Sophia Institute Press
The New Testament Retold
by Henri Daniel-Rops
Henri Daniel-Rops takes us back to the very foundation of Christianity, to the secret meetings of a persecuted community, and back even further to the life of the One who changed the world forever.
Beginning with the appearance of the Angel to a young girl in Nazareth, he traces the fascinating story of Christ, His youth, teaching ministry, first disciples, many miracles . . . and, in the end, His betrayal, trial, and death on the Cross.
That end made a new beginning, for then comes the triumphant Resurrection, and the final appearances of Jesus in His earthly body before He is taken up to heaven, leaving us the Eucharist and the other sacraments that enable us to share in His divine life.
It s a story that can t be told too often, a story for young and old, rich and poor: the story of our salvation.
Paperback, size 9" x 6", 176 pages
The Secret Diary of Elisabeth Leseur
The Woman Whose Goodness Changed Her Husband From Atheist to Priest
by Elisabeth Leseur
This inspiring book gives you a splendid example of how to live as a Christian in a secular environment that can be indifferent or hostile to your Faith. For Elisabeth Leseur had two great loves: God, and her husband Felix. Felix loved Elisabeth as well; yet to their mutual sorrow, he couldn’t share the life of the Spirit that Elisabeth cherished.
Occasionally the happiness of their life together in upper-class Parisian society was shattered by Felix’s frustration and impatience. How could such an intelligent woman waste her time, as he saw it, with ignorant superstitions? Sometimes he and his friends would even ridicule and mock her faith.
But Elisabeth loved Felix too much to allow their home to degenerate into an emotional war zone. She realized that confrontations and arguments were useless; she chose instead to keep quiet and pray for Felix. In her secret diary, she recorded how she used his efforts to destroy her faith as means to grow in love for him and for God.
Throughout their life together, it grieved Elisabeth to think that Felix might be separated from her for all eternity because of his rejection of God. For her, life in Heaven wouldn’t be happy without him. Yet when she died prematurely, Felix was still an unbeliever.
The story doesn’t end there. When Felix found this diary, he discovered how Elisabeth’s whole life bore witness to the truth of the God she loved.
In time, Felix was transformed by the diary and his memories of Elisabeth. He became a Christian and, later, a priest. Now she may even be declared a saint. Elisabeth’s diary and spiritual writings (all included in this one volume) map out for you a path to marital harmony and greater love for God — especially if you love someone who stands outside the Faith. Let Elisabeth’s two great loves, and her faith and perseverance, inspire you now.
Paperback, size 9" x 6", 290 pages
The Sign of the Cross
The Fifteen Most Powerful Words in the English Language
by St. Francis de Sales
From the young St. Francis de Sales’s heroic efforts to bring Calvinists back to the Faith comes this succinct, eloquent defense of the age-old Catholic practice of making the Sign of the Cross, which sixteenth-century Calvinists denounced as a Popish invention and many Protestants scorn even today.
Embodying the zeal of youth and the wisdom of age, this gentle jewel of Catholic apologetics traces the origins of the Sign of the Cross back to the Fathers of the Church, to the Apostles before them, and finally to our Lord Himself.
Along with St. Francis’s other lucid explanations of our Catholic Faith and his undaunted love even for those who hated him, this modest book helped restore to their native Catholic faith tens of thousands of heretics who not long before were intent on killing him.
As they did for the Calvinists in St. Francis’s day, so in our day these pages will bring you a better understanding and a renewed love for the Sign of the Cross, that brief and lively exterior prayer by which, from time immemorial, God has been invoked by serious Christians before all of their endeavors.
Among the other things you’ll learn here:
- Why now is always the right time to make the Sign of the Cross
- Why God chooses to attach power to the Sign of the Cross
- Why it is made on the forehead
- How to convince skeptics to value and pray with it
- Two uses of the Sign of the Cross: do you know both of them?
- How the Sign of the Cross is the antidote to the Mark of the Devil
- Errors in the claims of those who oppose this practice
- The theological significance of the motions, vertical and horizontal
- Two reasons it has particular power against the Enemy
- Why you should make the Sign of the Cross publicly and often
Outside the Creed itself, there are few topics to which the Fathers testify as universally and unanimously as the pious practice of making, frequently and well, the Sign of the Cross. With the help of these holy pages, the saints’ love for it will enkindle yours. Soon you’ll be saying with St. Jerome, “With every work, with all of my comings and goings, may my hand make the Sign of the Cross!”
