A CELEBRATION OF ALL THINGS CANINE AND DIVINE!
No one loves dogs or writes about them quite like William B. Miller. While living on the island of Kauai, he adopted a special mutt who had been abandoned and was found wandering by the side of the road. Combining his Texas roots and new Hawaiian home, he named his new buddy Nawiliwili "Wili" Nelson. By the time they moved to Louisiana, William and Wili had become best friends and made some extraordinary memories together. When his faithful one-in-a-million canine companion was diagnosed with terminal cancer and given only three months to live, Miller's whole world fell apart. But eight months later, on a paw and a prayer, the dynamic duo embarked on The Last Howlelujah Tour, a 5,000 mile epic journey from New Orleans to Las Vegas, sharing Wili's story that God (and Dog) is Love, and that our relationships - human, canine, and divine - matter above all else. Blazing his barketlist trail on borrowed time, Wili, the unlikely canine hero, inspired thousands of Americans to come together to make a pawsitive difference in their communities. Funny, profound and heartwarming, The Last Howlelujah offers "Tails from the Trail" from their unique adventure - a caninical collection of inspirational stories that will delight and refresh your soul. Saint Wili of Woofster, a dog given up for dead, offers a powerful witness that, by God's grace, it's never too late for a miracle.
It’s no accident that Jesus’ first miracle was turning water into wine! Written by an Episcopalian priest-slash-bar owner, this thoughtful, well-written book of spiritual essays distills lessons about the character of God from stories about adult beverages.
“Oh taste and see that the Lord is good.” —Psalm 34:8
Being upright does not mean you have to be uptight—at least according to Father Bill Miller, an Episcopal priest/bar owner. As a fan of both spirits and the Holy Spirit, he is very familiar with the intoxicating lure of some of God’s finer creations, and in The Beer Drinker’s Guide to God he brews up insightful, beautifully written reflections about the strange intersections of God, and, well…beer.
In this humorous collection of essays, he weaves together stories from his life in ministry, his travels in search of the world’s best Scotch, his conversations with Trappist monks, and colorful evenings in his bar, Padre’s. He also reflects on the lessons he’s learned from baseball, Playboy bunnies, Las Vegas, and his attempts to become chaplain to the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders, all while (somehow) crafting essays about the spiritual importance of generosity, sacrifice, openness, and spiritual transformation. Really.
Essays include:
-WWJD: What Would Jesus Drink?
-Brewed Over Me and Distill Me, O Lord
-Pearls of Great Price
-Chicken Soup for the Hooters Girl’s Soul
-Miss Hawaii and Other Miss Takes
-Don’t Leave me Hanging: The Theological Significance of Athletic Supporters
From the deeply touching to the laugh-out-loud funny, these stories ultimately open our minds to the glory of God and our mouths to some of God’s more delicious creations. The Beer Drinker’s Guide to God is a smart, hilarious book for those thirsty for God’s truth.
What Readers are Saying
The Reverend Kempton Baldridge
on “The Gospel According to Sam”
“Fr. Bill Miller is the kind of priest I wish every church could have. And when you read him, you feel he is the kind of friend whose acquaintance you are so glad to have made you want to keep him on speed-dial for the rest of your natural days.
I happen to love dogs, but this book of Bill's is hardly one of those shopping mall specials of the too-cute-for-words, well-intended but theologically suspect book of essays espousing "salvation through dog slobber" one sees so often. What the reader finds is a flesh and blood adult male (though that term is dangerously close to a tautology) who honestly wrestles with faith, doubt, love, betrayal, self-discovery, self-sacrifice, life, death and even cheese. And that's just when he is writing about dogs -- okay, dogs, and the people who love dogs, and some that don't...do you see what I mean? Bill writes normally the way most clergy wish they could preach on their best days, (and the way most people in the pews wish they did too) and yet he somehow never comes off as "preachy". Not even once. How does he do that? Beats the heck out of me, yet it makes this book an easy read though inarguably substantive all the same.
