A well-designed guidebook with pragmatic instruction for spiritual retreats.
A Catholic author rediscovers traditional Jesuit Spiritual Exercises through the writings of Pope Francis.
The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius Loyola have been the cornerstone of Jesuit meditation and prayer for half a millennium; they were designed especially for Catholics in religious retreats who seek to discern the will of God. At the peak of the 2020 Covid-19 lockdowns, Ivereigh—the lead organizer of a retreat for the British Province of the Jesuits—moved his group to a virtual setting where participants were “linked by screens and fellowship and the vulnerability we were feeling at that time.” This book’s eight chapters parallel the topics of that eight-day event, which particularly focused on the 21st century’s “crisis of nonbelonging”: “Restless, anxious, and insecure, people find it hard to build community.” The author emphasizes that isolation extends well beyond the context of pandemic-related social distancing, and he highlights the social ills of self-interest and the marginalization of migrants and refugees. The book draws heavily on the writings of Pope Francis, who, as the first Jesuit pope, has a special connection to the Spiritual Exercises, having served as “a formidable Ignatian spiritual director” in his pre-Vatican life. As the author of two biographies of Pope Francis, as well as co-authoring a bestselling book with him (2020’s Let Us Dream: The Path to a Better Future), there’s perhaps no better expert on the philosophy of Francis than Ivereigh. This well-researched book, which includes more than 20 pages of sources and bibliographic entries, offers readers excerpts from Pope Francis’ writings, many of which are presented here in English translation for the first time; the book even features a foreword by the pope himself that effectively contextualizes the Spiritual Exercises and retreats as one of the Catholic Church’s “channels of grace.” Designed for personal or group use, the book offers easily replicated retreat activities, replete with prayers, discussion questions, and readings for contemplation. The book’s backmatter provides a handy “User Guide” and other helpful materials to facilitate an event.
A well-designed guidebook with pragmatic instruction for spiritual retreats.Pub Date: Feb. 13, 2024
ISBN: 9780829457919
Page Count: 240
Publisher: Loyola Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2024
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.
Memories and life lessons inspired by the author’s mother, who was murdered in 2021.
“Neither my mother nor I knew that her last text to me would be the words ‘Think you’ll be happy,’ ” Avant writes, "but it is fitting that she left me with a mantra for resiliency.” The author, a filmmaker and former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas, begins her first book on the night she learned her mother, Jacqueline Avant, had been fatally shot during a home invasion. “One of my first thoughts,” she writes, “was, ‘Oh God, please don’t let me hate this man. Give me the strength not to hate him.’ ” Daughter of Clarence Avant, known as the “Black Godfather” due to his work as a pioneering music executive, the author describes growing up “in a house that had a revolving door of famous people,” from Ella Fitzgerald to Muhammad Ali. “I don’t take for granted anything I have achieved in my life as a Black American woman,” writes Avant. “And I recognize my unique upbringing…..I was taught to honor our past and pay forward our fruits.” The book, which is occasionally repetitive, includes tributes to her mother from figures like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton, but the narrative core is the author’s direct, faith-based, unwaveringly positive messages to readers—e.g., “I don’t want to carry the sadness and anger I have toward the man who did this to my mother…so I’m worshiping God amid the worst storm imaginable”; "Success and feeling good are contagious. I’m all about positive contagious vibrations!” Avant frequently quotes Bible verses, and the bulk of the text reflects the spirit of her daily prayer “that everything is in divine order.” Imploring readers to practice proactive behavior, she writes, “We have to always find the blessing, to be the blessing.”
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9780063304413
Page Count: 288
Publisher: HarperOne
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
This a book of earlier, philosophical essays concerned with the essential "absurdity" of life and the concept that- to overcome the strong tendency to suicide in every thoughtful man-one must accept life on its own terms with its values of revolt, liberty and passion. A dreary thesis- derived from and distorting the beliefs of the founders of existentialism, Jaspers, Heldegger and Kierkegaard, etc., the point of view seems peculiarly outmoded. It is based on the experience of war and the resistance, liberally laced with Andre Gide's excessive intellectualism. The younger existentialists such as Sartre and Camus, with their gift for the terse novel or intense drama, seem to have omitted from their philosophy all the deep religiosity which permeates the work of the great existentialist thinkers. This contributes to a basic lack of vitality in themselves, in these essays, and ten years after the war Camus seems unaware that the life force has healed old wounds... Largely for avant garde aesthetes and his special coterie.
Pub Date: Sept. 26, 1955
ISBN: 0679733736
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 1955
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