Witnesses to Mystery: Investigations Into Christ's Relics

In this lavishly illustrated large coffee-table volume, writer Gorny and photographer Rosikon embarked on a two year investigative journey to seek the truth behind all the relics associated with the passion of Christ. The authors investigated a rich body of documentary evidence found in various museums, archives and churches surrounding sacred objects believed to have been preserved since Jesus' lifetime, exploring and collaborating with historians and scientists in their attempt to verify the relics' authenticity. They reach their conclusions not so much on the basis of faith as on the evidence supplied by historical sources and expert scientific opinion.

The relics associated with the Passion - the suffering, death and burial of Christ - have long proved something of an enigma for the scientific community. Relics investigated, and photographed, for this glorious volume include: the Cross, nails, crown of thorns, pillar of scourging, Christ's tunic, the Veil of Manoppello, the Sudarium of Oviedo, the famous Shroud of Turin burial cloth and more.

$34.95

Startled by God: Wisdom from Unexpected Places

Startled by God: Wisdom from Unexpected Places offers a different way of seeing God in all things. Reminiscent of the spirituality fostered by Richard Rohr and other contemporary mystics, Joe McHugh writes out a tradition infused with the basics of Jesuit and Trappist theology, yet fully planted in the day-to-day workings of the contemporary world. He does not shy away from the secular culture in seeking God, but incorporates each element of daily life into a contemplative practice.

McHugh makes ample use of stories to show, rather than tell, about our search for the living God. These stories enable us to see and feel, not just understand, allowing us to step into them with our imagination and discover ourselves lurking in the twists and turns of their plots. Building on his work as a consultant and spiritual director, McHugh guides readers on a spiritual journey where they encounter God in the hidden and mundane workings of their lives. He pushes us to go deeper and writes with an edge that keeps us engaged and hungering for more.

This book will challenge readers to look beyond the ordinary earmarks of spirituality and venture into new ways of seeing, new ways of encountering God and others with the eyes of faith. It’s for the seeker in all of us, encouraging a way of life rooted in the divine while being fully immersed in the real world.

$14.99

Faith of the Fatherless: The Psychology of Atheism

In this updated, expanded edition, starting with Freud's "projection theory" of religion - that belief in God is merely a product of man's desire for security - Professor Vitz argues that psychoanalysis actually provides a more satisfying explanation for atheism. Disappointment in one's earthly father, whether through death, absence, or mistreatment, frequently leads to a rejection of God.

A biographical survey of influential atheists of the past four centuries shows that this "defective father hypothesis" provides a consistent explanation of the "intense atheism" of these thinkers. A survey of the leading defenders of Christianity over the same period confirms the hypothesis, finding few defective fathers. Vitz concludes with an intriguing comparison of male and female atheists and a consideration of other psychological factors that can contribute to atheism.

Professor Vitz does not argue that atheism is psychologically determined. Each man, whatever his experiences, ultimately chooses to accept God or reject him. Yet the cavalier attribution of religious faith to irrational, psychological needs is so prevalent that an exposition of the psychological factors predisposing one to atheism is necessary.

“Vitz offers a radical new thesis about the psychological origins of atheism. By studying the lives of numerous famous atheists, from the old atheists Nietzsche, Sartre, and Freud to the new atheists Hitchens, Dawkins, and Dennet, Vitz discovers a startling common pattern: atheism arises in people with dead, absent, or abusive fathers. By contrast, prominent defenders of religious belief-including Blaise Pascal, John Henry Newman, and G.K. Chesterton-were blessed with attentive, loving and caring fathers. Vitz's provocative book raises important questions about psychology, religious belief, and the importance of fathers. ”
- Christopher Kaczor, Author, The Seven Big Myths about the Catholic Church

“Quite simply, Paul Vitz's Faith of the Fatherless is a minor classic, a book that should be on the short list of all those who want to understand, in the deepest terms, the ill effects caused by the failures of fatherhood. Faith of the Fatherless should function as a gateway book to research in all fields examining our current, highly-secularized culture, a culture marked deeply by both unbelief and hostility toward the family and especially fatherhood. ”
- Benjamin Wiker, Author, Architects of the Culture of Death