Paperback, size 7" x 5.1", 128 pages
by Romano Guardini
If you already say the Rosary, this book will help you pray it with greater devotion. If you don't say the Rosary, you'll discover why you should—and how to begin.
Unlike most Rosary books, The Rosary of Our Lady doesn't assume you already have a special love for Mary. Rather, it shows why such love is appropriate to all Christians who yearn to grow closer to Christ.
In these pages, you'll learn how to pray the Rosary as it was meant to be prayed and to identify—and overcome—the bad habits that too easily develop in those of us who pray the Rosary often.
Whether you've already spent many hours praying the Rosary or only want a simple, clear, and holy book to introduce the Rosary to a relative or friend, then this book is the book for you.
You'll also learn:
- How to take your daily concerns with you to the Rosary—and leave them there.
- Who should—and shouldn't—pray the Rosary
- What makes up the Rosary? The beads? The thoughts behind them? Or must there be something deeper?
- The paradox of the Rosary: Why is the Rosary both easy and difficult?
- How much of the Rosary should you be praying?
- How to pray the Rosary . . . even in times of exhaustion and stress.
- The one petition you must make if you're going to pray the Rosary well.
- The "paramount truth" that is the key to linking the words of your prayers to the mystery you're contemplating.
- Three practical hints for those who have difficulty with the Rosary.
Paperback, size 7" x 5", 160 pages
A History of the Christian City Beneath Pagan Rome
by Fr James Spencer Northcote
Enter into the shadows of the Roman catacombs where early Christians attended Mass and hid in fear from Roman soldiers seeking their death for refusing to renounce the Christian Faith.
You'll read dramatic acts of faith and courage as Fr. James Spencer Northcote, the world-renowned 19th-century expert on the catacombs, relates the intense belowground life of the catacombs.
For over three centuries, Christians buried their dead in often elaborate crypts hollowed out for them underground by fossors — designated diggers whose status was just below that of deacons and priests.
With scores of maps and illustrations in these pages, you'll see that the architecture of many crypts was as elaborate as buildings above-ground, creating under the streets and fields of Rome a second-city—indeed, a Christian city in the very heart of pagan Rome—graced with broad underground tunnels and large rooms where assemblies could be held.
In good times and in bad, during peace and during persecutions, the catacombs were central to the vibrant life of the early Church, whose history is here retold from its creation to its eventual decline, loss, and then, hundreds of years later, its rediscovery.
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 154 pages
Wellspring of Virtue
by Dietrich von Hildebrand
Of all sins, pride is the most dangerous . . . and the most sorrowful: it cuts the Christian off from God, estranges him from others, and leaves him lost and unhappy.
This book shows readers how to drive pride from the soul and discover the incredible strength and joys of humility today.
You ll also discover the incredible strength of humility, the only virtue that has the power to expel every vestige of pride from your soul. These pages will help you to begin experiencing the joys of humility today.
You'll learn:
- How humility breaks the back of every form of pride
- Why it is impossible to grow spiritually without humility
- Why humility is a form of strength not weakness (as many falsely believe)
- How humility enables you to acknowledge even your gravest sins without despairing
- How humility helps you to see the world clearly, and to love all things in it with greater intensity
- How humility allows you to experience the consolation of God's loving embrace
- Why only humility ensures true freedom
- How humility enables you to see God not as a vague presence, but as a Person who knows and loves you
- How humility helps you to see the dignity of every person (even the dignity of those you are tempted to scorn)
- How humility lets you hear God calling you personally to life with Him Why you best imitate Christ, Mary, and the saints by striving for humility
- And much more!
Paperback, size 6" x 4.5", 114 pages
St. Thomas Aquinas's Own Concise Version of His Summa Theologica
by St Thomas Aquinas
From the Church's greatest theologian: the essentials of Catholic doctrine. This book contains Aquinas's simple summary of the Faith. He covers the Trinity, Providence, the Incarnation, the Last Judgment, and much more. It's a concise statement of the key doctrines and elements of the Faith.
Paperback, size 9" x 6", 412 pages
by Cardinal Jean Danielou
The truth about angels — according to the Fathers of the Church
From St. Augustine to John Henry Newman, the greatest among the saints and men of God have lived on familiar terms with the angels; and the Church has always accorded them a very large place in her theology.
