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Books > Language & Literature > Biography & autobiography > Religious & spiritual
In 1979, 24-year-old Maura O'Halloran left her waitressing job in
Boston and began her study of Zen in Japan. Today she is revered as
a Buddhist saint, and a statue in her honor stands at the monastery
where she lived. This is the story of her journey.
Elegant and learned, personal and universal, literary,
philosophical, and historical-Hillel Halkin's finely wrought essays
on themes of Jewish culture and life are an education in
themselves. Hillel Halkin is widely admired for his works of
literary criticism, biography, fiction, and nonfiction, as well as
for his celebrated achievements as a translator. Born and raised in
New York City, he has lived most of his life in Israel. His complex
sensibility, deeply rooted in Jewish literature and history no less
than in his own personal experience, illuminates everything it
touches. In A Complicated Jew, Halkin assembles a selection of
essays that form, if not a conventional memoir, a haunting and
intimate record of a profoundly Jewish life that defies
categorization. It is a banquet for the mind. "Hillel Halkin is a
master storyteller and a brilliant cultural critic, and in A
Complicated Jew he combines both talents to take his readers on an
intellectual thrill ride through his encounters with Jewish
thought, art, and life. I envy him his lifetime of adventures and
am grateful to him for sharing them with all of us." Dara Horn,
novelist and author of Eternal Life and People Love Dead Jews "I
have been reading Hillel Halkin for well on to half a century,
always deriving pleasure from his stately prose, intellectual
profit from his deep learning, and inspiration from his integrity.
I am pleased to think of him as my contemporary." Joseph Epstein,
author of Life Sentences: Literary Essays, Narcissus Leaves the
Pool and Fabulous Small Jews, and former editor of The American
Scholar. "Hillel Halkin himself has always been even more
interesting to me than his highly interesting subjects, and here he
gives us full access to his adventurous mind, the dazzling range of
his learning, and his passionate spirit. More than a collection of
essays, this book charts the intellectual journey of one of our
most original Jewish writers." Ruth Wisse, Professor emeritus of
Yiddish and Comparative Literature at Harvard University and author
of If Am Not for Myself: The Liberal Betrayal of the Jews, Jews and
Power, and No Joke: Making Jewish Humor. "Even when Hillel Halkin
exasperates, there is no voice on the contemporary Jewish scene
more intellectually alert or lucid. The work of a cultural critic
of rare breadth, this keenly personal, fiercely argued volume is as
trenchant of tour of Jewry's dilemmas of the last half-century as
any I know." Steven J. Zipperstein, Professor of Jewish Culture and
History at Stanford University and author of Imagining Russian
Jewry and Pogrom: Kishinev and the Tilt of History.
Roland Allen (1868-1947) is remembered as one of the foremost
missionaries of the last century. Throughout his life, Allen
travelled the world, following his vocation and building his
missionary methods centred on a theology of indigenisation. From
his early days as a Chaplain in China (during which Allen was
forced to flee to the British Legation in Beijing), through to his
continued mission to India, Canada and South Africa, he developed
as man, missionary and theologian. The first of two volumes, Roland
Allen: A Missionary Life is an intellectual biography which
explores the people and ideas that influenced Allen while tracing
the ways in which his missionary ecclesiology evolved during his
life. Through extensive examination of unpublished archival papers,
including lesser known letters and sermons, Steven Richard Rutt has
uncovered the growth of a forthright, morally indefatigable
churchman, who was also a loving family man with close and
long-running friendships. Rutt unpacks Allen's Church-centred
missionary ecclesiology and 'missiology of indigenisation', which
were based on Allen's knowledge, gained from experience. Roland
Allen: A Missionary Life and Roland Allen: A Theology of Mission
explore the thought of a Christian whose writings provided
farsighted clarity on global Christian missionary work that is
still relevant today.
In 1897 Tom Cochrane, a young, newly-qualified Scottish medical
missionary, arrived with his wife in Chaoyang, Inner Mongolia. For
three years he laboured single-handed in a mud-floored dispensary,
quickly realising his work was a drop in a sea of suffering. He
became seized by the vision of a Western medical college and
teaching hospital in Peking. In 1900 the Boxer Rebellion began.