“In deploying Freudian theory against atheism itself, Paul Vitz has proven beyond a doubt what's missing from secular accounts of secularization: namely, actual human beings. His thesis is intellectual jujutsu of the first order, as anyone reading this timely revisiting will appreciate in full. ”
- Mary Eberstadt, Author, The Loser Letters and Adam and Eve after the Pill

$17.95

The Thorny Grace of It: And Other Essays for Imperfect Catholics

Best-selling and award-winning essayist Brian Doyle knows that the heartbeat of Catholicism is found not in papal decrees and pageantry, but in the parish halls, potluck dinners, and the believing community. In this spirited collection of more than 40 essays, Doyle employs his trademark wit, candor, and gusto for life and faith to reignite readers’ excitement for Catholicism as he plumbs some of the stickier and trickier elements of the Catholic character.

From preparing for his first confession with a fake laundry list of sins to his young observations of President Kennedy’s assassination, Doyle’s passionate writing makes for a heartfelt, genuine, and often laugh-out-loud read. The Thorny Grace of It reaffirms that the Catholic faith—imperfect as it is—is wildly aflame in hearts and lives everywhere.

“It is a boon, a blessing, to have Brian Doyle’s vagabond essays now rubbing elbows in a single, handy, and altogether delightful volume."
- Kenneth L. Woodward, author of The Book of Miracles

$14.95

Living By Faith, Dwelling in Doubt: A Story of Belief, Uncertainty, and Boundless Love

It may seem as if the concept of faith has become a line in the sand: you either have it or you don’t; that you are either certain or you are lost. But as author Kyle Cupp has learned, we can have an uncertain faith while still being confident in and committed to our belief in God. He shares the pressing questions and winding path to understanding in Living by Faith, Dwelling in Doubt.

Pushed off a spiritual precipice after the death of his daughter only a few shorts hours after her birth, Cupp shares his ongoing spiritual journey—from the certainty of truth during his college years, through the shaken faith that can come with lived experience, to the burgeoning confidence that it takes to live somewhere in between.

Cupp reconciles his doubts about faith and religion and reaches a place where he is confident that faith and uncertainty can exist side by side. It is the belief in the mystery that is faith and the awesome power of boundless love that makes the winding path of faith passable.

$13.95

Discovering Your Dream: How Ignatian Spirituality Can Guide Your Life

Decisions, decisions, decisions! The world, our lives—every day is full of them. Big or little, major or minor, we are constantly choosing between paths. But have you ever thought about how that happens? More importantly, have you ever impulsively made a decision that turned out not to be in your best moral or spiritual interests? Overall, are you sure that the decisions you’re making are helping you get closer to God’s desire for your life?

In Discovering Your Dream, Gerald Fagin, SJ, uses St. Ignatius’s principles of the Spiritual Exercises, coupled with an Ignatian approach to decision making, to guide us through a discernment process that truly satisfies our deepest desires and brings us closer to God. He shows readers how St. Ignatius’s own decision-making process can be molded to meet the needs of our faith and lead us to our truest selves that God desires for all of us.

When faced with difficult or crippling decisions, it helps to seek wisdom in others. Discovering Your Dream shows us that the path to our truest desires is attainable in our own lives when we are guided by the groundwork laid by St. Ignatius.

$9.95

Patron Saints: A Feast of Holy Cards and Holy Cards

In the tradition of Abrams' successful "Holy Cards and Saints: A Year in Faith and Art", comes "Patron Saints: A Feast of Holy Cards". From the thousands of Catholic Saints, authors Calamari and Di Pasqua have chosen more than 120 who are beautifully portrayed in rare antique holy cards, and whose particular role as patrons is explained by reference to their inspiring lives. The book is divided into five sections: there are patrons of occupations, of nations, of health, of states of life and of nature, animals or natural disasters. Each section includes a list of significant Saints, along with illustrated biographies of the ones selected for the book. Most readers will find here Saints whose patronage is relevant to their own lives.For hundreds of years, holy cards have offered comfort, consolation and encouragement to Catholics, who often carry these portable images of their favourite saints with them and use them in daily religious ritual. Given as remembrances at wakes and funerals, communions and confirmations, holy cards are also a widely popular - and highly collectible - form of folk art.
$27.50

