Download or read book Thomas More written by Richard Marius and published by Knopf. This book was released on 2013-02-13 with total page 930 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Most previous biographers of Thomas More have sought to prove him a saint; in this, the first full-scale biography of More in half a century, Richard Marius, a leading Reformation historian, seeks to restore the man. More’s life spanned a tumultuous period in Western history. He was born in 1478 into a society still medieval in its customs and laws. But by the time of his death in 1535 England was already shaken to its depths by the powerful and unsettling ideas of the Renaissance. Marius draws upon important recent research and his profound knowledge of More’s own voluminous writing to make a coherent whole of the life and work of the immensely complex man who was both a product of the times and a singular figure in them. He gives us More the boy—his London childhood, he deep respect for his father, who rose from a tradesman’s background to become a judge of the highest court in the land (a “council of fathers” was to rule More’s kingdom of Utopia) . . . More the youth—sent at about age twelve to serve in the household of the powerful and political Bishop Morton, later struggling to choose between the priesthood and the lures of secular life: marriage and a career in the great world… More the Londoner, the city man—lawyer, graduate of the Inns of Court, member of the rising middle class with its drive for an achievement and position. We see More the humanist man of letter as Marius treats in full his friendship with Erasmus; his now controversial History of Richard III, from which Shakespeare’s Richard derives; and the originals and meanings of his most famous work, Utopia. More the family man is reveal in his relationship with his father, his two wives, and his children as far more complex than the sanctified image of legend. Marius explore More’s public career as Lord Chancellor, as champion of the Catholic church, and finally as martyr to the old faith. He shows us a man who, although he hated and feared tyrants, always believes that authority as a source of order was necessary to the public good—a man who as royal councilor and Lord Chancellor upheld his king until the very moment when, in response to Henry’s final tyranny, he chose “to die the King’s good servant, but God’s first.” Marius also demonstrates that it was the centuries-old authority of the Catholic Church that More revered; that he was as suspicious of paper supremacy as of any tyranny. The man Marius ultimately reveals is one more passionate and driven (in his family life, his convictions, his persecution of heretics) than the serene hero of A Man For All Seasons. But he is also a man possessed of such wit, integrity and charm that he was loved not only by his family but by almost everyone who knew him. It is the special triumph of this biography that with its rare combination of impeccable scholarship and narrative power, we are brought into the presence of a whole person with all his flaws and virtues, and that by the time More meets his death, he has become familiar and important to us not merely as a historical figure but also as a human being.

Download or read book The Sadness of Christ written by Saint Thomas More and published by Scepter Publishers. This book was released on 1993 with total page 188 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book was the last that St. Thomas More wrote in the Tower of London before he was executed for standing firm in his Catholic faith. In it, he explores the Gospel passages that depict the agony of Our Lord in the Garden of Gethsemane. He depicts Christ as a model of virtue in the face of suffering and persecution. And along the way, he includes valuable and eternally relevant reflections on prayer, courage, friendship, statesmanship, and more. Here is an excellent resource for Lent or anytime!

Download or read book Every Thing Is Sacred written by Richard Rohr and published by Convergent Books. This book was released on 2021-02-16 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this companion to The Universal Christ, Richard Rohr and Patrick Boland offer forty reflections and practices exploring what it means to live “in Christ.” In his landmark book The Universal Christ, Richard Rohr articulated a transformative view of what it means to recognize Jesus as “Christ”—as a portrait of God’s constant, unfolding work in the world. Now, in partnership with Patrick Boland, a psychotherapist and member of Rohr’s Center for Action and Contemplation community, he invites readers to engage with the themes of the book through spiritual practice. Each reflection in this book draws on a key passage of The Universal Christ, paired with prayers, journal prompts, and embodied exercises that invite readers into a more personal encounter with the truth that the presence and compassion of the Christ are in every thing. Whether read daily for the season of Lent or explored over the course of a year, Every Thing Is Sacred is a hope-filled journey into the love at the heart of all things.