Recent theologians have dwelt on dry questions about the nature of the angels, but the early Fathers of the Church, with the memory of Jesus fresh in their minds (and of the angels of whom He spoke often) were fascinated with the energetic action of the angels among men and the ways in which the angels have carried out that mission from the instant of Creation through the time of Jesus; and how they will continue their work even unto the end of time.
From the works of these early Fathers of the Church, the late French Cardinal Jean Daniélou has drawn forth threads of knowledge and wisdom which he has here woven into a lucid and bright tapestry that shows us who the ministering angels really are, and how—in every instant and in every way—they are working for your salvation and mine.
Here you'll find no sentimental cherubs: the Fathers knew that majesty and power cloak actual angels, which is why God gave them the formidable tasks of shepherding not only souls, but entire nations, and the motions of the entire material universe itself.
Open these pages to meet the glorious angels as they were known by the Church's greatest saints and theologians: Origen and Eusebius, and Sts. Basil, Ambrose, Methodius, Gregory of Nyssa, Clement of Alexandria, and John Chrysostom (among others).
Soon you, too, will find yourself on familiar terms with the angels, and they'll begin to play in your life the larger role that God intends them to play.
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 144 pages
by Dietrich Von Hildebrand
These pages will give you what you need to make your marriage a source of profound happiness and lasting peace:
- Knowledge: You'll come to understand the nature of marriage and its superiority to "living together" and other temporary unions.
- Love: You'll learn to distinguish love from lust, infatuation, and other common counterfeits; and you'll discover the healing role it can play in the best - and bleakest - of marriages.
- Faith: You'll come to see how the sacramental marriage of Christians is the fulfillment and perfection of marriage, giving husband and wife what every spouse secretly longs for.
Especially today, this beautiful book - which reveals the sublime vocation of Christian marriage - is a must for anyone who is eager to live worthily this great mystery of love.
Marriage will show you:
- The one right motive for marrying - and the many wrong ones (some often accepted by Christians)
- The difference between the meaning of marriage and its purpose (and the dangers of confusing the two)
- The five ways in which married love differs from other loves
- Six counterfeit loves: what sometimes passes for love isn't
- The key role of will in sustaining love
- Your unhappy marriage: it may be a clear "call" from God
- How difficulties and suffering can deepen your marriage - and make you and your spouse better persons
- How marriage reveals God's love and presence
- How Christianity intensifies married love
The meaning of marriage as a sacrament: its promises, its demands, and how it is a source of strength and grace
Paperback, size 6.8" x 4.9", 84 pages
A Handbook for Christians
by Fr William Ullathorne
Find lasting happiness through the two virtues that lead to all others: patience and humility.
Heroism, self-denial, and even martyrdom are worthless without humility and patience. This book shows you how to develop these two key virtues, no matter how difficult your circumstances may be.
You’ll learn why Jesus said that to save your life, you must first lose it, and you’ll come to see how the self-surrender in humility and patience is guaranteed to bring you lasting peace and happiness.
From this simple book you’ll learn many things:
- Ten ways you can start acquiring patience today
- Why God’s patience is the guarantee of your salvation
- Humility: why it’s the foundation of our Christian Faith
- The startling reason why God rejects the proud
- The four ways that patience heals the soul
- Easily hurt or disappointed? Learn the Lord’s antidote!
- How to avoid all spiritual injury – forever!
- Why humility is the very core of holiness
- The battle for your soul: do you know who’s winning?
- God’s own humility: it’s a searing lesson for the proud
- Minor troubles: how to keep them from overwhelming you
- The secret rewards of humility that only the humble know
- Five obstacles to virtue: how to overcome them
- Why troubles may be your most valuable possessions
- How faith depends on the virtue of humility
- Three obstacles to prayer: a simple way to wipe them out
- Six conditions for making your prayer more effective
- Spiritual problems: how to gain strength to overcome them
- And many other truths to make your life happier and holier
Paperback, size 7" x 5", 144 pages
by Mary Reed Newland
First published fifty years ago, How to Raise Good Catholic Children is a rare treat for today's parents: a wise and readable book on child care that derives its wisdom from the Catholic home rather than from psychologists.
Author Mary Reed Newland here draws on her own experiences as the mother of seven to show how the classic Christian principles of sanctity can be translated into terms easily applied to children - even to the very young.
Because it's rooted in experience, not in theory, nothing that Mrs. Newland suggests is impossible or extraordinary. In fact, as you reflect on your experiences with your own children, you'll quickly agree that hers is an excellent commonsense approach to raising good Catholic children.