Rebels roamed the countryside. Their cry was: `Kill the foreigners!
Kill them before breakfast!' Over 30,000 converts were butchered in
months, with hundreds of missionaries. The Cochranes escaped with
their three young sons, but by 1901 Tom was back. In Peking he
practised from mule stables amongst beggars and lepers. A powerful
nobleman befriended him, and in 1903 his intervention brought a
major cholera epidemic under control. The Imperial Grand Eunuch,
right-hand man of the feared Empress Dowager, helped Tom to
petition the Dragon Throne and obtain a substantial grant for his
college. In 1906 he established the Peking Union Medical College.
Today it stands in Beijing, prestigious and respected. Its origins
forgotten, it remains one of countless seeds Christians planted in
China.
A memoir by one of the original female psychedelic pioneers of the
1960s * Shares Rosemary's early experimentation with psychedelics
in the 1950s, her development through the psychedelic revolution of
the 1960s, and her involvement, at first exciting but then
heartbreaking, with Dr. Timothy Leary * Describes her LSD trips
with Leary, their time at the famous Millbrook estate, their
experiences as fugitives abroad, including their captivity by the
Black Panthers in Algeria, and Rosemary's years on the run after
she and Timothy separated One of the original female psychedelic
pioneers, Rosemary Woodruff Leary (1935-2002) began her psychedelic
journey long before her relationship with Dr. Timothy Leary. In the
1950s, she moved to New York City where she became part of the
city's most advanced music, art, and literary circles and expanded
her consciousness with psilocybin mushrooms and peyote. In 1964 she
met two former Harvard professors who were experimenting with LSD,
Timothy Leary and Ralph Metzner, who invited her to join them at
the Millbrook estate in upstate New York. Once at Millbrook,
Rosemary went on to become the wife--and accomplice--of the man
Richard Nixon called "the most dangerous man in America." In this
intimate memoir, Rosemary describes her LSD experiences and
insights, her decades as a fugitive hiding both abroad and
underground in America, and her encounters with many leaders of the
cultural and psychedelic milieu of the 1960s. Compiled from
Rosemary's own letters and autobiographical writings archived among
her papers at the New York Public Library, the memoir details
Rosemary's imprisonment for contempt of court, the Millbrook raid
by G. Gordon Liddy, the tours with Timothy before his own arrest
and imprisonment, and their time in exile following his sensational
escape from a California prison. She describes their surreal and
frightening captivity by the Black Panther Party in Algeria and
their experiences as fugitives in Switzerland. She recounts her
adventures and fears as a fugitive on five continents after her
separation from Timothy in 1971. While most accounts of the
psychedelic revolution of the 1960s have been told by men, with
this memoir we can now experience these events from the perspective
of a woman who was at the center of the seismic cultural changes of
that time.
Frances Willard (1839-1898) was one of the most prominent American
social reformers of the late nineteenth century. As the long-time
president of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), Willard
built a national and international movement of women that
campaigned for prohibition, women's rights, economic justice, and
numerous other social justice issues during the Gilded Age.
Emphasizing what she called "Do Everything" reform, Willard became
a central figure in international movements in support of
prohibition, women's suffrage, and Christian socialism. A devout
Methodist, Willard helped to shape predominant religious currents
of the late nineteenth century and was an important figure in the
rise of the social gospel movement in American Protestantism. The
first biography of Frances Willard to be published in over
thirty-five years, Do Everything explores Willard's life, her
contributions as a reformer, and her broader legacy as a women's
rights activist in the United States. In addition to chronicling
Willard's life, historian Christopher H. Evans examines how Willard
crafted a distinctive culture of women's leadership, emphasizing
the importance of religious faith for understanding Willard's
successes as a social reformer. Despite her enormous fame during
her lifetime, Evans investigates the reasons why Willard's legacy
has been eclipsed by subsequent generations of feminist reformers
and assesses her importance for our time.
James offers a concise and accessible introduction to a New
Testament text, in this case aimed specifically at
undergraduate-level students. John S. Kloppenborg introduces the
reader to a series of critical issues bearing on the reading of
James and provides a balanced presentation and assessment of the
range of scholarly views, with guidance for further reading and
research.
