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Books > Religion & Spirituality > Christianity > Christian worship > General
Hundreds of pilgrims set out from Europe to the Holy Land between
385 and 1099 AD, but of these only eighteen wrote descriptions
which have survived. They provide essential background material for
the history of Christianity in the Holy Land, as well as for all
archaeologists and geographers of the Byzantine and Early Arab
period. In this companion volume to Wilkinson's Egeria's Travels ,
these texts are translated and wherever possible related to
archaeological work. With maps and indexes, the reader is provided
with a vivid picture of the physical conditions of travel and the
development of Christian prayer in the Holy Places. This second
edition is updated and expanded.
Of all the things we can know about J. S. Bach's Mass in B Minor
and Christmas Oratorio, the most profound come from things we can
hear. Listening to Bach explores musical style as it was understood
in the early eighteenth century. It encourages ways of listening
that that take eighteenth-century musical sensibilities into
account and that recognize our place as inheritors of a long
tradition of performance and interpretation. Daniel R. Melamed
shows how to recognize old and new styles in sacred music of Bach's
time, and how movements in these styles are constructed. This opens
the possibility of listening to the Mass in B Minor as Bach's
demonstration of the possibilities of contrasting, combining, and
reconciling old and new styles. It also shows how to listen for
elements that would have been heard as most significant in the
early eighteenth century, including markers of sleep arias, love
duets, secular choral arias, and other movement types. This offers
a musical starting point for listening for the ways Bach put these
types to use in the Mass in B Minor and the Christmas Oratorio. The
book also offers ways to listen to and think about works created by
parody, the re-use of music for new words and a new purpose, like
almost all of the Mass in B Minor and Christmas Oratorio. And it
shows that modern performances of these works are stamped with
audible consequences of our place in the twenty-first century. The
ideological choices we make in performing the Mass and Oratorio,
part of the legacy of their performance and interpretation, affect
the way the work is understood and heard today. All these topics
are illustrated with copious audio examples on a companion Web
site, offering new ways of listening to some of Bach's greatest
music.
Respected Bible teacher Warren Wiersbe defines the essence of
worship and discusses the key issues surrounding this often
controversial topic within the church.
The doctrine and history of the 7 Sacraments. Covers Indulgences
and Sacramentals. Topics include the Scriptural background of the
Sacraments, their institution by Christ, essential requirements for
receiving them, their effects in the soul, etc.
If you were to join us in either of our homes at the end of almost
any evening, or if you were to attend one of our retreats, we would
invite you to do with us the process described in these pages. This
book is about asking ourselves two questions: For what am I most
grateful? For what am I least grateful? These questions help us
identify moments of consolation and desolation. We call this
process the examen. "We have given retreats in over forty
countries,and we find that regardless of culture or age group, this
simple process is the most helpful way for people to hear the voice
of God guiding them from within. For example, should people bring
us many questions ranging from, 'Should I change my job?' to What
can help me with my depression?' We usually suggest they spend the
next month focusing each day on the examen questions. Such people
often return a month later having discovered from their own
experience of consolation and desolation exactly what they should
do more of and less of in order to resolve their problem. "For
centuries, prayerful people have found direction for their days and
for their lives by identifying these moments. Since even small
children can do this, we have tried here to present the examen in a
format that families, friends and communities can share and that
will be easily accessible to anyone. We hope the examen will enrich
your lives and your relationships as much as it has ours."
The message of the kingdom of God: an ecology of equality and
peace, and an economy of justice. Hope from beyond, sent to the
present, is what Advent asks us to reckon with. Hope consists of
God’s jump leads sent from the future through time and space,
wired right into our present pains, panics, and predicaments. How
can the light of Christ illuminate this present darkness? This book
engages with two great Christmas hymns: the Magnificat and
Benedictus. It is also rooted in poets, prophets and the theology
and devotional writing of the black theologian and mentor to Martin
Luther King Jr., Howard Thurman. Using the lectio divina approach
to passages drawn from Isaiah and Luke, An Advent Manifesto is an
invitation to pray and practise that most ancient Advent prayer,
‘Come, Lord Jesus, come.’