Download or read book The Universal Christ written by Richard Rohr and published by Convergent Books. This book was released on 2019-03-05 with total page 250 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From one of the world’s most influential spiritual thinkers, a long-awaited book exploring what it means that Jesus was called “Christ,” and how this forgotten truth can restore hope and meaning to our lives. “Anyone who strives to put their faith into action will find encouragement and inspiration in the pages of this book.”—Melinda Gates In his decades as a globally recognized teacher, Richard Rohr has helped millions realize what is at stake in matters of faith and spirituality. Yet Rohr has never written on the most perennially talked about topic in Christianity: Jesus. Most know who Jesus was, but who was Christ? Is the word simply Jesus’s last name? Too often, Rohr writes, our understandings have been limited by culture, religious debate, and the human tendency to put ourselves at the center. Drawing on scripture, history, and spiritual practice, Rohr articulates a transformative view of Jesus Christ as a portrait of God’s constant, unfolding work in the world. “God loves things by becoming them,” he writes, and Jesus’s life was meant to declare that humanity has never been separate from God—except by its own negative choice. When we recover this fundamental truth, faith becomes less about proving Jesus was God, and more about learning to recognize the Creator’s presence all around us, and in everyone we meet. Thought-provoking, practical, and full of deep hope and vision, The Universal Christ is a landmark book from one of our most beloved spiritual writers, and an invitation to contemplate how God liberates and loves all that is.

Download or read book Utopia written by Thomas More and published by e-artnow. This book was released on 2019-04-08 with total page 105 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Utopia is a work of fiction and socio-political satire by Thomas More published in 1516 in Latin. The book is a frame narrative primarily depicting a fictional island society and its religious, social and political customs. Many aspects of More's description of Utopia are reminiscent of life in monasteries.

Download or read book The Spiritual Direction of St Claude De La Colombiere written by Claude de la Colombière and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2018-01-15 with total page 178 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: As a spiritual director Saint Claude, canonized by Pope John Paul II, ranks among the masters of the spiritual life. He gave guidance to countless souls, including Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque, the seventeenth-century French visionary who received the Sacred Heart revelations. In prayer she heard Jesus say of Father Claude that his "talent is to lead souls to God". Saint Claude was a clever psychologist who easily read the hearts of others. His sure judgment, aided by grace, enabled him to understand the difficulties of people and to give them sound advice. Readers of this spiritual gem, which contains excerpts from his notes, letters, and retreats, will find it full of practical wisdom on confession, Mass and Communion, confidence in God, peace of soul, love of neighbor, and much more.

Download or read book Eager to Love written by Richard Rohr and published by Franciscan Media. This book was released on 2024-10-01 with total page 230 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The loving, inclusive life and preaching of Francis of Assisi make him a recognizable and beloved saint across many faith traditions. In the ten-year-anniversary edition of Eager to Love, globally recognized spiritual teacher Richard Rohr, OFM, provides for spiritual seekers a pathway to the inclusivity, freedom, and beauty found in the Christian mystical tradition. As an integrative thinker, Rohr expertly weaves psychological insights and literary and artistic references with Franciscan theology, showing that the rich theological contributions of St. Francis, St. Clare, St. Bonaventure, and John Duns Scotus are guiding lights for sincere spiritual seekers.

Download or read book Transformation in Christ written by Dietrich Von Hildebrand and published by Ignatius Press. This book was released on 2011-02-01 with total page 542 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recognized as a modern spiritual classic and perhaps Dietrich von Hildebrand's greatest work, this sublime and practical study gives a penetrating analysis of the true path to holiness for those who love Christ. The first requisite is the person's desire for change, and with that fundamental attitude in mind, von Hildebrand devotes a chapter to each of the successive spiritual attitudes necessary for those who strive for Christian perfection. The Beatitudes are treated with beauty and depth in an uncompromising challenge to every serious Christian to put into practice these teachings of Christ. "A magnificent treatise by a distinguished philosopher on the pursuit of spiritual perfection." -Publishers Weekly "A major contribution to the only important question: the transformation of our soul in Christ." -Archbishop Fulton Sheen "A masterpiece of modern spirituality: eminently practical and highly recommended." -Fr. John Hardon, S.J. "A solid and penetrating analysis of the Christian virtues, and their application in the struggle toward Christian perfection." -Library Journal