How do you hold on to hope when you don't get the ending you asked
for? When Katie Davis Majors moved to Uganda, accidentally founded
a booming organization, and later became the mother of thirteen
girls through the miracle of adoption, she determined to weave her
life together with the people she desired to serve. But joy often
gave way to sorrow as she invested her heart fully in walking
alongside people in the grip of poverty, addiction, desperation,
and disease. After unexpected tragedy shook her family, for the
first time Katie began to wonder, Is God really good? Does He
really love us? When she turned to Him with her questions, God
spoke truth to her heart and drew her even deeper into relationship
with Him. Daring to Hope is an invitation to cling to the God of
the impossible-the God who whispers His love to us in the quiet, in
the mundane, when our prayers are not answered the way we want or
the miracle doesn't come. It's about a mother discovering the
extraordinary strength it takes to be ordinary. It's about choosing
faith no matter the circumstance and about encountering God's
goodness in the least expected places. Though your heartaches and
dreams may take a different shape, you will find your own questions
echoed in these pages. You'll be reminded of the gifts of joy in
the midst of sorrow. And you'll hear God's whisper: Hold on to
hope. I will meet you here. Content Benefits: Picking up where she
left off in the best-selling book Kisses from Katie, Katie Davis
Majors shares her ongoing experiences in Uganda as the adoptive
mother to thirteen girls and describes how she's wrestled through
the darkness of disappointment to find the answer to whether God
truly is good. Inspiring story of a woman of faith who trusted God
Riveting account of a ministry in Uganda The follow up to Kisses
from Katie Honest look at what happens when tragedy happens and
faith is shaken Wrestles with how to find God in the doubts and
questions Perfect book to encourage someone who is struggling in
their faith Ideal reading for anyone who loves to see God at work
in the world Great gift idea to encourage others Binding -
Paperback Pages - 240 Publisher - Authentic Media
Around 1147 the bishop of Chartres directed Geoffrey Grossus, a
monk of Tiron Abbey, to write the life of its founder Bernard of
Abbeville (ca. 1050-1116) in an effort to further his canonization.
Although Geoffrey Grossus blithely borrowed from other writings on
saints' lives to further his hagiographical purpose, he presented
an erudite, action-filled, and sympathetic portrait of the ascetic
founder of an increasingly prominent and wealthy congregation.
Bernard was a reformed Benedictine monk, abbot of Saint-Cyprien of
Poitiers, and claustral prior of its daughter abbey,
Saint-Savin-sur-Gartempe. Deposed at the instigation of Abbot Hugh
of Cluny shortly after his installation in 1100, Bernard traveled
to Rome to make a spirited defense of Saint-Cyprien's independence
before the papal curia. He alternated cloistered life with
unauthorized retreats with Vital of Savigny's hermit community,
supporting himself by woodworking and ironwork, and offshore on the
pirate-infested Chausey Island. On tours with Vital and Robert of
Arbrissel, he risked his life preaching clerical celibacy in
Normandy. In old age he founded Tiron Abbey in Perche near Chartres
and became known as a healer and visionary. Although Bernard worked
few miracles and was never canonized, he was venerated as a holy
man who was deeply involved in many aspects of the religious
reformation of the eleventh and twelfth centuries. Tiron expanded
into a large congregation under royal patronage with abbeys and
priories in modern France and the British Isles, where it preceded
the Cistercians by a decade in Wales, Scotland, and on the
Southampton Water. Tironian abbeys and priories survived until the
English Reformation and the French Revolution. The first English
translation of the ""Vita Bernardi"", this book makes accessible to
medieval and religious historians one of the more interesting and
lively stories of the twelfth century.
Think Mother Jones meets Mother Teresa, in Mogadishu. Amid a
volatile mix of disease, war, and religious fundamentalism in the
Horn of Africa, what difference could one woman make? Annalena
Tonelli left behind career, family, and homeland anyway, moving to
a remote Muslim village in northern Kenya to live among its
outcasts - desert nomads dying of tuberculosis, history's deadliest
disease. "I am nobody," she always insisted. Yet by the time she
was killed for her work three decades later she had not only
developed an effective cure for tuberculosis among nomadic peoples
but also exposed a massacre, established homes and schools for the
deaf, advocated against female genital mutilation, and secured
treatment for ostracized AIDS patients. Months after winning the
Nansen Refugee Award from the UN in 2003, Annalena Tonelli was
assassinated at one of the tuberculosis hospitals she founded.
