This popular introduction to praying the rosary draws readers closer to Jesus and Mary by placing the mysteries-including the new mysteries of light-in the context of Scripture. The book addresses commonly asked questions about Mary and the rosary and provides the biblical background for all twenty mysteries. It also includes a scriptural rosary that offers ten Bible texts suitable for meditation on each mystery. An appendix offers the complete text of Pope John Paul II's Apostolic Letter, Rosarium Virginis Mariae. A Servant Book.

    Saint Francis of Assisi is quite possibly the most popular of all Christian saints. Perhaps it is his adoration for all living things or his unrelenting generosity that has made so many people open their hearts to him. Perhaps it is the deep conviction and piety expressed not only by the saint himself, but in his name, in the Franciscan orders throughout the centuries.Whatever the reason, in a world that is quickly developing in a direction diametrically opposite to the saint's own simple asceticism, Saint Francis of Assisi still stirs strong emotions and compassion. How close he found God, in the very nature around him, is inspiring.All books in The Life and Prayers series come complete with a Touch-or-Click Table of Contents, divided by each section. Enjoy.

    S. Lewis here offers wisdom and lessons that illuminate our private dialogue with God—prayer—in this collection drawn from the breadth of his writings.C. S. Lewis’s insights on Christianity and his reflections on Christian life continue to guide us more than fifty years after his death. How to Pray showcases Lewis’s enduring wisdom on prayer and its place in our daily lives.Cultivated from his many essays, articles, and letters, as well as his classic works, How to Pray provides practical wisdom and instruction to help readers nurture their spiritual beliefs and embrace prayer in all its forms. While many people would like to speak to God, they often don’t know how to begin. Lewis guides them through the practice, illuminating the significance of prayer and why it is central to faith.A welcome addition to the C. S. Lewis canon, How to Pray offers a deeper understanding of our personal tradition of prayer, our faith, and what is means to be a Christian.

    True Christianity involves a sight of the majesty of God and calls for a godly life.

    Christians today sometimes forget this, dangerously ignoring the importance of their physical selves when it comes to technology, sexuality, worship, and even death. Anderson's book will help readers learn what the Bible says about our bodies and grow to appreciate the importance of embodiment in our spiritual lives. It will also explore generational differences when it comes to how we perceive and use our bodies. Just as Christ's body was crucial to our salvation, our own bodies are an important part of the complete Christian life.

    The awareness of sin used to be our shadow. Christians hated sin, feared it, fled from it--and grieved over it. But the shadow of sin has now dimmed in our consciousness. Even preachers, who once got visibly angry over a congregation's sin, now speak of sin in a mumble.Cornelius Plantinga pulls the ancient doctrine of sin out of mothballs and presents it to contemporary readers in clear language, drawing from a wide range of books, films, and other cultural resources. In smoothly flowing prose Plantinga describes how sin corrupts what is good and how such corruption spreads. He discusses the parasitic quality of sin and the ironies and pretenses generated by this quality. He examines the relation of sin to folly and addiction. He describes two classic "postures" or movements of sin -- attack and flight. And in an epilogue he reminds us that whatever we say about sin also sharpens our eye for the beauty of grace.

    Is God all-powerful? Is God good? How can God allow so much innocent human suffering?These questions, taken together, have been called the "theodicy problem," and in this book Thomas Long explores what preachers can and should say in response. Long reviews the origins and history of the theodicy problem and engages the work of major thinkers who have posed solutions to it. Cautioning pastors not to ignore urgent theodicy-related questions arising from their parishioners, he offers biblically based approaches to preaching on theodicy, guided by Jesus' parable of the wheat and the tares and the "greatest theodicy text in Scripture" -- the book of Job.

    As the youngest-ever op-ed columnist for The New York Times and the author of the critically acclaimed books Privilege and Grand New Party, Ross Douthat has emerged as one of the most provocative and influential voices of his generation. Now he offers a masterful and hard-hitting account of how American Christianity has gone off the rails — and why it threatens to take American society with it.In a story that moves from the 1950s to the age of Obama, Douthat brilliantly charts traditional Christianity’s decline from a vigorous, mainstream, and bipartisan faith — which acted as a “vital center” and the moral force behind the Civil Rights movement — through the culture wars of the 1960s and 1970s down to the polarizing debates of the present day. He argues that Christianity’s place in American life has increasingly been taken over, not by atheism, but by heresy: Debased versions of Christian faith that breed hubris, greed, and self-absorption. Ranging from Glenn Beck to Eat Pray Love, Joel Osteen to The Da Vinci Code, Oprah Winfrey to Sarah Palin, Douthat explores how the prosperity gospel’s mantra of “pray and grow rich”; a cult of self-esteem that reduces God to a life coach; and the warring political religions of left and right have crippled the country’s ability to confront our most pressing challenges, and accelerated American decline.His urgent call for a revival of traditional Christianity is sure to generate controversy, and it will be vital reading for all those concerned about the imperiled American future.

    

    The end result of this conversation, Dark hopes, will be a better understanding that there is a reality more important, more lasting, and more infinite than the cultures to which we belong, the reality of the kingdom of God.