Let Mrs. Newland show you how to introduce even your littlest ones to God and develop in your growing children virtues such as:
- The habit of regular prayer
- Genuine love of the Rosary
- A sense of the dignity of work
- Devotion to Mary and the saints
- A proper love for the things of this world and for the things of Heaven
- Attentiveness at Mass
- Love for the Eucharist
- An understanding and love of purity
- The ability to make good confessions
- And dozens of other skills, habits, and virtues that every good Catholic child needs.
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 336 pages
The Aquinas Catechism
A Simple Explanation of the Catholic Faith by the Church's Greatest Theologian
by St Thomas Aquinas
The essentials of the Catholic Faith — clearly & beautifully explained by one of the Church’s greatest thinkers!
Although St. Thomas Aquinas was one of the Church’s most intellectually powerful theologians, few know that he also wrote a great deal that’s well within the reach of ordinary believers.
In fact, as you’ll find in The Aquinas Catechism, St. Thomas had a remarkable ability to communicate the Faith — including both its most complex and its simplest elements — in plain language. Here you’ll find his deeply insightful, straightforward, and clear explanations of the Apostles’ Creed, the Commandments, and the Sacraments — as well as of the Our Father and the Hail Mary.
In other words, this book will give you a basic course in the Catholic Faith, taught by the Church’s greatest theologian.
Let him help you:
- Gain a better grasp of Church doctrine
- Pray with greater fervor and understanding
- Receive the Sacraments more worthily
- Learn what God requires of you and why
- Explain Church teachings to non-Catholic friends
- Discover the scriptural sources of our Catholic Faith
- Find remedies for moral weaknesses that still afflict you
- Glimpse the greatness of the Church’s supernatural mission
- And much more!
Above all, let St. Thomas teach you how to explain, defend, and live your Faith . . . with the clear-sighted wisdom of a saint!
Paperback, size 9" x 6", 336 pages
by Fr. Frederick Faber
Sharp penance for remembered sins helps stouthearted Christians seize heaven, but gentler souls like Our Blessed Lady and scores of her saints have trod a different path. Their souls are possessed by gratitude, inspired by the remembrance of past benefits, and filled with wonder at the abundant loving-kindness of God.
As Father Faber shows, gratitude is the fertile soil from which springs an ardent, exuberant love of Christ – a love that can be yours as well. These wise pages reveal the critical role that gratitude plays in your sanctification, and they'll remind you of the many things the Lord has given you for which you should be grateful each moment of every day. Here you'll also learn:
- That thanksgiving is the very essence of Christian worship
- Why gratitude is easiest way to heaven and the surest path to joy
- How gratitude dissolves pride even faster than penance
- How gratitude can make you like the Angels themselves
- That ingratitude is the hidden sin of too many good people (What about you?)
- Why you should even be grateful — yes — for blessings received by your enemies
- How gratitude often wins souls more quickly than preaching
- Why it's scandalous that we neglect gratitude more than prayer
- Why you should even be grateful for your troubles
- That gratitude brings far more blessings than most of us ever suspect
Hear in this small book the voices of so many saints who knew that gratitude is the very key to holiness: St. Alphonsus de Liguori, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, St. Bonaventure, St. Bridget of Sweden, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Francis de Sales, St. Francis Xavier, St. Gertrude, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. Ignatius of Loyola, St. Jane Frances de Chantal, St. Jerome, St. John Chrysostom, St. John of Avila, St. John of God, St. Lawrence Justinian, St. Louis of France, St. Peter Faber, St. Philip Neri, St. Teresa of Avila, St. Thomas Aquinas, and many others
Paperback, size 7" x 5", 128 pages
The Classic Key to Knowing Yourself, Getting Along with Others, and Growing Closer to the Lord
by Art and Laraine Bennett
All of us are born with distinct personality traits. Some of us live for crowds and parties; others seek solitude and time for quiet reflection. Some of us are naturally pushy, while others are content just to get along. We don't pick and choose these traits; they're just part of the way we're made.
For in the womb God doesn't merely mold our body; He also gives us the temperament that, all our days, colors our understanding, guides our choices, and serves as the foundation of our moral and spiritual life.
