Catholic
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Rule Of Saint Benedict A Doctrinal And Spiritual Commentary
$44.95Add to cartAfter living the Rule and studying it for many years, the author introduces it to those who are encountering it for the first time. The relationship of Benedict’s Rule to other early monastic legistation is treated thoroughly but the book is designed for those who are seeking a guide for christian living in this `little rule for beginners’.
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Treasures From The Storeroom
$27.95Add to cartDo we really know about religion in the Middle Ages? Gary Macy suggests that what most people believe about the Church of the Middle Ages is actually wrong or founded on the perspective of one figure, Aquinas. Now, after two decades of research, Macy explores the truth about medieval religion and the Eucharist in Treasures from the Storeroom, an intriguing look into the forgotten areas of our Christian heritage. Using a wide range of original sources for these articles, Macy discusses such topics as theology, devotion, ecclesiology, and historical methodology.
This collection of eight essays provides an important backdrop to the plenary address, “The Eucharist and Popular Devotion,” presented at the 1997 national convention of the Catholic Theological Society of America (CTSA), since several themes raised in that address are actually summaries of the fuller arguments presented in these articles. By presenting them here as a whole in the form of a book, Macy offers readers a clearer, more systematic look at the themes raised in that address.
As comforting as it may be for today’s theologians (and others) to pick and choose from the past so that history conveniently leads to their own favorite conclusions, Macy suggests that the Church’s true tradition is diversity. Writing to fellow scholars, he offers Treasures from the Storeroom as a text for classroom use and as simply interesting reading.
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Ishmael Instructs Isaac
$34.95Add to cartJews, Christians, and Muslims trace their roots to Abraham and yet it is a shock to many Bible readers that some of the characters and stories in their sacred text are also found in the pages of Islam’s sacred text, the Qur’an. By exploring the relationship between the Bible and the Qur’an in Ishmael Instructs Isaac, John Kaltner challenges Bible readers to think about their sacred book in new, exciting ways. In doing so, he leads all to a better appreciation of Islam.
After a brief overview of the text, themes, structure, and use of the Qur’an, Kaltner focuses on traditions that are shared with the Bible. He explains that the Bible and Qur’an contain many of the same themes, figures, and episodes. However, at times, there are significant differences in their descriptions of the same event or figure. By discussing such topics and figures as God, humanity, prophecy, creation, life after death, Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mary, Kaltner examines the similarities and differences between the two texts. This comparative method allows readers to better appreciate both what is distinctive about Islam and what it shares with Judaism and Christianity.
Jews and Christians view Isaac as the son of Abraham in whom the family line continued. Muslims, on the other hand, view Isaac’s brother Ishmael as the rightful heir. This difference must not obscure what is held in common: a belief in the one God and a family-albeit distant-relationship.
Written for undergraduate and seminary courses on Islam, the Qur’an, comparative religions, inter-religious dialogue, world scriptures, and biblical interpretation, Ishmael Instructs Isaac is also a useful resource for discussion groups in churches, synagogues, and mosques.
Includes English translations of the Qur’anic texts discussed.
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Centered Living : The Way Of Centering Prayer
$17.99Add to cartThis look at the popular contemplative technique known as Centering Prayer is your key to a richer spiritual life. In easy-to-understand, non-technical language, internationally renowned author M. Basil Pennington combines testimonies of practitioners, updated guidelines, theological reflections, and helpful hints for teaching others in an exploration of all the essential information about Centering Prayer.
For millions of Christians worldwide, it is the experience of prayer rather than the words which constitute it that are most important. In its simplicity, Centering Prayer opens our hearts to God, cleanses the mind, and soothes the soul.
More than just a catalog of facts and practical suggestions, this book benefits even the most seasoned practitioner or teacher of Centering Prayer. However, the clarity of Father Pennington’s approach also enables newcomers, Catholic and non-Catholic alike, to develop a firm grasp of the practice.
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Medjugorje The Message
$18.99Add to cartA Protestant journalist investigates what could be the most significant miracle since the Day of Pentecost.
On October 27, 1985, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, newspaper publisher and columnist, Wayne Weible, first learned of the phenomenon occurring in the little town with the unpronounceable name. Sensing that their might be material for his column, he decided to pursue the story,
To date, more than fifteen million copies of the tabloid have been distributed. And Wayne Weible’s life has been radically and permanently altered. Now he has written a book about Medjugorie – the first from a Protestant perspective. It may be the most penetrating from any perspective.