Holy cards offer comfort, consolation, and encour­agement to Catholics, who often carry these portable images with them and use them in daily religious rituals. Given as remembrances at wakes and funerals, Communions, and confirmations, holy cards are also a widely popular—and highly collectible—form of folk art. This handsome volume is both a richly illustrated survey of this devotional art and a gallery of saints organized thematically along with brief biographies, attributes, and powers. Prophets and angels, disciples and evangelists, martyrs and hermits, visionaries and mystics are among the religious figures in Catholicism represented here—in exquisite depictions that are at times dramatic and disturbing, at times moving and comforting. This book explains the often enigmatic symbolism in these cards in a beautiful package that makes an ideal gift for first Communion, confirmation, or graduation.
$19.95

My Best Teachers Were Saints: What Every Educator Can Learn from the Heroes of the Churc

Discipline problems, self-doubt, tense meetings, classroom stress . . . Couldn’t every teacher use some saintly help?

Every teacher can think of at least one mentor who has served as an inspiration over the years. However, many teachers—even those with a Catholic faith—might not have considered that saints can serve as mentors. Author and teacher Susan H. Swetnam believes that saints aren’t only good teachers—they’re the best teachers.

In My Best Teachers Were Saints, Swetnam focuses on fifty-two saints—many of them teachers—who faced challenges similar to those that nearly all educators face today, from indifferent students and recalcitrant colleagues to their own limitations and feelings of isolation. With the examples of saints such as Augustine, Ignatius of Loyola, and Scholastica, Swetnam eagerly shares how their words and deeds helped immensely in her own career as a teacher and how they can aid and inspire other educators as well.
Anyone involved in education—whether teaching religion or mathematics, kindergartners or graduate students—will discover within these pages a treasure trove of saintly help that is sure to prove that the best teachers are in fact saints!

$15.95

Saint Catherine Laboure of the Miraculous Medal

This is the story of the saint through whom we received the Miraculous Medal. No sacramental since the Rosary has had such an impact on the Church, and none has ever been diffused in such incredible numbers, with many millions of people all over the world wearing the Medal within a few years. Since 1933, when it was exhumed and found miraculously preserved, the body of St. Catherine Labouré (1806-1876) has lain incorrupt at 140, rue du Bac, Paris, in the Motherhouse of the Sisters of Charity of St. Vincent de Paul, venerated by thousands of pilgrims each year.

Who was this St. Catherine Labouré who during her lifetime chose to remain entirely unknown, except to her confessor, as the visionary of the Miraculous Medal? To answer this question, the author spend ten years in research, studying many documents never before available to her biographers and carrying out his investigation in Paris, Rome and Catherine's own village. What he has produced here is a definitive life of the Saint which is at once highly readable and inspiring.

Emerging from his work is the fact that Catherine Labouré was no accidental saint -- that, to launch the Miraculous Medal devotion, Heave chose its seer well. The reader will come to love St. Catherine Labouré  will see in her a woman of incredible strength and character, of unbelievable constancy, of kindness, humility, obedience and self-effacement.

$16.95

Hildegard of Bingen, Doctor of the Church

“Humanity, take a good look at yourself. Inside, you’ve got heaven and earth, and all of creation. You’re a world—everything is hidden in you.” —St. Hildegard of Bingen

She was a Benedictine abbess, artist, composer, dietician, naturalist, poet, traveling preacher, mystic, and political consultant. Meet the incomparable St. Hildegard of Bingen, recently proclaimed a “Doctor of the Church.” Nourishing, challenging, and idea-bursting, her writings will stir and awaken your soul.

This essential reader captures the vibrant spirit and intelligence of Hildegard with selections from her songs, theological texts, liturgical music, and letters. Combined with an introduction to St. Hildegard’s life and era, a map of her Germany, a chronology of her life, and a thorough bibliography/discography, St. Hildegard of Bingen is the ideal doorway into this fascinating medieval mystic.