Download or read book St Thomas More action and contemplation written by Thomas More and published by . This book was released on 1970 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Action Versus Contemplation written by Jennifer Summit and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2018-03-22 with total page 253 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone,” Blaise Pascal wrote in 1654. But then there’s Walt Whitman, in 1856: “Whoever you are, come forth! Or man or woman come forth! / You must not stay sleeping and dallying there in the house.” It is truly an ancient debate: Is it better to be active or contemplative? To do or to think? To make an impact, or to understand the world more deeply? Aristotle argued for contemplation as the highest state of human flourishing. But it was through action that his student Alexander the Great conquered the known world. Which should we aim at? Centuries later, this argument underlies a surprising number of the questions we face in contemporary life. Should students study the humanities, or train for a job? Should adults work for money or for meaning? And in tumultuous times, should any of us sit on the sidelines, pondering great books, or throw ourselves into protests and petition drives? With Action versus Contemplation, Jennifer Summit and Blakey Vermeule address the question in a refreshingly unexpected way: by refusing to take sides. Rather, they argue for a rethinking of the very opposition. The active and the contemplative can—and should—be vibrantly alive in each of us, fused rather than sundered. Writing in a personable, accessible style, Summit and Vermeule guide readers through the long history of this debate from Plato to Pixar, drawing compelling connections to the questions and problems of today. Rather than playing one against the other, they argue, we can discover how the two can nourish, invigorate, and give meaning to each other, as they have for the many writers, artists, and thinkers, past and present, whose examples give the book its rich, lively texture of interplay and reference. This is not a self-help book. It won’t give you instructions on how to live your life. Instead, it will do something better: it will remind you of the richness of a life that embraces action and contemplation, company and solitude, living in the moment and planning for the future. Which is better? Readers of this book will discover the answer: both.

Download or read book New Seeds of Contemplation written by Thomas Merton and published by Shambhala Publications. This book was released on 2003 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of thirty-nine short essays in which Thomas Merton examines what true contemplation is and how it can impact one's spirituality.

Download or read book The Virgin of Prince Street written by Sonja Livingston and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2019-09-01 with total page 182 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With organized religion becoming increasingly divisive and politicized and Americans abandoning their pews in droves, it’s easy to question aspects of traditional spirituality and devotion. In response to this shifting landscape, Sonja Livingston undertakes a variety of expeditions—from a mobile confessional in Cajun Country to a eucharistic procession in Galway, Ireland, to the Death and Marigolds Parade in Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Mass in a county jail on Thanksgiving Day—to better understand devotion in her own life. The Virgin of Prince Street chronicles her quest, offering an intimate and unusually candid view into Livingston’s relationship with the swiftly changing Catholic Church and into her own changing heart. Ultimately, Livingston’s meditations on quirky rituals and fading traditions thoughtfully and dynamically interrogate traditional elements of sacramental devotion, especially as they relate to concepts of religion, relationships, and the sacred.

Download or read book Radical Grace written by Richard Rohr and published by . This book was released on 1995 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of 408 meditations by America's foremost retreat master and preacher follows the Church's liturgical cycle, striking the spirit of each season.

Download or read book John Fisher and Thomas More written by Robert J Conrad and published by . This book was released on 2021-06-15 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1929, nearly four hundred years after the deaths of Saints Thomas More and John Fisher, G.K. Chesterton observed in words equally attributable to Fisher, "Blessed Thomas More is more important at this moment than at any moment since his death, even perhaps the great moment of his dying; but he is not quite so important as he will be in a hundred years." Judge Robert J Conrad, Jr. anticipates Chesterton's one-hundred-year mark in a collection of stories from the lives of More and Fisher, demonstrating how their sanctity and integrity carried them and those who loved them through tumultuous and heart-wrenching times which, perhaps surprisingly, bear a striking resemblance to the present epoch. At first blush, nothing could appear more different than the pre-industrial sixteenth century and the tech-centered modern era. But a closer examination presents a similar tale of political maneuvering and hostile hearings, legal corruption, viral pandemics, riots, suppression of speech, loss of religious liberty, and a profound indifference for truth. Judge Conrad effortlessly weaves together tales of both men and what made them who they were--family, faith, friendship, oaths, vocation, detachment, conscience--inviting those who strive for holiness down the same narrow path these two martyrs walked with a clarity founded upon the truth of Christ's Church, and a wit that charmed even their persecutors. Both these men refused to consent to the theological farce that would permit the king's divorce and remarriage and drive a wedge into the unity of the Christian world, and both paid for their convictions with their lives. More died the king's good servant and God's first. Fisher approached his execution with joy befit for a wedding. And yet, both stand today, long after they are gone, as models of courage in a time when it is desperately needed. Discover in this volume of powerful stories two saints whose lives could not be timelier for the present age.

