Religious Studies Review John Cassian: Conferences translation and preface by Colm Luibheid introduction by Owen Chadwick I f you wish to achieve true knowledge of scripture you must hurry to achieve unshakable humility of heart. This is what will lead you not to the knowledge that puffs a man up but to the lore which illumines through the achievement of love. John Cassian (c. 365-c. 435) At the turn of the sixth century the Mediterranean world was witnessing the decline of Roman rule that had formed the bedrock of its civil order. During the chaos of those years, there arose in the deserts of Egypt and Syria monastic movements that offered men and women a radical God-centered alternative to the present society. Among the most eloquent interpreters of this new movement to western Europe was John Cassian (c. 365-c.435). Drawing on his own early experience as a monk in Bethlehem and Egypt, he journeyed to the West to found monasteries in Marseilles and the region of Provence. Included in this volume is Cassian's masterpiece, the Conferences, which is a study of the Egyptian ideal of the monk. The new translation by Colm Luibheid is coupled with an insightful introduction by the distinguished Regius Professor Emeritus of Modern History, Cambridge University, Owen Chadwick, who writes of Cassian's achievement: Like the Rule of St. Benedict, his work was a protection against excess and a constant recall to that primitive simplicity where eastern spirituality met western. +

    . . and life-changing. Discover why growing in prayer, which sometimes can be compared to a battle, is worth every ounce of effort you give it. Even if you've never prayed, or if you've never developed the habit of daily prayer, God is waiting to meet you where you are and encourage you every step of the way. Using a simple approach to prayer, you'll learn how even ten minutes a day can change your life. Author Dan Burke explains how to set up your own sacred prayer space, discusses the common obstacles to prayer, and provides practical ways to overcome them. You'll also read stories of others who are seeking to orient themselves to God through prayer. If you re ready for God to transform your heart and mind, you will know the life that Jesus has promised; a life of peace and joy that cannot be taken away by the trials of this world.

    Becca Stevens, founder and president of Thistle Farms, shares true stories of healing and joy where brokenness is transformed into compassion. In each chapter, Stevens provides encouragement and practical steps for anyone going through a difficult season or searching for a deeper faith. Love Heals is:A gorgeous gift book with beautiful photography and inspirational calloutsFor women of any age seeking healing and hopeA gift of hope for a friend or self-purchaseAfter reading, readers will learn:Love heals by the mercy of God.Love heals with compassion.Love heals during the act of forgiving.Love heals past our fears.Love heals across the world.In Love Heals, you'll find principles that have transformed lives. Stevens has been featured in the New York Times, on ABC World News, NPR, the TODAY show, and PBS, and named a 2016 CNN Hero. In 2011, the White House named Becca a "Champion of Change."

    My Bright Abyss, composed in the difficult years since and completed in the wake of a bone marrow transplant, is a moving meditation on what a viable contemporary faith—responsive not only to modern thought and science but also to religious tradition—might look like.Joyful, sorrowful, and beautifully written, My Bright Abyss is destined to become a spiritual classic, useful not only to believers but to anyone whose experience of life and art seems at times to overbrim its boundaries. How do we answer this “burn of being”? Wiman asks. What might it mean for our lives—and for our deaths—if we acknowledge the “insistent, persistent ghost” that some of us call God?

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    In addition, the book explores the many myths of Jesus and the Goddess and unlocks the lost secret teachings of Christian mysticism, which promise happiness and immortality to those who attain the state of Gnosis, or enlightenment. This daring and controversial book recovers the ancient wisdom of the original Christians and demonstrates its relevance to us today.

    I lost peace. I lost clarity and certitude. My faith was never perfect before my son was born, but somewhere in that first year, somewhere in my distraction and exhaustion, I lost the Spirit-life I had known. I blamed myself.

    A simple and direct method of invoking the mercy of Jesus Christ by repeating his Holy Name, it is a way of obeying St Paul’s instruction to “pray always”. In an increasingly noisy and frenetic world, the Jesus Prayer offers us an oasis of inner peace and a lifeline back to God.

    Anselm's ardor, literary brilliance, and scrupulous theology have secured him admiration. And, as Archbishop of Canterbury, his tussle with the early Norman kings earned him a place in secular history as well.

