Best of
Christianity

1937

The Soul of The Apostolate


Jean-Baptiste Chautard - 1937
    In this age of relentless activity it is easy for Christians, particularly those involved in good works, to fall into the pattern of the activist.  But mere activity and material results are not sufficient for a successful apostolate.In his classic work The Soul of the Apostolate,  Dom Chautard demonstrates that the very foundation of all apostolic work must be the Interior Life.  The apostle of Christ will grow to become an instrument and true channel of God’s graces to the world only through prayer, meditation and the cultivation of the Interior Life.  When one is involved in works of spiritual or corporal charity, his work can only be truly efficacious when he anchors his Interior Life in Christ.  Without Christ we can do nothing.  Inside you’ll learn about the:Pre-eminence of the Interior Life over the Active Life Dangers of the Active Life: for you and your apostolateThe Devil’s  special temptations for those working for Our LordSteps necessary in order to develop and grow in the Interior LifeNecessity of the Interior Life to a successful and spiritually fruitful apostolateFor anyone who would work for Our  Lord and His Church there is simply no book more important to read and to follow than The Soul of the Apostolate .

The Lord


Romano Guardini - 1937
    Unlike other books seeking to strip Jesus' story to reveal only the human being, Romano Guardini's The Lord gives the complete story of Jesus Christ—as man, Holy Ghost, and Creator. Pope Benedict XVI lauds Guardini's work as providing a full understanding of the Son of God, away from the prejudice that rationality engenders. Put long-held myths aside and discover the entire truth about God's only begotten Son.

The Cost of Discipleship


Dietrich Bonhoeffer - 1937
    One of the most important theologians of the twentieth century illuminates the relationship between ourselves and the teachings of Jesus in this classic text on ethics, humanism, and civic duty.What can the call to discipleship, the adherence to the word of Jesus, mean today to the businessman, the soldier, the laborer, or the aristocrat? What did Jesus mean to say to us? What is his will for us today? Drawing on the Sermon on the Mount, Dietrich Bonhoeffer answers these timeless questions by providing a seminal reading of the dichotomy between "cheap grace" and "costly grace." "Cheap grace," Bonhoeffer wrote, "is the grace we bestow on ourselves...grace without discipleship....Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought again and again, the girl which must be asked for, the door at which a man must know....It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life."The Cost of Discipleship is a compelling statement of the demands of sacrifice and ethical consistency from a man whose life and thought were exemplary articulations of a new type of leadership inspired by the Gospel, and imbued with the spirit of Christian humanism and a creative sense of civic duty.

Letters by a Modern Mystic


Frank C. Laubach - 1937
    Laubach's spiritual journey as he began such an experiment. Read about the remarkable results. What might you experience in the practice of such a spiritual discipline?

Providence: God's loving care for men and the need for confidence in Almighty God


Réginald Garrigou-Lagrange - 1937
    Garrigou-Lagrange; O.P. shows how God\'s Providence works in the Gospel; and he explains how Providence relates to prayer; to the duty of the present moment; to faithfulness in little things; to charity toward our neighbor; to the grace of a happy death; etc. Impr. 389 pgs; PB

Full Assurance: How to Know You're Saved


H.A. Ironside - 1937
    Ironside affirms that faith, hope, and understanding are guaranteed by Scripture to all believers and that they can have "full assurance.

Divini Redemptoris: On Atheistic Communism


Pope Pius XI - 1937
    Pius XI states that “bolshevistic and atheistic Communism” threatens “Christian civilization” everywhere and promises a new barbarism worse than that of Jesus’ time. It aims at “upsetting the social order” and undermining Christianity’s foundations. He states that the Church cannot remain silent and must defend truth and justice.Pius XI had already condemned communism in five encyclicals beginning in 1924 when he wrote the 1937 encyclical. In this encyclical, he relates how as early as 1846, Pius IX had condemned communism, and Leo XIII labeled it a “fatal plague.” However, from its center in Moscow, communism continues to “struggle against Christian civilization.” Bishops also have spoken out against communism, but the pope says that “clever agitators” and their “subversive ideas” only grow in influence. In the encyclical, he states that he will present communism’s most corrosive ideas, uncover its method of action, and refute its claims with the truth of the Church.

Dominican Life


Ferdinand D. Joret - 1937
    Dominic and his sons to seek union with the Divine Will through Jesus Christ our Lord. The Children of this family of St. Dominic, forming themselves on the traditions and examples of seven centuries, are bound together within God�s Church by ties that transcend differences of race and language and are more enduring than the bonds of earthly kinship. This book is intended as a guide and manual to teach the spirit of St. Dominic so that the reader might learn more about the Dominican Order and absorb its spirit. Although it was written for lay Dominicans, it will prove instructive and useful to all members of the Dominican Order as well as any laity interested in finding the character and spiritual charism of St. Dominic. This new edition has been completely re-typeset in full agreement with the original. English spelling of words has been maintained from the original.

Creation and Fall Temptation: Two Biblical Studies


Dietrich Bonhoeffer - 1937
    Here he discusses the seeming scientific naiveté behind the creation story, God’s love and goodness, and humanity’s creation, its free will, and its blessedness. Bonhoeffer also tackles difficult questions that are raised from the first book of the Bible, questions about the seemingly redundant second story of creation, about God’s own beginning, about the source of the light that was created the first day. The author then expounds upon Adam and Eve’s fall from grace: How could they, creatures made in God’s image, have thought to oppose God so foully? Where did the first evil come from? How did humanity lose its right to live in paradise?In “Temptation,” Bonhoeffer questions how temptation appeared in the midst of Eden’s innocence, and he explores the very nature of evil. Bonhoeffer explains that Jesus Christ helps us to understand and conquer physical and spiritual temptation through His grace and goodness.