Publisher: Random House

Things Every Catholic (and Non-Catholic) Should Know – {Review} The Catholic Catalogue

Posted April 18, 2016 in Faith, Reading, Review / 0 Comments

Things Every Catholic (and Non-Catholic) Should Know – {Review} The Catholic CatalogueThe Catholic Catalogue by Melissa Musick, Anna Keating
Publisher: Image (2016)
Hardcover (432 pages)
Via: Blogging for Books
Rating:
Reading Challenges: Read 2016

Synopsis

The popular mother-daughter team behind the hit website TheCatholicCatalogue.com helps readers to discover, rediscover, and embrace some of the smells and tastes, sounds and sensations, holidays and seasons of the Catholic life. This collection of prayers, crafts, devotionals and recipes will help readers make room in their busy lives for mystery and meaning, awe and joy.
This beautifully designed book will help readers celebrate Catholicism throughout the years, across daily practice and milestones. Like the most useful field guides, it is divided into user-friendly sections and covers such topics as the veneration of relics, blessing your house, discovering a vocation, raising teenagers, getting a Catholic tattoo, planting a Mary garden, finding a spiritual director, and exploring your own way in the tradition.
With more than 75 inspiring chapters, this book promises to be a resource that individuals and families will turn to again and again.

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{Review} Miriam – The Plagues, the Exodus from Egypt, and My Three Favorite Characters

Posted February 13, 2016 in Reading, Review / 0 Comments

{Review} Miriam – The Plagues, the Exodus from Egypt, and My Three Favorite CharactersMiriam by Mesu Andrews
Series: Treasures of the Nile #2
Publisher: WaterBrook Press (2016 - March 15)
Paperback ARC (369 pages)
Via: Blogging for Books
Rating:
Also by this author: The Pharaoh's Daughter, Isaiah's Daughter, Isaiah's Legacy
Also in this series: The Pharaoh's Daughter
Reading Challenges: 2016 Royal Challenge, Read 2016

Synopsis

The Hebrews call me prophetess, the Egyptians a seer. But I am neither. I am simply a watcher of Israel and the messenger of El Shaddai. When He speaks to me in dreams, I interpret. When He whispers a melody, I sing.
At eighty-six, Miriam had devoted her entire life to loving El Shaddai and serving His people as both midwife and messenger. Yet when her brother Moses returns to Egypt from exile, he brings a disruptive message. God has a new name – Yahweh – and has declared a radical deliverance for the Israelites.
Miriam and her beloved family face an impossible choice: cling to familiar bondage or embrace uncharted freedom at an unimaginable cost. Even if the Hebrews survive the plagues set to turn the Nile to blood and unleash a maelstrom of frogs and locusts, can they weather the resulting fury of the Pharaoh?
Enter an exotic land where a cruel Pharaoh reigns, pagan priests wield black arts, and the Israelites cry out to a God they only think they understand.

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{Review} Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives – The Story of Christmas

Posted December 24, 2015 in Reading, Review / 0 Comments

{Review} Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives – The Story of ChristmasJesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives by Pope Benedict XVI
Series: Jesus of Nazareth
Publisher: Image (2012)
Hardcover (127 pages)
Rating:
Reading Challenges: 2015 Alphabet Soup, 2015 What's In A Name?, Read 2015

Synopsis

New York Times Bestseller! The momentous third and final volume in the Pope’s international bestselling Jesus of Nazareth series, detailing how the stories of Jesus’ infancy and childhood are as relevant today as they were two thousand years ago.
In 2007, Joseph Ratzinger published his first book as Pope Benedict XVI in order “to make known the figure and message of Jesus.” Now, the Pope focuses exclusively on the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life as a child. The root of these stories is the experience of hope found in the birth of Jesus and the affirmations of surrender and service embodied in his parents, Joseph and Mary. This is a story of longing and seeking, as demonstrated by the Magi searching for the redemption offered by the birth of a new king. It is a story of sacrifice and trusting completely in the wisdom of God as seen in the faith of Simeon, the just and devout man of Jerusalem, when he is in the presence of the Christ child. Ultimately, Jesus’ life and message is a story for today, one that speaks to the restlessness of the human heart searching for the sole truth which alone leads to profound joy.

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{Review} City of Saints: A Pilgrimage to John Paul II’s Kraków

Posted December 23, 2015 in Faith, Reading, Review / 0 Comments

{Review} City of Saints: A Pilgrimage to John Paul II’s KrakówCity of Saints by George Weigel
Publisher: Image (2015)
Paperback (336 pages)
Via: Blogging for Books
Rating:

Synopsis

“Karol Wojtyła, Pope John Paul II, was a man whose life was the expression of a richly textured and multidimensional soul. The many layers of that soul took on their first, mature form in Kraków.” – George Weigel
In this beautifully illustrated spiritual travelogue,
New York Times bestselling author George Weigel leads readers through the historic streets of Kraków, Poland, introducing one of the world’s great cities through the life of one of the most influential Catholic leaders of all time.
“To follow Karol Wojtyła through Kraków is to follow an itinerary of sanctity while learning the story of a city.” Weigel writes. “Thus, in what follows, the story of Karol Wojtyła, St. John Paul II, and the story of Kraków are interwoven in a chronological pilgrimage through the life of a saint that reveals, at the same time, the dramatic history and majestic culture of a city where a boy grew into a man, priest, a bishop—and an apostle to the world.”
With stunning photographs by Stephen Weigel and notes on the city’s remarkable fabric by Carrie Gress, City of Saints offers an in-depth look at a man and a city that made an indelible impression on the life and thought of the Catholic Church and the 21st century world.

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{Review} Encountering Truth – Daily Homilies from the Casa Santa Marta

Posted October 19, 2015 in Reading, Review / 0 Comments

{Review} Encountering Truth – Daily Homilies from the Casa Santa MartaEncountering Truth by Pope Francis
Publisher: Image (2015)
Hardcover (416 pages)
Via: Blogging for Books
Rating:
Also by this author: The Joy of the Gospel, Walking with Jesus, The Name of God is Mercy
Reading Challenges: Read 2015

Synopsis

Experience the morning homilies of Pope Francis and witness how he continues to change the life of the Catholic Church.
Shortly after seven in the morning, Pope Francis gives a brief homily in the little Vatican chapel of Saint Martha, in front of an audience that is always different: gardeners, office workers, nuns and priests, as well as a growing group of journalists. It is a set appointment, and in some ways a revolutionary innovation, where a pope speaks to everyone, off the cuff, without any written text, as he would have done as a parish priest.
Encountering Truth is a collection of highlights from these homilies from March 2013 to May 2014. Along with summaries by Radio Vaticana (who recorded and transcribed the homilies) and commentary by Father Antonio Spadaro, SJ, these reflections provide moments of inspiration, simplicity, and a glimpse into the papal world very few ever get to experience.

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