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Paul And Third World Women Theologians
$15.95Add to cartFor many people Paul is seen as anti-woman and male-dominating, mired in images and concepts from ancient worlds people cannot relate to. Yet why have his letters endured? Why do women in Guatemala, Nigeria, or Korea find a resonance in their experience today? Why has Paul continued to be a major resource for people wanting to live a deeply Christian life? Loretta Dornisch explores these questions by examining Paul’s letters in Paul and Third World Women Theologians.
In Paul and Third World Women Theologians Dornisch explores the themes of liberation and justice against a background of oppressing and oppressed people, whether in the first century or in the twenty-first. She pays particular attention to Third World women theologians who are emerging as voices calling for a new consciousness. These women speak for the many voiceless Third World women who are often treated as less than human and whose oppression can no longer be tolerated. -
Introducing The Gospel According To Mark 1-8:21
$29.95Add to cartMark wrote “the beginning of the Gospel” for Christians who thought it was the end. For that he told them a story of another time when Jesus’ disciples thought it was end but turned out to be the beginning. That is why the passion – resurrection of Jesus dominates the Gospel according to Mark. Using rhetorical and literary analysis, Father LaVerdiere introduces Mark’s story as the beginning of the Gospel as we enter a new millennium.
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Journeys At The Margin
$19.95Add to cartHow does the experience of being an immigrant, an ethnic minority person on the margins of society, affect one’s way of doing theology? In Journeys at the Margin prominent Asian-American theologians reflect on how being an Asian and a North American has shaped the way they understand the Christian story.
Asian Americans, having roots in Asia, do not fully belong either to America or Asia. They find themselves straddling two different world cultures, sharing something of both but belonging entirely to neither. Thus, their marginality can best be understood in terms of their experience of living “in-between” two cultures, that of the immigrant and that of the dominant group, and being “in-both” of these cultures-and, ultimately, being “in-beyond” the two cultures altogether.
Coming from different parts of the Far East and nourished by diverse Christian traditions, the contributors to Journeys at the Margin bring to their work richly divergent perspectives, resources, and methods. More than an anthology of personal stories, this collection of essays develops the emerging theological themes (including the contributors’ visions of a new America) out of their experience. What binds these highly varied essays is their authors’ common journeys at the margin.
As the United States becomes increasingly multiethnic and multicultural at the threshold of a new millennium, Journeys at the Margin offers useful suggestions on how to meet the challenge of cultural diversity in both Church and society.
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Revelatory Text : Interpreting The New Testament As Sacred Scripture (Reprinted)
$29.95Add to cartIn this new edition of her major study of the New Testament, Sandra Schneiders proposes a comprehensive hermeneutical theory for New Testament interpretation, which takes full account of the Bible as both sacred Scripture and as a historical-literary classic. Designed to spur reflection on the role of Scripture as revelatory text in the life of the Church and in the lives of individual believers, The Revelatory Text shows that an integral hermeneutical theory can ground a transformational hermeneutical praxis to make the biblical text available as a faith resource to the oppressed as well as to the privileged.
Schneiders investigates the meaning of the theological claim that the Bible is the “Word of God” and the “Church’s book,” along with the implications of these claims for biblical interpretation. She then examines the historical, literary, and religious-spiritual dimensions of the New Testament, highlighting the implications for interpretation theory and methodology, and concludes by putting her theory to the test in a feminist interpretation of John 4.The author argues that the comprehensive object of biblical interpretation is not merely information but transformation. She suggests that an adequate hermeneutical theory must include a wide range of exegetical and critical methods within a theologically and philosophically adequate understanding of Scripture as sacred text. She writes specifically to educated believers who wonder how sound biblical criticism can be incorporated into a faith- filled reading of the New Testament; biblical scholars who struggle with the question of whether or how faith can function legitimately in biblical scholarship; and those whose task it is to teach and preach the faith that looks to the New Testament as source and norm.
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Spirituality Of Perfection
$29.95Add to cartThroughout this century the Epistle of James has been viewed consistently as a disjointed set of instructions. In A Spirituality of Perfection Patrick Hartin differs from this approach by showing that the “call for perfection” provides a unifying meaning for the epistle. Examining the concept of perfection against the background of the Graeco-Roman world, the Old Testament, and the Septuagint, Father Hartin shows that perfection provides a key to defining the spirituality of the Epistle of James.
Father Hartin shows how the notion of perfection plays a key role in the definition of God, as well as the way one is called “to be in the world.” He adopts a fresh approach toward understanding the categories of wisdom, eschatology, and apocalyptic as they illuminate the epistle’s advice. He allows James to be read in its own right, instead of through the eyes of other traditions, such as Paul, and shows that what James intends by perfection is different from our modern understanding-that the concept of perfection unlocks an important self-understanding in Christianity.
