Spiritual Friends

Christianity Today Book Award Winner Friendship is a relationship like no other. Unlike the relationships we are born into, we choose our friends. It is also tenuous--we can end a friendship at any time. But should friendship be so free and unconstrained? Although our culture tends to pay more attention to romantic love, marriage, family, and other forms of community, friendship is a genuine love in its own right. This eloquent book reminds us that Scripture and tradition have a high view of friendship. Single Christians, particularly those who are gay and celibate, may find it is a form of love to which they are especially called. Writing with deep empathy and with fidelity to historic Christian teaching, Wesley Hill retrieves a rich understanding of friendship as a spiritual vocation and explains how the church can foster friendship as a basic component of Christian discipleship. He helps us reimagine friendship as a robust form of love that is worthy of honor and attention in communities of faith. This book sets forth a positive calling for celibate gay Christians and suggests practical ways for all Christians to cultivate stronger friendships.

Spiritual Friends provides a biblically relevant training manual and relationally practical workbook for relating God's truth to human relationships. Spiritual Friends is for the layperson, pastor, or professional Christian counselor. It will equip the reader to master the personal ministry of the Word and spiritual friendships with thousands of illustrative interactions and hundreds of skill-building exercises.

A collection of the favorite guided meditations of senior monks and nuns of the International Mahayana Institute of the FPMT. A collection of the favorite guided meditations of senior monks and nuns of the International Mahayana Institute of the FPMT. These meditations center on different Buddhist themes and provide a good resource for the practicing meditator. The book also includes brief spiritual autobiographies that allow the reader to trace each contributors' entry into and study of Tibetan Buddhism. Our true spiritual friends are the positive potentials in our minds, which will never never disappoint us and never desert us. Similarly, the generous and personal meditations offered in this book help us develop these potentials and thus are true friends to whom we can always turn. Likewise, the Sangha, as the ordained followers of the Buddha upon whom the continuity of the Buddha's teachings depend, are spiritual friends who encourage us and inspire us to transform our minds. This unique book—the first from the International Mahayana Institute—contains meditations written by eighteen nuns and monks of the IMI Sangha as well as an autobiographical essay from each in which these nuns and monks share how they came to the ordained life.

The idea of spiritual friendships is ancient. Yet for many modern Christians, the concept of being vulnerable and transparent with another pilgrim on the way is mysterious and new. Different from "discipling" another believer - a relationship that implies leader and follower, teacher and student - spiritual friendship is built on equality, mutual trust, accountability and risk-taking by both parties. Spiritual friendships aren't easy, but they're worth it. Spiritual Friendship explores the spiritual and Biblical foundations for spiritual friendships. Encouragement and stories about spiritual friendships drawn from the author's long experience helping to nurture these unique relationships, can set even the most reluctant traveler on the road to deeper, more transparent friendship with others and with God. Norm Allen is founder of Touchstone Ministries, a loosely linked community of friends whose vocation places them in leadership in the business, political, arts and spiritual marketplaces. Through Touchstone's work, leaders explore what it means to love God with heart, soul, mind and strength.

Becoming Gertrude is one woman’s wisdom on the beauty of spiritual friendship and God’s unfolding grace over the course of a life lived for Him. Jan uses the term spiritual friendship to capture this idea of journeying with others through life, sharing experiences and wisdom and seeking God together. In Becoming Gertrude, Jan wants to be your spiritual friend, sharing what she’s learned and painting a picture of what you might uncover as you seek to develop these kinds of relationships in your own life. Join Jan in exploring the critical pieces of spiritual friendship: hospitality, encouragement, acceptance, serving, and caring. With seasoned wisdom and winsome stories, Jan uses personal experiences to walk you through what each of these things can mean in your life. You can have rich, rewarding, faith-filled friendships that emerge from the everyday rhythms of your days—and Becoming Gertrude will lead you on that journey.

Like wise old friends, two Tibetan masters offer down-to-earth advice for cultivating compassion, wisdom, and happiness in every situation. Based on practical Buddhist verses on "thought training" Advice from a Spiritual Friend teaches how to develop the inner skills that lead to contentment by responding to everyday difficulties with patience and joy.

Giving spiritual direction and preparing to become a spiritual director are characterized in terms of the preparation, qualities, and practical considerations necessary for guiding fellow Christians.