Download or read book A Companion to Thomas More written by A. D. Cousins and published by Fairleigh Dickinson Univ Press. This book was released on 2009 with total page 255 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Latin lives of Thomas More / Germain Marc'hadour -- Modern biographies of Sir Thomas More / Michael Ackland -- More's letters and "The comfort of the truth" / Alison V. Scott -- Humanism, female education, and myth : Erasmus, Vives, and More's To Candidus / A.D. Cousins -- Virtue, transformation, and exemplarity in The Lyfe of Johan Picus / L.E. Semmler -- Inhabiting time : Sir Thomas More's Historia Richardi Tertii / Arthur F. Kinney -- The epigrams of More and Erasmus : a literary diptych / Clarence H. Miller -- Erasmus and More : exploring vocations / Bruce Mansfield -- "Civitas philosophica" : ideas and community in Thomas More / Dominic Baker-Smith -- Utopia / Damian Grace -- The reluctant champion : More's Responsio ad Lutherum and Letter to Bugenhagen / Alistair Fox -- "The field is won" : an introduction to the Tower works / Seymour Baker House.

Download or read book Thomas More written by Louis Lohr Martz and published by Yale University Press. This book was released on 1990-01-01 with total page 132 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Recent writings about Thomas More have questioned his integrity and motivation and have challenged the long-held view of him as a humane, wise, and heroic "man for all seasons." This new book responds to these revisionist studies by closely and persuasively analyzing More's writings as well as Holbein's portraits of More and his family. "Martz cuts down the revived charge of More as a bloodthirsty hunter of heretics, a furious, sexually repressed, and frustrated man. . . . This penetrating rebuttal of the revisionists deserves high commendation."--Choice "Martz draws a compelling picture of More's attempts during his lonely imprisonment to adjust to his human fear of death and to see his own plight in the perspective of the universal human condition. In these essays More's voice and personality speak to us from his own literate and humorous prose."--M. Edmund Hussey, Antioch Review "In his gracefully written Thomas More: The Search for the Inner Man, Louis L. Martz provides a sharply different account of the 'dark side' of More. . . . He] lays out the case for a more complex, ironic construction of More's texts."--Stanley Stewart, Studies in English Literature "This . . . book is a gemstone."--Terence R. Murphy, History: Reviews of New Books "Correcting the view of Thomas More as a cold-blooded prosecutor of heresy, Martz here considers the gentle, affectionate, yet upright man pictured in Holbein's family portraits and implicit in More's prose."--Judith Fair, Theological Studies

Download or read book The Life of Thomas More written by Peter Ackroyd and published by Anchor. This book was released on 2012-06-27 with total page 685 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Peter Ackroyd's The Life of Thomas More is a masterful reconstruction of the life and imagination of one of the most remarkable figures of history. Thomas More (1478-1535) was a renowned statesman; the author of a political fantasy that gave a name to a literary genre and a worldview (Utopia); and, most famously, a Catholic martyr and saint. Born into the professional classes, Thomas More applied his formidable intellect and well-placed connections to become the most powerful man in England, second only to the king. As much a work of history as a biography, The Life of Thomas More gives an unmatched portrait of the everyday, religious, and intellectual life of the early sixteenth century. In Ackroyd's hands, this renowned "man for all seasons" emerges in the fullness of his complex humanity; we see the unexpected side of his character--such as his preference for bawdy humor--as well as his indisputable moral courage.