Rachel Pieh Jones, an American writer, was living a few doors down,
having moved to Somaliland with her husband and two children just
months before. Annalena's death would alter the course of her life.
No one who encounters Annalena in these pages will leave unchanged.
Her confounding, larger-than-life example challenges our
assumptions about aid and development, Christian-Muslim relations,
and what it means to put one's faith into practice. Brought vividly
back to life through Jones's meticulous reporting and her own
letters, Annalena presents us with a new measure of success and
commitment. But she also leaves us a gift: the secret to overcoming
the fear that pervades our society and our hearts - fear of disease
and death, fear of terrorism and war, fear of others, and fear of
failure.
Between Two Rivers chronicles the life of noted scholar of
religion, politics, and philosophy, Ronald H. Stone. From his
childhood between the East and West banks of the Des Moines River
through graduate work in New York between the Hudson and the East
Rivers through his scholarly career and retirement in Pittsburgh,
between the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers, the book highlights
Stone's focus on Christian social ethics and his prolific writing
in the area. The book includes unique insights into some of the
renowned scholars Stone worked with closely, including Reinhold
Niebuhr and Paul Tillich, and it discusses Stone's scholarship on
the relationship between religion and politics.
Discover never-before-told details of POW underground operations
during the Vietnam War told through one airman's inspiring story of
true love, honor, and courage. Air Force pilot Captain Carlyle
"Smitty" Harris was shot down over Vietnam on April 4, 1965 and
taken to the infamous Hoa Lo prison--nicknamed the "Hanoi Hilton."
For the next eight years, Smitty and hundreds of other American
POWs--including John McCain and George "Bud" Day--suffered torture,
solitary confinement, and unimaginable abuse. It was there that
Smitty covertly taught many other POWs the Tap Code--an old,
long-unused method of communication from World War II. Using the
code, they could softly tap messages of encouragement to lonely
neighbors and pass along resistance policies from their leaders.
The code quickly became a lifeline during their internment. It
helped the prisoners boost morale, stay unified, communicate the
chain of command, and prevail over a brutal enemy. Meanwhile, back
home in the United States, Harris's wife, Louise, raised their
three children alone, unsure of her husband's fate for seven long
years. One of the first POW wives of the Vietnam War, she became a
role model for other military wives by advocating for herself and
her children in her husband's absence. Told through both Smitty's
and Louise's voices, Tap Code shares the riveting true story of:
Ingenuity under pressure Strength and dignity in the face of a
frightening enemy The hope, faith, and resolve necessary to endure
even the darkest circumstances Praise for Tap Code: "Tap Code is an
incredible story about two American heroes. Col. "Smitty" Harris
and his wife, Louise, epitomize the definition of commitment--to
God, to country, and to family. This tale of extreme perseverance
will restore your faith in the human spirit." --Brigadier General
John Nichols, USAF "The incomprehensibly long ordeal of the Harris
family is agonizing. Their love, faith, loyalty, and courage
epitomize all that is good about America." --Lt. Col. Orson
Swindle, USMC (ret.), POW, Hanoi, 11/11/1966 to 3/4/1973
Nathan Soederblom (1866-1931), was not only a profoundly
influential figure in Swedish church history, but also one of the
great pioneers of the modern ecumenical movement. Elected
Archbishop of Uppsala, the head of the Lutheran church in Sweden,
in 1914, he was a ceaseless advocate for peace during the first
world war. His collaboration with George Bell laid the foundations
for intercommunion between the Church of Sweden and the Church of
England. Finally, in the year before he died, he was awarded the
Nobel Peace Prize. Despite this, until this landmark biography he
was largely neglected by historians, the subject of only a few
partial studies. In Nathan Soederblom: His Life and Work, Bengt
Sundkler corrects this, with new analysis of Soederblom's
meticulously preserved correspondence and interviews with his
family, friends and former students. The resulting image is of a
man deeply committed to his leadership of ecumenical projects, most
significantly his movement of 'Life and Work', btu also of a
complex and fascinating personality.
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