    Today, professing that Jesus Christ is the only way to approach God and receive his salvation may seem to some like a form of intolerance or arrogance. A growing number of Christian intellectuals, pastors, and leaders are favoring a more inclusive view of a person's path to salvation.But what does this mean in practice? Are there biblical or theological means of defending inclusivism or pluralism, or do these views simply pay tribute to modern ethical standards?The fact is that unity among Christians on this fundamental issue has disappeared. Many people of faith choose among three fundamentally different answers to the question, "Is Jesus the only Savior?" Stated succinctly, these answers are:No! (Pluralism)Yes, but... (Inclusivism)Yes, period! (Exclusivism)In Is Jesus the Only Savior?, Ronald Nash explores the divergent views of pluralism and inclusivism in depth, laying out the reasoning, history, and major supporters behind them; and making a resounding case for exclusivism based on firm theological standards.Christians of all walks of life will find their faith in Christ affirmed and strengthened by this vital treatise, written in accessible terms and a readable style.

    Thomas Aquinas's five arguments for the existence of God, this book is for you. Written as dialogue between Lucy and AJ in a coffee shop, these arguments are presented by Fradd and Delfino in every day language, with helpful examples and analogies, and by raising and answering objections along the way. Additional resources at the end of the book will deepen your understanding of the material, help you to grow in wisdom, and strengthen your faith.

    Driven by anxiety—enslaved to the fear of death—we are revealed to be morally and spiritually vulnerable as "the sting of death is sin." Beck argues that in the face of this predicament, resurrection is experienced as liberation from the slavery of death in the martyrological, eccentric, cruciform, and communal capacity to overcome fear in living fully and sacrificially for others."Richard Beck's new book seamlessly integrates deep theological reflection with sound psychological insight while never compromising either discipline. Liberating ideas about fear, sin, and death from the mire of abstraction, The Slavery of Death invites believers to discover and embrace true freedom together at the far side of the cross, a freedom reflected in and essential to the very nature of God. This book is a gift to the church." —Jamie Arpin-Ricci, author, "The Cost of Community""With Eastern Orthodox tradition and the work of modern theologians like McGill, Stringfellow, and Kelsey in one hand, and social science texts in the other, Richard Beck analyzes our culture of death in this compelling book. What can liberate us from this demonic power that is feared and fetishized, institutionalized and internalized, and reconfigure our self-enclosed identities? The kenotic love of the risen Christ! With the colloquial skills of a gifted teacher, Beck has written a prophetic, practical—and urgent—manifesto."—Kim Fabricius, minister, the United Reformed Church (UK)"It's an age-old Faustian tale. We conspire with demonic principalities and powers to cheat death and save ourselves. Such idols, Richard Beck warns, inexorably enslave and damn us. He follows this indictment, however, with a prophetic analysis that is nothing short of an emancipation proclamation. Christ's resurrection not only burst the gates of hell and destroyed death's sting, but also freed us from the enslaving addiction of self-empowerment—resurrecting us for self-expenditure and sacrificial love."—Richard Goode, co-editor, "And the Criminals With Him""Beck is like the 'rabbi trained for the kingdom of heaven' that Jesus talked about: a master pulling out things old and new, weaving together ancient theology and contemporary psychology in a way altogether provocative and compelling, rightfully re-orienting us with regard to some of our most basic convictions. Good, good, good work." —Lee C. Camp, author, "Mere Discipleship"

    "...Therefore, the most important and most profound question of the Christian faith must be, how and from where did death arise, and why has it become stronger than life? Why has death become so powerful that the world itself has become a kind of global cemetery, a place where a collection of people condemned to death live either in fear or terror, or, in their efforts to forget about death, find themselves rushing around one great big burial plot?"- Alexander Schmemann, Radio Liberty Broadcast In this brief collection, Father Alexander Schmemann does not have the luxury for platitudes and pleasantries on the most difficult of life's ultimate questions. Taking us to the heart of Christian revelation and anthropology, he leads us unequivocally and directly, as only he can, to discole why the apostle Paul calls death the "last enemy" (1 Cor. 15:26) and Christ's decisive answer to this enemy. Father Alexander Schmemann (†1983) was a prolific writer, brilliant lecturer, and dedicated pastor.I: I Believe...

    But its roots are not there. They are in Athens and Jerusalem. European culture takes its bearing from references that are not in Europe: Europe is eccentric.What makes the West unique? What is the driving force behind its culture? Remi Brague takes up these questions in Eccentric Culture. This is not another dictionary of European culture, nor a measure of the contributions of a particular individual, religion, or national tradition. The author's interest is especially, with regard to the transmission of that culture, to articulate the dynamic tension that has propelled Europe and more generally the West toward civilization. It is this mainspring of European culture, this founding principle, that Brague calls "Roman".Yet the author's intent is not to write a history of Europe, and less yet to defend the historical reality of the Roman Empire. Brague rather isolates and generalizes one aspect of that history or, one might say, cultural myth, of ancient Rome. The Roman attitude senses its own incompleteness and recognizes the call to borrow from what went before it.Historically, it has led the West to borrow from the great traditions of Jerusalem and Athens: primarily the Jewish and Christian tradition, on the one hand, and the classical Greek tradition on the other. Nowhere does the author find this Roman character so strongly present as in the Christian and particularly Catholic attitude toward the incarnation.At once an appreciation of the richness and diversity of the sources and their fruit, Eccentric Culture points as well to the fragility of their nourishing principle. As such, Brague finds in it notonly a means of understanding the past, but of projecting a future in (re)proposing to the West, and to Europe in particular, a model relationship of what is proper to it.An international bestseller (translated from the original French edition of Europe, La Voie Romaine), this work has been or is presently being translated into thirteen languages.