    As we use the Book of Common Prayer, Black says, "we discover we are not alone, and this liturgical current of worship, prayer, and praise will indeed take us where we want to go-union with the God we seek to love." Welcome to the Book of Common Prayer shows readers everything from where to find the Sunday collect to how to pray the Daily Office. But it's more than a how-to. It offers history and background that help make the prayer book a more meaningful part of the worship life of individuals and congregations.With thoughtful reflection questions, this is a perfect volume for parish study groups.

    In the tradition of unsolved historical mysteries like David Grann's Killers of the Flower Moon and Douglas Preston's The Lost City of the Monkey God, Brian Muraresku’s 10-year investigation takes the reader through Greece, Germany, Spain, France and Italy, offering unprecedented access to the hidden archives of the Louvre and the Vatican along the way.In The Immortality Key, Muraresku explores a little-known connection between the best-kept secret in Ancient Greece and Christianity. This is the real story of the most famous human being who ever lived (Jesus) and the biggest religion the world has ever known. Today, 2.4 billion people are Christian. That's one third of the planet. But do any of them really know how it all started?Before Jerusalem, before Rome, before Mecca—there was Eleusis: the spiritual capital of the ancient world. It promised immortality to Plato and the rest of Athens's greatest minds with a very simple formula: drink this potion, see God. Shrouded in secrecy for millennia, the Ancient Greek sacrament was buried when the newly Christianized Roman Empire obliterated Eleusis in the fourth century AD.Renegade scholars in the 1970s claimed the Greek potion was psychedelic, just like the original Christian Eucharist that replaced it. In recent years, vindication for the disgraced theory has been quietly mounting in the laboratory. The rapidly growing field of archaeological chemistry has proven the ancient use of visionary drugs. And with a single dose of psilocybin, the psycho-pharmacologists at Johns Hopkins and NYU are now turning self-proclaimed atheists into instant believers. No one has ever found hard, scientific evidence of drugs connected to Eleusis, let alone early Christianity. Until now.Armed with key documents never before translated into English, convincing analysis, and a captivating spirit of quest, Muraresku mines science, classical literature, biblical scholarship and art to deliver the hidden key to eternal life, bringing us to what clinical psychologist William Richards calls "the edge of an awesomely vast frontier."Featuring a Foreword by Graham Hancock, the New York Times bestselling author of America Before: The Key to Earth's Lost Civilization.

    The real identity of the person who chose to write under the pseudonym of Dionysius the Areopagite is unknown. Even the exact dates of his writings have never been determined. Moreover the texts themselves, though relatively short, are at points seemingly impenetrable and have mystified readers over the centuries. Yet the influence of this shadowy figure on broad range of mystical writers from the early middle ages on is readily discernible. His formulation of a method of negative theology that stresses the impotence of humans' attempt to penetrate the "cloud of unknowing" is famous as is his meditation on the divine names.Despite his influence, relatively few attempts have been made to translate the entire corpus of his written into English. Here in one volume are collected all of the Pseudo-Dionysius' works. Each has been translated from the Migne edition, with reference to the forthcoming Göttingen critical edition of A.M. Ritter, G. Heil, and B. Suchla.To present these works to the English-speaking public, an outstanding team of six research scholars has been assembled. The lucid translation of Colm Luibheid has been augmented by Paul Rorem's notes and textual collaboration. The reader is presented a rich and varied examination of the main themes of Dionysian spirituality by René Roques, an incisive discussion of the original questions of the authenticity and alleged heresies in the Dionysian corpus by Jaroslav Pelikan, a comprehensive tracing Dionysius' influence on medieval authors by Jean Leclercq, and a survey by Karlfried Froehlich of the reception given the corpus by Humanists and sixteenth-century Reformers.

    This stirring fable captures a new spirit of Christianity--where personal, daily interaction with God is more important than institutional church structures, where faith is more about a way of life than a system of belief, where being authentically good is more important than being doctrinally "right," and where one's direction is more important than one's present location. Brian McLaren's delightful account offers a wise and wondrous approach for revitalizing Christian spiritual life and Christian congregations.If you are interested in joining a discussion group devoted to a A New Kind of Christian please visit groups.yahoo.com/group/NKOC.

    Also makes a perfect award or gift.

    Its pages chroncile not only Fox's spiritual travial when he heard a voice that said, "There is one, even Christ Jesus, that can speak to thy condition," but his years of ministry and gathering a people for Christ who became known as the Society of Friends. Includes a glossary of words and phrases most commonly used by Fox.