Since 1917, when three Portuguese shepherd children received
apparitions of the Virgin Mary, the Child Jesus, and Saint Joseph,
Fatima has been the destination of many millions of pilgrim
visitors. The apparitions occurred at a time of great turmoil in
the history of mankind: The Great War was in its third year, and
Russia was in the throes of revolution that would lead to Communism
taking hold. The so-called "Third Secret" of Fatima foretold the
assassination attempt on the Pope, Saint John Paul II in 1981.
These events may have passed, but the message of Fatima is eternal:
prayer and penance form the path to salvation. This book tells the
Fatima story and provides insights into the lives of the seers. It
gives the locations of the places of worship and interest in the
Sanctuary and nearby villages, and provides information on the
Programmes, Mass times, and practical essentials when visiting
Portugal. There is a small book of Devotions featuring the Rosary,
the Mass, and prayers and songs associated with Fatima. Several
trips to the surrounding area include abbeys, castles, The
Eucharistc Miracle at Santarem, and the shrine in the fishing town
of Nazare. The Convent of Carmel in the historic city of Coimbra,
home to Sister Lucia for many years, is visited. Lisbon, the
Estoril coast and the palaces of Sintra and Mafra are also
included. The book is illustrated in full colour with maps and
plans. This is an essential tool to enable you to make the most of
what will be a deeply spiritual, personal experience.
Before the charismatic John Duval Gluck, Jr. came along, letters
from New York City children to Santa Claus were destroyed,
unopened, by the U.S. Post Office. Gluck saw an opportunity, and
created the Santa Claus Association. The effort delighted the
public, and for 15 years money and gifts flowed to the only group
authorized to answer Santa's mail. Gluck became a Jazz Age
celebrity, rubbing shoulders with the era's movie stars and
politicians, and even planned to erect a vast Santa Claus monument
in the center of Manhattan - until Gotham's crusading charity
commissioner discovered some dark secrets in Santa's workshop. The
rise and fall of the Santa Claus Association is a caper both
heartwarming and hardboiled, involving stolen art, phony Boy
Scouts, a kidnapping, pursuit by the FBI, a Coney Island bullfight,
and above all, the thrills and dangers of a wild imagination. It's
also the larger story of how Christmas became the extravagant
holiday we celebrate today, from Santa's early beginnings in New
York to the country's first citywide Christmas tree and Macy's
first grand holiday parade.The Santa Claus Man is a holiday tale
with a dark underbelly, and an essential read for lovers of
Christmas stories, true crime, and New York City history.
William Law is best remembered today for his Serious Call to a
Devout and Holy Life. To those interested in his spirituality,
however, other works have greater impact, in particular The Spirit
of Prayer and The Spirit of Love, which are considered the finest
and most appealing. In the years in which they were written, his
vision had reached its fullest and most characteristic development,
and his literary power was at its height. It is in these books that
the profound influence of Jacob Boehme can be most clearly seen.
His great synthesis of the mystical outpourings and orthodox
Christian theology, provide an English spiritual classic. Law's
understanding and interpretation of mysticism was more original
than traditional, being dynamic and creative. He believed in the
life of God working from within, and the flame of divine love being
a link with and an understanding of God. He conceived that
mysticism was a matter of life, that relied on willing rather than
knowing, and that ultimately rested on trust in God. Despite
holding no official position he was widely regarded in his own time
and later as a spiritual guide, and his trilogy The Spirit of
Prayer, The Spirit of Love and The Way to Divine Knowledge was the
mature expression of his theology and religion.