I'd like to say that I could recommend this book without reservation, but as an Episcopal priest myself, I am obliged to find exceptions to nearly everything. Thus, this book may not be for everyone. In fact, it ought to come with a warning label, alerting buyers to potentially embarrassing social situations. When I was reading, "The Gospel According To Sam" inflight, the people in the rows around me became annoyed (or perhaps jealous) by the frequent, sudden if uncontrollable outbursts of laughter it caused. At the opposite end of the spectrum was the mortification suffered by my 16 year old daughter when seeing her fifty-something father with tears streaming down his face -- in public, no less -- when trying to retell the moving story (Chapter 9, "Eating Squirrel") of Bill's growing up in hard-scrabble Texas with a father who had no understanding much less appreciation of the boy Bill was nor the man he would become.
So, in all honesty, I cannot recommend this book to everyone. If you need a "how to" book on house-training puppies, this isn't it. Nor is it some canine-version of Christian apologetics*, its appealing photo of Sam on the cover notwithstanding.
But apart from those two exceptions, I would say just about everyone else will enjoy this book, will learn from it, and will (when finished reading it) eagerly await Fr. Bill's next efforts. And when you buy one for yourself, you may discover, as I did, you have to buy a second and third copy -- for my friends to read -- and return (eventually).
But they can't have my copy. Every so often, I feel the need for a good laugh...or a good cry...or the insight of a good friend. In the pages of, "The Gospel According To Sam," I know any one or all three may await.”
Josh C.
on “The Beer Drinker’s Guide to God”
“Taste and See that the Lord is good - and Laugh!
Poetic, sincere, crazy, sweet, and most of all honest. One of the best books I've read in ages. More reverent than I anticipated, Miller, writes with an honesty about life that I truly appreciate. He lives with zest, as he is an Episcopal priest as well as co-owner of a watering hole in Texas. He'll make you laugh, and make you wonder why it is you are doing what you are doing. He writes with depth and humor, and a love for others. "Oh taste and see that the Lord is good" Psalm 34:8. Miller both sees and tastes, and laughs along the way.”
Ron Starbuck, Saint Julian Press
on “The Last Howelulujah”
HOWLELUJAH INDEED!
“WILLIAM MILLER’S newest book about a dog, and a boy and his dog, is really a book about God. And about a boy and his God, “dog” spelled backwards. In the author’s engaging and well written prose, the light of God’s love shines through ever so clearly. This is a book about faith and faithfulness, healing and hope, and doubt and discovery. It is a book about God’s unlimited blessings and compassion.
THE LAST HOWLELUJAH: Tails from the Trail, is one of those rare books that will make you smile big, laugh out loud, and cry tears with wild abandon and a joyful celebration for life and love and all God’s creatures. And you will not care who may see you doing so, you will become lost in these stories and lost within your own thoughts and feelings, forgetting your troubles and self in a glorious kenosis—self emptying.
Miller’s smooth flowing and entertaining prose will bless everyone who reads them in a sacrament of words. Words that invoke a warm heart, a contemplative spirit, and a quickening of the flesh, where spiritual goosebumps will become a common occurrence, and joy comes easily bidden. These stories will break open your heart, while the light of lovingkindness flows from the page and into the great compassion of your soul.
They will ease your heaviest burdens, give rest to a weary soul, and renew your spirit. Before the end of the first chapter you will be humming and then singing that great Anglican hymn, All Things Bright and Beautiful, in a remembrance of its well-known and well-loved words and verses.
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all.
In the end, or rather at the end, you will discover something true, which is why this is a journey of discovery. You will know, if you did not already know this before, that the creatures God sends our way are an answer to an unspoken prayer we never knew we were praying. You will know, that the truest things in life, the truest knowledge, comes from a humility of heart and a loving-kindness and faithfulness of spirit we learn from them as the gracious gift they are to humankind.
You will learn, if you did not before, that in the deepest and greatest mysteries found within creation, dogs are their own howlelujah revelation. They are their own blessing from God. You will finally and utterly know, that “Dog” and “God” are a cosmic palindrome. And you will look with yearning and love upon the leash hanging by the doorway, to take your “best friend” out for a walk or to play in the park.
And if you have lost that friend recently or even long ago, you may one day find that God, within the infinite and loving wisdom of creation, has sent a new friend your way. And this is where you must pay attention. Because, such gifts really are an answer to an unspoken prayer, you never knew you were praying. So, pay attention, don’t miss that moment. It is an answer to your prayers.”