Befriending Our Desires

Befriending Our Desires portrays the intimate connection between desire and the spiritual journey. Philip Sheldrake explores the role of desire in relation to God, prayer, sexuality, making choices, and responding to change.

Desire is at the heart of what it is to be human. The power of desire, while embodied and sensuous, is God-given and the key to all human spirituality. Humanity is blessed with a deep longing that is infinite in extent and can only ultimately be satisfied in God. Befriending Our Desires portrays the intimate connection between desire and the spiritual journey. Drawing on Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, Christian spiritual classics (with some reference to Buddhist spirituality), poetry, and other literature, plus personal and pastoral experience, Philip Sheldrake explores the role of desire in relation to God, prayer, sexuality, making choices, and responding to change.

Claiming Our Deepest Desires integrates the spirituality of marriage with the practical experience of marriage. M. Bridget Brennan and Jerome L. Shen, a married couple, invite readers to reflect on God's call to marriage, the nature of the call, and the acceptance. Readers contemplate true love, intimacy, and how love is expressed and received in their marriage. The book addresses attitudes that are helpful for dealing with obstacles and fears that hinder intimacy. The rhythms, cycles, and stages in a marriage are discussed to provide awareness for a married couple. The wants, needs, and requirements for the relationship are acknowledged. The authors delve into some specific aspects of marriage by considering the process of making decisions as a couple, discussing making life choices, and different perspectives on the use of time and money. One chapter is devoted to love making. Communication and conflict resolution are brought up as well as the call to mission. The book ends by focusing on the hopes, dreams, and Vision that we have for marriage and how that motivates us to live better and more joy-filled lives today. Claiming Our Deepest Desires is for adults in healthy committed married relationships, who wish to grow in love and intimacy to realize the full promise of marriage. Ideally spouses will read, reflect on, and discuss the book together. It can be used by individuals, small groups, or as a supplemental text to university-level courses. Chapters are Call to Marriage," *What Is Love and Intimacy? - *Growing in Love and Intimacy, - *The Dynamics of Relationship, - *Making Decisions on Life Choices, Time, and Money, - *Making Love in a Sexually Charged World, - *Conflict and Communication, - *Mission: Fruit of a Vibrant Marriage, - and *The Fruit of Love Is Joy. - Exercises and reflection questions are provided at the end of each chapter. M. Bridget Brennan is the director of marriage ministry at St. Francis Xavier Church on the campus of St. Louis University. She serves as a consultant with the St. Louis Archdiocesan Office of Laity and Family Life. She is founder and president of The Cana Institute. She also serves as an adjunct instructor at Aquinas Institute School of Theology and St. Louis Community College. Jerome L. Shen served as director of fundamental research for DuPont Protein Technology International for several years. Presently he serves as visiting professor of chemistry at Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, Illinois. Bridget and Jerry travel throughout the United States presenting retreats and workshops for married couples. In addition, they direct marriage preparation seminars for first-time marriages, second-time marriages, and inter-faith marriages. "

Integrating the wisdom of Christian tradition and psychological findings on effective decision-making, this book presents a view of Christian discernment that honors the body-spirit unity of the person and the broad and mysterious ways we can be led by the spirit of God in our life-choices. Going beyond discernment skills and concrete practices, this book presents a coherent theoretical understanding of discernment that grounds the many spiritual practices used by Christians today. By providing a broad and inclusive understanding of the multiple ways God can provide guidance to individuals, this book helps individuals to honor the unique and idiosyncratic way that they receive divine guidance, as well as provides guidelines that guard against possible self-deception and personal blind-spots. While including anecdotal accounts and practical elements of Christian discernment, this book provides a conceptual understanding of discernment that will be helpful for those training to be professional ministers, pastors, priests, religious counselors, and spiritual directors. It is unique in applying Christian tradition and contemporary psychological insights to the process of discernment. +

To understand the life and thought of Thomas Merton, one must understand him as a monk. After introducing his vocation and entrance into the Trappist order, this book highlights some of his basic spiritual presuppositions. Relying primarily on Merton's writing, Bonnie B. Thurston surveys his thought on fundamental aspects of monastic formation and spirituality, particularly obedience, silence, solitude, and prayer. She also addresses some of the temptations and popular misunderstandings surrounding monastic life. Accessible and conversational in style, the book suggests how monastic spirituality is relevant, not only for all Christians, but also for serious spiritual seekers.

In the English-speaking Western world alone, thousands of men and women begin formal training for Christian ministry each year, or informally, seek to equip themselves for pastoral ministry. Over the past fifty years, the ancient world of virtue ethics has been reimagined as a means of forming people of character and morality today, and in this book, it is used as the framework to understand what we are doing as we form Christian ministers now, and how we might strengthen that formation by more consciously linking the practices of ministry with the person, spirituality, and wisdom of the practitioner. Writing out of the context of a lifetime of pastoral ministry and the oversight of ministers in the Baptist Union of Great Britain, Paul Goodliff explores what pastors do and who they are called to be, using a mixture of theological and pastoral inquiry, reflections upon art, and personal story. This book will be of interest to those who are charged with forming the next generation of ministers; but anyone starting out on that journey of formation for ministry will also find this vision of ministry challenging and inspiring.

Eros is the passionate energy that makes us one with the beautiful other, with a leper, with the world of nature waiting to be embraced and cared for, with our neighbor, the stranger, with God. The Whiteheads explore this vital energy of love as the gift of a Creator madly in love with his creation a God who would bring us to life in abundance if we only say "Yes." They discuss Eros in the movements of our sexuality, as well as in our arousals of compassion and care. They examine the Eros of pleasure and of generosity. They honor the Eros of hope, of anger, of suffering. They reveal that Eros has a Source far deeper than lust, and is a pathway to a passionate God. Holy Eros recovers this fundamental energy of love as a powerful resource in the revitalization of Christian spirituality. Unlike most books on the topic it eschews easy clichs. Its reader benefit is to understand and appreciate an energy that can heal as well as hinder and to tap into its positive force.

Finding Flow provides readers with a simple process to reclaim a close, playful relationship with God. This book adds a spiritual element to the current discussions about “flow,” i.e., being one with the Divine Spirit who opens our heart.