Maud Lewis has become one of Canada's favourite folk artists, and
her buoyant winter pictures of nature, pets, farm animals, and
people at work and play are among her most charming. Her hands were
twisted with arthritis, but Maud earned her living by painting
Christmas cards and pictures and selling them from her tiny, gaily
painted one-room house beside the highway near Digby, Nova
Scotia.Originally issued in 1997 and now available in this updated
edition, Christmas with Maud Lewis paints a portrait of how this
spirited woman celebrated the season in her life and art. Maud's
vision of Christmas embraces skaters sliding every which way,
passengers leaning over the box of a horse-drawn sleigh, smiling
oxen in their best harness, and bluebirds beside their snow-covered
house. The paintings in Christmas with Maud Lewis are from the
large collection of the Woolaver family.
Lent is not about giving up or taking up, but a radical opening up:
the opening up of our lives to God's transformative kingdom. That
is the challenge Trystan Owain Hughes sets in Opening Our Lives.
Through practical daily devotions he calls on us to open our eyes
to God's presence, our ears to his call, our hearts to his love,
our ways to his will, our actions to his compassion and our pain to
his peace.
What does it mean for music to be considered local in contemporary
Christian communities, and who shapes this meaning? Through what
musical processes have religious beliefs and practices once
'foreign' become 'indigenous'? How does using indigenous musical
practices aid in the growth of local Christian religious practices
and beliefs? How are musical constructions of the local intertwined
with regional, national or transnational religious influences and
cosmopolitanisms? Making Congregational Music Local in Christian
Communities Worldwide explores the ways that congregational
music-making is integral to how communities around the world
understand what it means to be 'local' and 'Christian'. Showing how
locality is produced, negotiated, and performed through
music-making, this book draws on case studies from every continent
that integrate insights from anthropology, ethnomusicology,
cultural geography, mission studies, and practical theology. Four
sections explore a central aspect of the production of locality
through congregational music-making, addressing the role of
historical trends, cultural and political power, diverging values,
and translocal influences in defining what it means to be 'local'
and 'Christian'. This book contends that examining musical
processes of localization can lead scholars to new understandings
of the meaning and power of Christian belief and practice.
A gift edition of Daily Prayer For All Seasons, with a bonded
leather cover, two ribbon bookmarks, gilded edges, a presentation
page, and shrink-wrapped in gift box. People in all kinds of
religious traditions, including Judaism and Christianity, have been
marking time with prayer for almost as long as we've divided the
day into hours. "Praying the hours," as it's called, has always
reminded us that God walks with us throughout each day; "praying
the hours" is also a way that the community of faith comes
together, whether we're united all in one place or scattered like
raindrops. In the Episcopal Church, the Book of Common Prayer
offers beautiful services for morning, noon, evening, and nighttime
in a section called "The Daily Office" (pp 35-146). Daily Prayer
for All Seasons offers a variation on that theme, where a complete
service covers one or two pages, thereby eliminating the need to
shuffle prayer books and hymnals. Daily Prayer for All Seasons
works for individuals, small groups, and/or congregations. This
prayer book presents a variety of images of God, uses inclusive and
expansive language for and about God, and presents a rich variety
of language, including poetry, meditation, and prayers from the
broader community of faith.
A glimpse into the ideals and insights that have shaped one of the
Episcopal Church's most widely known parishes, St. Gregory of Nyssa
in San Francisco. Rick Fabian, well known as one of the founding
priests of St. Gregory of Nyssa in San Francisco, writes his
"treatise in eleven parts" on the significant signs of communal
life: the welcoming table, authority (human and biblical), baptism,
mystery, marriage, children, the spirit, reconciliation, the
worship year, beauty, and hospitality. This "revisionist approach
to sacramental theology" offers a glimpse into the depth of thought
behind the praxis that has shaped one of the Episcopal Church's
most widely known parishes.
Winner - Edward Stanford Travel Memoir of the Year 2019.
Shortlisted - Rathbones Folio Prize, Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, and Somerset Maugham Award 2019.