Ancient philosophers identified four basic temperaments, and over the centuries, countless wise souls have used these four to understand human nature. Now comes The Temperament God Gave You, the first Catholic book on the subject in 70 years. Here veteran Catholic counselor Art Bennett and his wife Laraine provide an accessible synthesis of classical wisdom, modern counseling science, and Catholic spirituality: a rich understanding of the temperaments and what they mean for you and for your family.
Drawing on decades of study, prayer, and practical experience, Art and Laraine show you how to identify your own temperament and use it to become what God is calling you to be: a loving spouse, an effective parent, and a good friend. Best of all, they give you a Catholic understanding of the four temperaments that will bring you closer to God and help you discover the path to holiness that's right for you.
Peace. Happiness. Holiness.
You'll find yourself growing in each of these qualities as you come to understand -- and learn to use as you should -- the temperament God gave you.
Take the temperament test!
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 288 pages
Improve your marriage by understanding your spouse!
by Art and Laraine Bennett
In their bestselling book, The Temperament God Gave You, authors Art and Laraine Bennett re-introduced the age-old concept of the four classic temperaments, and showed how to use them to understand yourself, get along with others, and grow closer to God.
Now they're back with more temperament wisdom, designed specially for couples and guaranteed to improve your marital communication, intimacy, and happiness: The Temperament God Gave Your Spouse.
In no other kind of human relationship is knowledge of the temperaments - the fundamental personality traits, hard-wired into us at birth, that affect the way we respond to the world around us - so critical, and so fruitful, as in a Christian marriage. For it's only through mutual understanding of our own patterns of reaction, and those of our spouse, that we can motivate, nurture, respect, and above all, love each other with the selfless patience to which Christ calls us in the sacrament.
In a fun-to-read style that incorporates practical psychology, real-life anecdotes, and decades of clinical experience, the Bennetts will show you:
- The four kinds of spouses — which kind did you marry?
- How temperament affects the way you and your spouse work, pray, argue, socialize, and show affection.
- Tips for developing the communication skills that your temperament needs most, and for nurturing them in your spouse.
- All the possible temperament combinations in marriage, and how to handle the unique challenges that yours creates.
- Proven ways to figure out what really makes your spouse tick!
So often we wish we could make our spouses different (because they're not just like us); yet the Bennetts show that true marital contentment lies not in changing the way God made our loved ones, but in appreciating it — and helping them to perfect it. Read The Temperament God Gave Your Spouse and discover a new world of understanding and respect for the person you married.
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 209 pages
by Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet
Even three hundred years ago, believers found it difficult to sustain for forty days the proper Lenten spirit. That's why even then, countless Christians turned to the writings of Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet (1627-1704), whose great piety and simple eloquence won him renown as one of the greatest preachers of his time.
There is no better time to begin—or to renew—the habit of meditation than during the penitential season of Lent.
If you want to combine the spiritual benefits of a holy Lent with the supernatural harvest that regular mental prayer brings, then you stand to profit from Bossuet’s Meditations for Lent.
These brief but powerful meditations have been collected from the voluminous writings of the great 17th Century Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet, a close follower of St. Vincent de Paul and considered to be among the greatest homilists in Catholic history.
In these pages, Bishop Bossuet will bring you on a stunning inner pilgrimage to encounter Our Lord’s divine charity for souls, as He freely gives His life for you on the Cross. “The whole of Christian life consists in making this journey well,” says the author. “Why do I hesitate to leave?”
Read Meditations for Lent and avoid arriving at Easter Mass distracted and exhausted, having neglected your sacrifices and even ordinary prayers.
Instead, find yourself coming joyfully unto the altar of God, ready and eager to adore the Risen King, with your soul prepared as a worthy dwelling place for the Redeemer.
Paperback, size 7" x 5", 225 pages
by Caryll Houselander
Charming Catholic tales
Here are stories of princes and gypsies, bishops and bears - tales of Catholic boys and girls that remind us that especially in young souls the Faith is quite strong, and evil is never a match for goodness.
Among others, you'll meet:
- Bernard, the boy who walks three miles to Mass and meets Christ on his way;
- Nickie, the young prince who learns from a dancing bear a strong lesson in love;
- Tommy, who uses kindness and two minnows to heal a bishop and save a school;
- Osbert and Rupert, gypsy twins who make a donkey of themselves to bring peace to the world;
- Joey, the stable boy whose coat is transformed when his donkey bears Jesus to Jerusalem; and
- Kathleen, who goes without candy and brings a shopkeeper back to the Faith.
