George Herbert (1593-1633) is one of English spirituality's most treasured voices and, with his contemporaries Lancelot Andrewes Izaak Walton and Nicholas Ferrar, he epitomises the best of the 17th century Anglican tradition - learned, holy and self-effacing. Before settling down as a country parish priest - a calling that was cut short by his early death aged 39 - he was a complex character who led a varied life in politics and academia. His inner tensions resulted in memorable writing and a rich spirituality. Here, Philip Sheldrake explores themes in Herbert's work that stand out as most important: his deep biblical and liturgical roots, his Christ-centred spirituality, his emphasis on the importance of the everyday, his strong sense of place, his understanding of discipleship, his approach to prayer, and, his spirituality of service. Richly illustrated with excerpts from his poetry, prose and letters, this volume offers a comprehensive study guide to one of the most loved poetic voices.

Poet's Corner is Malcolm Guite's delectable column that appears on the back page of the Church Times each week. This second collection brings together more than seventy columns created from little glimpses and reflections from all corners of the country, the musings of a poet's mind, and the corners and alleyways of our literary heritage. Malcolm's lucid, perceptive and imaginative columns follow a similar pattern to the sonnets for which he is so renowned, with a sense of development, of a turn or volta part way through, and a sense that the end revisits and re-reads the opening. They draw together everyday events and encounters, landscape, journeys, poetry, stories, memory and a sense of the sacred, fusing them to create richly satisfying portraits of the familiar that at the same time open a doorway into a new and enchanted world.

Heaven in Ordinary is like a love affair with poetry that engages with religious questions, for good or ill, concerned with five poets who are haunted by God. Poets, in times of great faith and times of doubt, have expressed for us their sense of both the presence and the absence of God in language that is sometimes almost sacramental in its weight of beauty, love, fear, anger or despair. The poets considered here all relate, in some way, to the traditions of Anglicanism through the centuries, reflecting both a common humanity and a wide breadth of human experience as it struggles with God. Heaven in Ordinary is deliberately autobiographical in approach, as it is grounded in David Jasper's own lifetime experience of reading poetry since his school years, and over four decades as a priest. The poets he so beautifully discusses have related both positively and negatively to the Christian faith and the Anglican tradition. Some are deeply religious, others are haunted by God and the divine mystery.

A collection of short fiction by an O. Henry Award-winning author explores the transcendent and magical qualities that transform even the most mundane life in Midwestern Kansas, capturing the unique and extraordinary world of a young boy hunting for a runaway hourse, a couple ostracized in their small town, a grieving high school basketball star, and other colorful characters.

Explores the rich history of angels in America from Spanish colonialism and Puritan culture to modern incarnations found on TV, in movies, in comic books, and on bumper stickers. Finds that Americans have constructed the "useful angel" as a servant of man rather than an agent of God.