'An extraordinary travelogue, strange and brilliant' - i
In 2013 Guy Stagg walked from Canterbury to Jerusalem. Though a non-believer, he began the pilgrimage after suffering several years of mental illness, hoping the ritual would heal him. For ten months he hiked alone on ancient paths, crossing ten countries and more than 5,500 kilometres. Travelling without support, he had to rely each night on the charity of strangers.
The Crossway is an account of Stagg's extraordinary journey. It describes the dangers he faced on the road, captures the people he met and the landscapes he experienced, offers a unique insight into contemporary faith, and – most movingly – lays bare his struggle to escape the past and walk towards recovery.
It was a BBC Radio 4 'Book of the Week' on publication.
An Anglican priest hands out brass knuckles to his congregation to
guard his church from anti-Christmas fanatics. Fascists insist that
the real Christmas is the Winter Solstice, while Communists stage
atheist musicals outside of churches on Christmas Eve. Activists
vandalize shops that set out holiday advertising in October and
anti-consumerists sing parody carols in shopping malls. Is there
such a thing as a War on Christmas? As Gerry Bowler demonstrates in
this entertaining book, there is and always has been a War, or
rather, several wars, on Christmas. Christmas, a global phenomenon
adored by billions and a backbone of international trade, is the
biggest single event on the planet. For Christians it is the
second-most sacred date on the calendar. But whether one celebrates
it or not, it engages billions of people who are caught up in its
commercialism, music, sentiment, travel, and frenetic busyness.
Since its controversial invention in the Roman Empire, Christmas
has struggled with paganism, popular culture, fierce Christian
opposition to its celebration, its abolition in Scotland and New
England, and its neglect and near-death experience in the 1700s,
only to be miraculously reinvented in the 1800s. The twentieth
century saw it opposed by Bolsheviks, twisted by Hitler, and
appropriated by every special interest group in the industrialized
world. Lately it has been caught up in the cultural struggles
between the left and the right in America, often misinterpreted as
a war on Christmas, when the fight is really over whether religion
in general will be allowed a public face. Gerry Bowler tells the
fascinating story of the tug-of-war over Christmas, replete with
cross-dressing priests, ranting Puritans, atheist witches, the
League of the Militant Godless, aesthetic terrorists in Quebec and
rap-singing Santa killers in Spain.
The Divine Liturgy of Saint James is the eucharistic rite of the
ancient Church of Jerusalem and the most ancient extant liturgy of
the Eastern Church. In recent decades, the frequency of its use has
increased throughout the Orthodox Church. This service book offers
for the first time a parallel Church Slavonic-English text,
suitable for use by clergy and servers. It also contains the Divine
Liturgy of the Presanctified Gifts of the Holy Apostle James, which
is rarely served today but has been preserved in part in a few
Greek manuscripts and in full in several Georgian sources. An
introduction by Dr Vitaly Permiakov, a specialist in the Jerusalem
liturgy, presents the provenance and integrity of both ancient
Liturgical services.
Congregational Music, Conflict and Community is the first study of
the music of the contemporary 'worship wars' - conflicts over
church music that continue to animate and divide Protestants today
- to be based on long-term in-person observation and interviews. It
tells the story of the musical lives of three Canadian Mennonite
congregations, who sang together despite their musical differences
at the height of these debates in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
Mennonites are among the most music-centered Christian groups in
North America, and each congregation felt deeply about the music
they chose as their own. The congregations studied span the
spectrum from traditional to blended to contemporary worship
styles, and from evangelical to liberal Protestant theologies. At
their core, the book argues, worship wars are not fought in order
to please congregants' musical tastes nor to satisfy the
theological principles held by a denomination. Instead, the
relationships and meanings shaped through individuals' experiences
singing in the particular ways afforded by each style of worship
are most profoundly at stake in the worship wars. As such, this
book will be of keen interest to scholars working across the fields
of religious studies and ethnomusicology.
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