Just as every generation of believers aims at putting its faith into action, A Spirituality of Perfection culminates with the question: “What direction does the Epistle of James give Christians of the twenty-first century for putting their faith into action?”
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Celebration Of The Eucharist
$39.95Add to cartEucharistic liturgy has differed through the centuries and in different Churches. Because of these differences, it is essential that eucharistic liturgy be studied from a historical perspective. In The Celebration of the Eucharist, Enrico Mazza offers a thorough account of the theology of the Eucharist and presents a historical analysis of the origin and variety of eucharistic liturgies and their development in the Church.
Beginning with the Last Supper, Father Mazza weaves his way through interpretations elaborated by the Fathers of the Church and medieval writers to provide the rich tapestry of concepts and categories adopted by Vatican Council II. Complete with an appendix including Jewish texts and early Eucharistic Prayers, abbreviations, bibliography, and notes, The Celebration of the Eucharist is a comprehensive source for those who have an interest in the theology of the Eucharist in the course of history. -
Poor Therefore Rich
$29.95Add to cartFollowers of the way of Jesus Christ through two millennia have engaged in the joyful yet life-costing struggle of responding to the challenge of being transformed into his likeness. This further volume of Carthusian Novice Conferences offers the father-master’s words of instruction on poverty to the men who have been drawn to the Carthusian form of the Christian way.
As with all of us, ‘poverty’ operates on many levels, and one of the most remarkable qualities of these talks is that they range over the economic history as well as the more traditionally spiritual teaching of the Carthusian Order in its own struggle to seek Christ in simplicity and silence.
Like all Christians, the Carthusians find Jesus the great Exemplar of the poverty that is desirable and yet ‘costs not less than everything’; and once again we are reminded, with characteristic directness, of the source and fount of the desirable poverty – the total mutual self-giving of the Persons of the Holy Trinity.
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Does God Need The Church
$39.95Add to cartAre not all religions equally close to and equally far from God? Why, then, the Church? Gerhard Lohfink poses these questions with scholarly reliability and on the basis of his own experience of community in Does God Need the Church?
In 1982 Father Lohfink wrote Wie hat Jesus Gemeinde gewollt? (translated into English as Jesus and Community) to show, on the basis of the New Testament, that faith is founded in a community that distinguishes itself in clear contours from the rest of society. In that book he also described a sequence of events that moved directly from commonality to a community that was readily accessible to every group of people and was made legitimate by Jesus himself. Only later did Father Lohfink learn, within a new horizon of experience, that such a description is not the way to community. The story of the gathering of the people of God, from Abraham until today, never took place according to such a model.Today Father Lohfink states that he would not write Wie hat Jesus Gemeinde gewollt? the same way. The situation of belief and believers has undergone a shift: the question of the Church has become much more urgent. Church life is declining and the religions are returning, often in new guises.
In light of these shifts and the change in his own view of community, Father Lohfink inquires in Does God Need the Church? of Israel’s theology, Jesus’ praxis, the experiences of the early Christian communities, and of what is appearing in the Church today. These inquiries lead to an amazing history involving God and the world-a history that God presses forward with the aid of a single people and that always turns out differently from what they think and plan.
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Charles De Foucauld
$20.00Add to cartDrawn from writings, sermons, and letters and including a brief biography, this collection offers a full introduction to Charles de Foucauld, French aristocrat and soldier in North Africa at the turn of the century, who experienced a radical conversion. de Foucauld, who died a martyr in the desert of Algiers, was, as Richard Rohr says, “one of those rare souls who leaves no one untouched and many transformed.”
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Introducing Contemporary Theologies (Expanded)
$24.00Add to cartPart I provides a brilliant synthesis of the nature of theology, its relation to philosophy, a comparison of past and present approaches, and the nature of theological method. Part II introduces the work of leading theologians of the late 20th century: Karl Rahner, Hans Kung, Leonardo Boff, Wolfhart Pannenberg, Dorothee Soelle, Rosemary Ruether, Elizabeth Johnson, and John Meyendorff. Clear, non-technical language makes this the ideal doorway to understanding theology today.
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Gracias : A Latin American Journal
$18.00Add to cartIn this journal of his travels in Bolivia and Peru, Nouwen ponders the presence of God in the poor, the challenge of a persecuted church, the relation between faith and justice, and his own struggle to discern the path along which God is calling him.
