Includes an introduction for each writing, suggested grade levels, related themes, review questions and answers, suggested activities, and discussion ideas.

Includes an introduction for each writing, suggested grade levels, related themes, review questions and answers, suggested activities, and discussion ideas.

Best Catholic Spirituality Writing 2013 is a compilation of 25 essays published in the National Catholic Reporter. Since its founding in 1964, NCR has published many well-known authors of Catholic spiritual writing. This collection features works from Michael Leach, Melissa Nussbaum, Brian Cahill, Alex Mikulich, Angelo Stagnaro, Joseph Veneroso, Ed Hays, Donna Schaper, Ginny Kubitz-Moyer, Eloisa Perez-Lozano, Michael Sean Winters, Diane Pendola, Loretta E. Johnson, Jeannine Gramick, Patty McCarty, John McCarthy, Peg Ekerdt, Joshua J. McElwee, Brian Harper and Eileen Reutzel Colianni.

Best Catholic Spirituality Writing 2012 is a compilation of 30 essays published in the National Catholic Reporter. Since its founding in 1964, NCR has published many well-known authors of Catholic spiritual writing. This collection features works from Michael Leach, John Dear, Kathy Coffey, Michael Sean Winters, Joe McHugh, Melissa Nussbaum, Michael Morwood, Robert McAllister, James Behrens, Miriam Therese Winter, Heidi Schlumpf, Sidney Callahan, Joyce Rupp, Claire Bangasser, Sharon Abercrombie, Fran Rossi Szpylczyn, Nicole Sotelo, Tina Beattie, Jay Cormier, James Martin and Marty Haugen. From prayer to creation spirituality; the legacy of the Second Vatican Council to Facebook, NCR’s Best Catholic Spirituality Writing 2012 takes you through the Catholic liturgical year with reflections from 21 authors.

With about one billion members, the Catholic Church is one of the world's largest religious bodies, and its history is crucially linked to global events. In the Historical Dictionary of Catholicism, author William J. Collinge provides the reader with a comprehensive introduction to the theology, doctrines, and worship of the religion. He covers the entire Catholic tradition from the time of Jesus to the present, including the periods before the present division of Christianity into Roman Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, and Protestant. Collinge has also included entries on heretical, schismatic, and dissident movements within Catholicism, and he covers the relation of Catholicism to other Christian traditions, to the major non-Christian religions, and to Western cultural and philosophical traditions. The second edition of the Historical Dictionary of Catholicism has been updated to reflect recent developments in the Catholic Church, most notably the death of Pope John Paul II and his succession by Pope Benedict XVI. An updated introduction precedes the main body of the dictionary, which contains more than 500 alphabetical, cross-referenced entries covering persons, organizations, places, events, titles, and concepts. The entries are followed by several appendixes on popes, ecumenical councils, the documents of Vatican Council II, major papal encyclicals, and Catholic prayers, and a comprehensive bibliography provides the researcher with further readings. The second edition of the Historical Dictionary of Catholicism is an ideal access point for students, researchers, or anyone interested in the history of the Catholic Church.

For nearly twenty centuries, the Roman Catholic Church withstood all the currents of change and history and maintained a closely guarded orthodoxy which has always served as the basis and center of all Christianity. Yet, it is as if all of that has been just arbitrarily swept away in the few years since Vatican II. Given what the Church has always taught about itself being indefectible, how could this have happened? Did that Council have something to do with that terrible loss of faith? Can the real Catholicism be found today, and if so, where? The shocking answer to this, once seen and truly understood, is as every bit as glorious as the original resurrection of Christ Himself, a tremendous source of faith and inspiration. It is a broad-based, longstanding miracle passing right before our eyes, have we but the Grace to see it for what it is.

Tapping into the writings of such famous Catholic authors, saints, and doctors of the Church as Augustine, Chesterton, Aquinas, Francis de Sales, Newman, and Teresa of Avila, Father Myers has gathered together in this special volume a reading for each day of the year.

Women have been writing in the Catholic tradition since early medieval times, yet no single volume has brought together critical evaluations of their works until now. The first reference of its kind, Catholic Women Writers provides entries on 64 Catholic women writers from around the world and across the centuries. Each of the entries is written by an expert contributor and includes a biography of the author; a critical discussion of her works, especially her Catholic and women's themes; an overview of her critical reception; and a bibliography of primary and secondary sources. Authors writing in all genres, including fiction, autobiography, poetry, children's literature, and essays, are represented. The entries give special attention to the authors' use of Catholic themes, structures, traditions, culture, and spirituality. The writers surveyed range from Doctors of the Church to mystics and visionaries, to those who employ Catholic themes primarily in historical and cultural contexts, to those who critique the tradition. An introductory essay places the writers within the historical and literary contexts of women's writing in the Catholic tradition, and the volume closes with a selected, general bibliography.

Essays by scholars, journalists, lawyers, business and labor leaders, church administrators and lobbyists, novelists, activists, policymakers and politicians address the most critical issues facing the Catholic Church in the United States.