- Soviet cows, Marian icons, pet mice, Easter roosters, Noah and the ark, fish, donkeys, and even a dinosaur: they're all here in a dozen charming tales of children living their Faith while having great Catholic fun.
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 160 pages
by Caryll Houselander
Tales about Catholic children to form your own little ones in holy wisdom and piety.
Caryll Houselander is best known for the intensity of her vision of the suffering Christ and His immeasurable love for us, a theme that she frequently spoke of with breathtaking luminosity in her many books about Him.
Few know, however, of the many remarkable stories she wrote for Catholic children — delightful tales that are simple but not shallow. Indeed, like her books for adults, they manifest a tender love of Christ and His little ones not commonly found among us these days.
Here are twelve of Houselander's best tales, charmingly illustrated with Renée George's lively drawings of pirates and princesses, castles and kings.
Through the tale of Jack and Jim, even young children will grasp the meaning of Christ's suffering; in Racla the Gypsy, they'll discover the charity which is at the heart of the Eucharist; in the The Curé's Guest, they'll see how Christ makes up for the sins of others.
All the stories touch on Catholic themes, but these tales are not really catechetical. Yes, they do take for granted that Catholicism — especially prayer and the Mass — plays a large role in the lives of these children, but they do something more . . . and more important.
Tale after tale introduces children to the tender love that Jesus has for each of them, and to the fire of love for Him that can burn in the hearts of Catholics — even in the hearts of little ones like themselves.
There is no better gift you can give to a young child.
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 160 pages
by Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet
Keep Christ in Christmas this year by turning to this slim volume of daily Advent meditations by Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet, one of the greatest homilists in the history of the Church.
Carefully selected to lift your soul to God in those hectic days that stretch from Thanksgiving to Christmas, these forty daily meditations will keep you mindful of the real meaning of Christmas while affording you an admirable distillation of the doctrines and piety of our Holy Catholic Church.
With the help of Bishop Bossuet and the sense of God's grandeur and love that permeates his every word all through the rush toward Christmas you'll stay mindful of the holy words of Isaiah foretelling the birth of our savior; you'll find yourself marveling at the Annunciation and the Visitation; you'll rejoice in anticipation of the coming birth of Jesus; and, finally, you ll look forward to kneeling with St. Joseph and the Blessed Virgin in silent adoration of the incarnate Son of God. This year, you won't (as so often happens) arrive at Midnight Mass distracted, exhausted, and frazzled, having neglected your Advent devotions and your ordinary prayers, too. Instead, you'll find yourself stepping lightly into church, ready and eager to adore the newborn King, your soul what it should be: a fit dwelling place for the Redeemer.
Don't waste another Advent! Let Meditations for Advent keep you prayerful amidst the worst distractions of the holiday season. Let it draw you daily closer to Jesus, whose birth the season celebrates, and whose birth your soul yearns to celebrate, too.
Paperback, size 7" x 5", 173 pages
by Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet
Spiritual meditation is the surest way to grow in holiness, and Our Lady is truly an example of perfection. This combination makes Meditations on Mary a spiritual powerhouse that will lift your soul to God and help you along the path to heaven.
Meditations on Mary features twenty-four of the most powerful and moving meditations written by 17th Century Bishop Jacques-Benigne Bossuet —considered to be one of the best homilists in the history of the Church. Author of Meditations for Lent and Meditations for Advent, Bishop Bossuet has been admired for his piety and eloquence for over three hundred years. Now his meditations on Our Lady are available to you in English — for the very first time!
Although we know Our Lady serves as a perfect example of how a Christian should live and bear witness to Our Lord, Scripture contains only a few glimpses of her life, leaving our knowledge limited and our imagination wanting.
In these pages, Bishop Bossuet takes you on a stunning pilgrimage through the principal mysteries of Our Lady's life. He masterfully blends what he's learned from Sacred Scripture with the spiritual traditions rooted in the heart of the Church, and illuminates it with his own theological reflections.
He'll bring you to a deeper understanding of Our Lady's compassion, her suffering during Christ's Passion, and the loneliness she felt after his Ascension to heaven. Bishop Bossuet will show you how Jesus brings honor to himself by honoring his mother, and how Our Lady is extraordinary solely because of her alliance with Jesus.