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Sermon On The Mount
$24.95Add to cartToo often the Sermon on the Mount has been interpreted as though it were a book itself rather than a portion of a book. Dale Allison insists on the contrary that the full meaning of these chapters in Matthew’s Gospel can be seen only in relation to the broader literary context of the Gospel as a whole, with its Jewish Christian orientation. Indeed, the Sermon and the moral imperatives it contains must be understood: 1) in relation to the example provided by Jesus’ words and deeds elsewhere in the Gospel; 2) with reference to the community of believers that constitutes the intended audience of Matthew’s Gospel; and 3) in terms of what the Gospel says elsewhere about the end of the age. The Sermon does not present a simple set of rules, perhaps only intended for a small and select group within the Christian community, but seeks to instill a moral vision and to inspire the moral imagination of all who would follow Jesus.
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Praying With Benedict
$24.95Add to cartPraying with Benedict explores the spirituality of the monastic tradition and draws out the essence of a way of praying that embraces the whole of the Christian’s life.
Korneel Vermeiren begins by examining the spirituality of the early monastic tradition from the fourth to the sixth centuries. He looks at the central place of prayer in the Rule of St Benedict and the tradition of continuous prayer, exploring the teaching of such formative figures as Basil the Great. He then reflects on the Benedictine precept: ‘nothing is to be preferred to the work of God’.
Praying with Benedict looks in practical terms at the how, when, and where of prayer; at bodily postures, various types of prayer, and the importance of emotional and spiritual readiness. Finally, the place of the Eucharist in the life of prayer is discussed with reference to Benedict’s teaching and the eucharistic practices of pre-Benedictine monasticism.
This book offers a clear presentation of monastic spirituality and opens it to persons outside monastery walls. It links St Benedict’s teaching to earlier spiritual traditions and shows how various elements of monastic life complement each other. Common prayer, reading, personal prayer, and the Eucharist are not isolated from one another or from daily life, but are integral and essential elements of living in the spirit of St Benedict.
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God Of The Oppressed
$26.00Add to cartIn his reflections on God, Jesus, suffering, and liberation, James H. Cone relates the gospel message to the experience of the black community. But a wider theme of the book is the role that social and historical context plays in framing the questions we address to God as well as the mode of the answers provided.
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Journeys On The Edges
$19.00Add to cartThomas O’Loughlin’s fresh and original introduction to Celtic spirituality begins by questioning the very notion of a distinctively “Celtic” spirituality. Brilliantly re-examining the original sources, he argues that there is one over-arching theme giving them a unity–the idea of being “on the edge”, both culturally and geographically.
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Modern Readers Guide To Dantes The Divine Comedy
$22.99Add to cartThe Divine Comedy has been a cornerstone of Western literature for the better part of a millennium. In this work, Joseph Gallagher brings the power and prestige of this medieval classic to a new generation of readers–taking them on a guided tour through heaven, purgatory, and hell.
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Ezra And Nehemiah
$44.95Add to cartEzra-Nehemiah has been neglected in biblical studies, but it is important as one of the few windows into the Persian period of Israel’s history, the setting for so much of the final shape of the Hebrew Bible. To know this period is to know what influenced these redactors. In Ezra and Nehemiah Gordon Davies provides that knowledge using rhetorical criticism, a methodology that reveals the full range and progress of the book’s ideas without hiding its rough seams and untidy edges.
The purpose of rhetorical criticism is to explain not the source but the power of the text as a unitary message. This approach does not look at plot development, characterization, or other elements whose roughness makes Ezra-Nehemiah frustrating to read. Instead, it examines the three parts of the relationship-the strategies, the situations, and the effects-between the speaker and the audience. Rhetorical criticism’s scrutiny of the audience in context favors the search for the ideas and structures that are indigenous to the culture of the text.Rhetorical criticism is interested in figures of speech as means of persuasion. Therefore, to apply it to Ezra-Nehemiah, Davies concentrates on the public discourse-the orations, letters, and prayers-throughout its text. In each chapter he follows a procedure that: (1) where it is unclear, identifies the rhetorical unit in which the discourse is set; (2) identifies the audiences of the discourse and the rhetorical situation; (3) studies the arrangement of the material; (4) studies the effect on the various audiences; (5) reviews the passage as a whole and judges its success. In the conclusion, Davies explains that Ezra-Nehemiah makes theological sense on its own terms, by forming a single work in which a range of ideas is argued.
Biblical scholars as well as those interested in literary criticism, communication studies, rhetorical studies, ecclesiology, and homiletics will find Ezra and Nehemiah enlightening.