$16.99

Saint Gianna Molla: Wife, Mother, Doctor

This is the inspiring story of a newly canonized contemporary woman. Gianna Molla (1923-1962) risked her life in order to save her unborn child. Diagnosed with uterine tumors during her fourth pregnancy, she refused a hysterectomy that would have aborted the child, and opted for a riskier surgery in an attempt to save the baby. Herself a medical doctor, Molla did give birth to the child, but succumbed to an infection.

An Italian woman who loved skiing, playing piano, attending concerts at the Milan Conservatory, Molla was a dedicated physician and devoted wife and mother who lived life to the fullest, yet generously risked death by cancer for the sake of her child.

A unique story, co-authored by her own husband, with his deeply moving personal insights of the heroic witness, love, sacrifice and joy of his saintly wife. A woman for all times and walks of life, this moving account of the multi-faceted, selfless St. Gianna Molla, who made the ultimate sacrifice to save her unborn child, will be an inspiration to all readers.

$11.95

Lily of the Mohawks: The Story of St. Kateri

Even before Kateri Tekakwitha’s canonization on October 21, 2012, many had been inspired by the story of the young Native American mystic who lived in the Mohawk Valley during the seventeenth century. With Emily Cavins's skill for weaving together historical facts and a compelling story, readers will discover Kateri’s path to sainthood against the backdrop of her life as a Native American in New York. These pages will reveal:

• What led to Kateri’s desire to become a Christian
• Her piety and self-denial in the face of persecution and illness
• Her impact on the Catholic Mohawk community
• The long road to sainthood, including two miracles attributed to Kateri

More than just a compelling story of Kateri’s short life, readers will also learn how to avail themselves of Kateri’s intercession, why Kateri has become known as the patron saint of the environment, and of her connection to St. Francis of Assisi.

$14.99

St. Rose of Lima : Patroness of the Americas

St. Rose of Lima (1586-1617), Patroness of the Americas, is the first canonized saint of the New World. She was the tenth of thirteen children, and her mother experienced no pain at her birth. Though exquisitely beautiful (hence her nickname, Rose), she refused to marry, and while helping support her family by needlework and growing flowers, she practiced heroic charity and lived as a Dominican Tertiary in her parents home. Rose tenderly cared for the sick, even those with repulsive wounds, and she often obtained miraculous cures for people from the Child Jesus. On other occasions, she worked miracles in order to feed the members of her family, and became known as Mother of the Poor. Rose continually prayed and offered her sufferings for the conversion of the idolatrous Incas. In the year 1615, through her prayers, the Blessed Sacrament and the people of Lima were spared attack by savage pirates. St. Rose was a friend and confidant of St. Martin de Porres, who lived in the same city. Her mystical experiences caused an ecclesiastical inquiry. Though dead at only 31, St. Roses love of God was so intense that she was recognized as a saint in her own time and was canonized by the Church just 54 years later, in 1671. St. Rose of Lima has captured the imagination of the world and stands as one of the most popular saints in the history of the Church.

$19.95

Bakhita: From Slave to Saint

When she was about nine years old, Josephine Bakhita was kidnapped near Darfur, Sudan, by Arab slave traders. For several years she was subjected to brutal and humiliating treatment until she was ransomed and taken to Venice, Italy, where she became a Catholic and a nun.

Joyfully and serenely Bakhita served in a convent, school and infirmary run by Canossian sisters in a small, obscure town in northern Italy until her death in 1947. Then something even more remarkable than her redemption happened.

Hundreds of ordinary people came to see Bakhita lying in state, and along with these visits came stories about how the simple nun had given comfort, advice and encouragement as she went about her tasks as cook, doorkeeper, nurse, etc. Almost immediately graces and miracles attributed to Bakhita's intercession began to be reported.

Ever since, the place where Bakhita died and the wonders began has been a shrine visited by people from all over the world. They come to seek the intercession of one who was no stranger to loss and suffering and yet had given herself with complete confidence to the Lord. It is here, in this sparsely furnished room, where Italian journalist Roberto Italo Zanini begins his story of Bakhita and her journey from slavery to sainthood.

Based on Bakhita's autobiography, which she dictated to a Canossian sister in obedience to her superior, the canonization files and many other sources, Zanini records the life, virtues and miracles of this daughter of Africa who has become a sister to the whole world.

$16.95