You know what I love about our Catholic faith? There’s always next year. Or next week. Or, hey, the next hour! Here it is, Good Friday. Have I prayed the Stations? No, I have not, and don’t even ASK if I’ve prayed them with my children. My litany of excuses is long and impressive, but it’s still just a list of excuses. I love the idea of the Stations, but I’m not very comfortable with them. Blame my convert status, though I... Read more
Code Zero by Jonathan Maberry My rating: 5 of 5 stars SHORT VERSION: WOAH. This is the worthy sequel to Patient Zero. At one point, Rudy Sanchez says that “this has done something fundamental to the American people.” I’ll tell you this. It did something fundamental to me. It was exciting, suspenseful, terrifying, and haunted me in my dreams and at random moments in my day. And it was satisfying. Very satisfying. I’m not sure Maberry can top this. Though... Read more
Now that my oldest, who’s nine and in the third grade, is an avid reader, I’m always on the lookout for ways to introduce her to Bible stories, again and again. So when the Adventure Bible Handbook, by Robin Schmitt & David Frees (Zondervan, 2013) came my way, I was thrilled. I was even more thrilled by the way my nine-year-old took off with it and carried it around with her. Dare I hope that this might rate up there with... Read more
This partial review is part of a blog tour for the recently released paperback edition of Fr. Barron’s Catholicism: A Journey to the Heart of the Faith. This blog tour is focused on reviewing one chapter from this book. So I will be looking at Chapter 10 – World Without End: The Last Things which is quite appropriate for Lent. This book grew out of Fr. Robert Barron’s major project to produce a media series that explained the faith using... Read more
Catholic by Choice: Why I Embraced the Faith, Joined the Church, and Embarked on the Adventure of a Lifetime by Richard Cole My rating: 4 of 5 stars I read this for the Patheos book club after they approached me because they needed more bloggers to participate. Originally I thought, “another conversion story … I’ve read so many, do I need to read another?” I forgot, of course, that every conversion story is the same, a love story. And every... Read more
C. S. Lewis Bible: New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) by C.S. Lewis My rating: 4 of 5 stars I’ve never understood the enthusiasm for study Bibles on a single theme or with a single person’s commentary. Obviously, they are popular because you can see them everywhere. When this Bible came to my attention, I blanched. However, it seems as if 2014 is fast becoming my “year of C.S. Lewis” as I work my way through his books in audio format.... Read more
From the back cover of Pope Francis: Why He Leads the Way He Leads: Pope Francis has captured the world’s attention with his seemingly counterintuitive approach to leadership. In Pope Francis: Why He Leads the Way He Leads, best-selling author and former Jesuit seminarian Chris Lowney offers an in-depth look at how Pope Francis’s Jesuit training has directly impacted his various leadership roles and what it suggests about how he might lead in the future. Readers will gain essential lessons to help... Read more
Jesus: A Pilgrimage by James J. Martin My rating: 5 of 5 stars I am a fan of Father James Martin’s books, especially A Jesuit Off-Broadway. When Scott chose this book for our next religious book discussion at A Good Story is Hard to Find podcast, I was excited, having been interested since I first saw it mentioned at Amazon. This is a much thicker and more substantive book than I expected. The bibliography alone makes one step back and... Read more
I know, I know, this is a book blog. But sometimes you’ve got to go beyond books because something else shows things to you better. That’s why I thought you’d like to know about The Faithful Traveler in the Holy Land. This review is by Scott Danielson. I haven’t made a trip to The Holy Land, but would like to go. There’s got to be something special about walking where Jesus and his contemporaries walked. The escape from day-to-day life... Read more
Good Pope, Bad Pope: Their Lives, Our Lessons by Mike Aquilina My rating: 5 of 5 stars Of course, we all know about Pope Francis. Even when he became a bishop and then a cardinal, he was in the habit of walking rather than riding, fasting, staying up all night to pray, and in general acting more like a humble servant than like a prince. But now that he was a pope, he was surrounded by imperial pomp. Would it... Read more
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