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Your Sorrow Is My Sorrow
$16.95Add to cart1. The Foretelling Of Sorrow
2. Fleeing From Destruction
3. Searching For Our Lost Treasures
4. Meeting Our Pain
5. Standing Beneath The Cross
6. Embracing Our Loss
7. Laying Our Sorrows To Rest
176 PagesAdditional Info
With the exquisite prose and poetry that has always graced her writing, Joyce Rupp mines the multiple meanings of important images in the Bible, in order to get us through our own rough moments. Included are: the prophecy of Simeon, the flight into Egypt, Jesus lost in the temple, Mary seeing Jesus carrying the cross, Mary at the foot of the cross, Mary receiving Jesus’ dead body, and Jesus being laid in the tomb. -
Sexuality And The Black Church
$18.00Add to cartThis book tackles the “taboo” subject of sexuality that has long been avoided by the Black church and community. Douglas argues that this view of Black sexuality has interfered with constructive responses to the AIDS crisis and teenage pregnancies, fostered intolerance of sexual diversity, frustrated healthy male/female relationships, and rendered Black and womanist theologians silent on sexual issues.
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Petrine Ministry And The Unity Of The Church
$24.95Add to cartIn the context of the ecumenical dialogues which have taken place after the Second Vatican Council, few topics have generated as much discussion and reflection as that of the papacy. What has been the function of this service of unity? What are the foundations of its existence? What are its unrelinquishable elements which cannot change? What can be renewed in the manner in which the office is carried out?
John Paul II’s encyclical “On Commitment to Ecumenism” (Ut unum sint) inspired these essays originally presented at a symposium in Rome. In this encyclical the Bishop of Rome recognizes the difficulty that the Petrine office holds for many on the ecumenical journey and exhorts Church leaders and theologians to engage [him] in a patient and fraternal dialogue on his ministry. This symposium was the first attempt to begin this dialogue in Rome with theologians from many Christian traditions: the oriental and orthodox, the Anglican, Lutheran, Reformed, Methodist, Baptist and Free Church traditions.
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Making Faith Sense
$17.95Add to cartMaking faith-sense is a new term for an ancient practice. It is what the early Christians called mystical or wisdom theology: understanding life in the light of God’s participation recorded in the Gospels, recognizing the signs of God’s presence in everyday events and shaping one’s life accordingly. In Making Faith-Sense, Robert Kinast shows all who seek to unify their life experience around their belief in God how to follow that ancient practice. Drawing upon the award-winning process he has used with students for the ministry, Father Kinast explains how to make sense of family, work, and cultural experience from the perspective of Christian faith. Each chapter contains numerous real-life examples and practical guidelines that can be used privately or with a group.
Making Faith-Sense begins with a discussion of wisdom theology and its revival in modern times, highlighting “the turn to experience” that characterizes feminist, liberation, and enculturated theologies. The methods for making faith-sense embrace three main components: experience, reflection, and action. The first section describes what is meant by experience, the value of narrating it, how to analyze it, and what to pay attention to so that experience will reveal its theological meaning. The second section explains the role of reflection, its similarity to prayer, techniques for connecting experience to theological tradition, and the most useful theological resources for making faith-sense. The third section affirms the importance of putting reflection into practice, of ensuring that action flows from reflection, of planning and evaluating the effect of one’s practice, and of using practice as the starting point for continuing the process of making faith-sense. Examples from work, family, and cultural life are used throughout to provide illustrations of these general points. A concluding chapter summarizes the reemergence of practical theology since the 1980s as an effort of church communities to make faith-sense of their collective lives.
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Water Buffalo Theology (Anniversary)
$26.00Add to cartWater Buffalo Theology marked the emergence of a self-conscious Asian Christian theology, on the world scene when it was published in 1974. In this twenty-fifth anniversary edition, Koyama thoroughly updates the original, adding an retrospective introduction that records how he has changed his mind on many topics but maintained his position on others. In addition to eliminating several chapters, Koyama also adds one on his “pilgrimage in mission.”
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Ladder Of The Beatitudes
$20.00Add to cartDrawing on stories from the lives of the saints, scripture, and everyday life, Jim Forest opens up the mysteries of the Beatitudes. These ancient blessings, with which Christ began his Sermon on the Mount, are all aspects of communion with God. As Forest shows, they are like rungs on a ladder, each one leading to the next. They appear at the doorway of the New Testament to provide an easily memorized summary of everything that follows, right down to the crucifixion (“Blessed are you who are persecuted”) and the resurrection (“Rejoice and be glad”).
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Community Of The Beautiful
$29.95Add to cartThe Community of the Beautiful is not simply an analysis of Balthasar’s theology; there exists a more personal and concrete reason for a reconsideration of the connection between God and the beautiful. The experience of a particular living ecclesial tradition, the Latin Church of the Americas, may be a guide to a world that lost its confidence in the religious dimensions of the beautiful.