Mary teaches us how to let God direct our steps, how to remain humble in commanding and obeying, and how to seek holiness through our daily work. She shows us how to pray with humility and perseverance, to advance in perfection, and, by doing all these things, to conform ourselves to the holy will of God. Each short meditation is worthy of your contemplation, because each contains a lesson directly from the Blessed Mother to sinners like you and me.
Paperback, size 7" x 5", 145 pages
And Other Working Women
by Hubert Van Zeller
This unique spiritual guide will help you grow holier and more prayerful as you perform the most menial household chores -- not in spite of those chores, but in the midst of them.
Written especially for women in charge of households, Holiness for Housewives will help you better understand and respect your vocation as a housewife -- and discover in it your own God-given path to sanctity.
This handy guide will show you how to:
- Find meaning in even the most boring work
- Pray in the midst of a bustling household
- Bear the stress of those long days in which the work never seems to end
- Develop a greater awareness of God's presence -- even amid the diapers and the dirty dishes
- Learn to rely more on your will and less on emotions, when life seems to be an endless round of drudgery
- Handle your burdens and sorrows with prayers that are especially fashioned for housewives
Let Holiness for Housewives show you how to find and savor the lasting pleasures that await you in your noble, God-given vocation as a housewife!
Paperback, size 8.5" x 5.5", 104 pages
A Father Gabriel Mystery #5
by Fiorella de Maria
Father Gabriel has finally returned to St Mary's Abbey, but all is not well in the sleepy Wiltshire village of Sutton Westford. Joseph Beaumont, a former village boy turned London property developer, has returned to build a row of houses on the grounds of a disused mine. A local opposition group – led by Joseph's boyhood nemesis – campaigns to stop the development, and Joseph finds himself the target of increasingly menacing threats. Then, workmen make a gruesome discovery on the building site: the skeleton of a child who went missing thirty years before, while the Great War was raging. Fr Gabriel is called in to investigate, but the task seems impossible. How can he uncover a secret that has been carefully hidden for three decades? Is the killer even still alive? Worse, as the tragic details emerge of a lost little girl's final moments, Gabriel is tormented by the memory of his own daughter and the life that was stolen from her many years before.
Missing Presumed Lost explores the themes of childhood innocence, guilt, and the responsibilities faced by society to protect the young. The book also delves deeper into Gabriel's own troubled past and the need to lay it to rest.
Paperback, size 8" x5.25", 270 pages
Saint Pius V
The legendary Pope Who Excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I, Standardized the Mass, and Defeated the Ottoman Empire
by Prof Roberto de Mattei
Few Catholic writers have been as prolific as University of Rome Professor Roberto de Mattei. Over decades he has produced a wealth of incisive analyses about the Catholic world’s collapse and charted an authoritative path back to health and sanity.
He has now written an exceedingly compelling and powerful biography of Pope Pius V, widely recognized as one of the boldest and most courageous popes of the past millennium, who decisively defeated the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Lepanto and fought head-on the Protestant Reformation, which had assailed the Church.
The life of every Christian is a battle, and St. Pius V offers us a luminous example of leadership in a time of trial. In these pages, you’ll learn:
- How the “Revolution of Luther” was met with a papal shrug — that is, until Pius V became pope
- The inside story of how Pope Pius V led the Counter-Reformation on multiple fronts
- How the devastating Sack of Rome in 1527 forever changed the Holy See and had deadly consequences for clergy and religious alike
- Why St. Pius V’s no-compromise approach toward both the Renaissance and Humanist corruption preserved the Church to this day
- The behind-the-scenes story of the Council of Trent — the most dramatic conclave in the history of the Church
- The role inquisitions played in the time of Pope Pius V and what they enabled him to accomplish
- How St. Pius V dealt with stray bishops and how his rebukes and mandates led to meaningful reform of both their lives and the Church
- How St. Pius V dealt with rebellious Catholics in France and England and what led to the excommunication of Queen Elizabeth
You’ll also learn of Pope Pius V’s remarkable spiritual life and regimen, his foresight and prudence in dealing with the iconoclastic fury of the Huguenots in France, and the way he handled the trials of excommunicated heretics and reformed the rotting religious orders of his
day.
Professor de Mattei makes clear that Pope Pius V was so effective and so holy that no pontificate can be judged accurately without measuring it against his. In page after fascinating page, he shows contemporary Catholics what it means to be “a great pope” or “a saintly bishop.” Here, at last, is the complete life and times of one of the Church’s greatest prelates by one of her finest historians.
Paperback, size 9" x 6", 464 pages
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