Reading: The Spirit of the Liturgy -- Commemorative Edition 
by Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger (Author), Romano Guardini (Author) $18
Paperback, Ignatius – April 30, 2020 (238 pages)
Recommendation and discussion leader: Father Hilgendorf

Considered by Ratzinger devotees to be one of his greatest works, this profound and beautifully written treatment of the liturgy will help readers to deepen their understanding of the "great prayer of the Church". The cardinal discusses fundamental misunderstandings of the Second Vatican Council's intentions for liturgical renewal, especially about the priest's orientation of prayer to the Father, the placement of the tabernacle in churches, and the posture of kneeling. Other important topics are the essence of worship, the Jewish roots of Christian prayer, the relationship of the liturgy to time and space, sacred art and music, and the active participation of the faithful in the Mass. Also includes the earlier classic work with the same title by Servant of God Romano Guardini, a book that helped Ratzinger to "rediscover the liturgy in all its beauty, hidden wealth and time-transcending grandeur, to see it as the animating center of the Church, the very center of Christian life".

NOTE: If your schedule does not permit reading both works in the book, simply read Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger’s work (through page 238 of large type). Romano Guardini’s work of the same name that inspired Cardinal Ratzinger’s book, and is an optional read.

Reading options:
Amazon purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Spirit-Liturgy-Fortieth-Anniversary-Commemorative/dp/1621644294/
Free PDF download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/avpldf0mpsp77h4hpmr5s/The-Spirit-of-the-Liturgy_Ratzinger.pdf?rlkey=8e8cp7fh0ic42vv7ftfmtm3ir&dl=0

Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
RSVP: Please sign up below and RSVP for the next meeting using the reminder email that you will receive before each meeting.
                                                                   

Reading: Reflections on the Psalms 
by C. S. Lewis (Author) 
HarperOne (Paperback), $11 – 192 pages
Recommendation and discussion leader: Nick Weil

In this wise and enlightening book, C. S. Lewis—the great British writer, scholar, lay theologian, broadcaster, Christian apologist, and bestselling author of Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, The Chronicles of Narnia, and many other beloved classics—examines the Psalms. As Lewis divines the meaning behind these timeless poetic verses, he makes clear their significance in our daily lives and reminds us of their power to illuminate moments of grace.

Reading options:
Amazon purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Reflections-Psalms-C-S-Lewis/dp/0062565486 ;
Free PDF download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/gx3pv7o1sv8rjvmjlqxt3/Reflections_on_the_Psalms_C-S-Lewis.pdf?rlkey=iy90whflpygax69ssswatcc47&dl=0 ;

Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
RSVP: Please sign up below and RSVP for the next meeting using the reminder email that you will receive before each meeting.

Reading (Novel): The Bridge of San Luis Rey
by Thornton Wilder 
SeaWolf Press Illustrated Classic Paperback – January 1, 2023 - $9 (118 pages)
Recommendation and discussion leader: Tom Heenan

The Bridge of San Luis Rey is American author Thornton Wilder's second novel. It was first published in 1927 to worldwide acclaim. The novel won the Pulitzer Prize in 1928, and was the best-selling work of fiction that year. It has also been made into several movies. It tells the story of several interrelated people who die in the collapse of an Inca rope bridge in Peru, and the events that lead up to their being on the bridge. A friar who witnesses the accident then goes about inquiring into the lives of the victims, seeking some sort of cosmic answer to the question of why each had to die.

Reading options:
Amazon purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Bridge-San-Luis-Rey-Illustrated/dp/B0BRH4KFW8
Free PDF download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/i1wxro2a3onv227817hg7/The_Bridge_of_San_Luis_Rey.pdf?rlkey=a5maghs245k6kxbltodjrsh1d&dl=0

Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
RSVP: Once you've registered, please RSVP for each meeting no less than five days beforehand using the reminder email that you will receive in advance of each meeting. This allows us to properly account for refreshments and munchies

Film for Viewing + Readings:
1.    Nefarious (film)
Recommendation and discussion leader: Tom Heenan
On the day of his scheduled electrocution, a convicted serial killer gets a last-minute court-ordered psychiatric evaluation. The killer surprises the psychiatrist with his claim that instead of trying to avoid his fate, he is in fact a demon who wants the punishment to go forward... and further claims that before their brief time together is over, the doctor will have committed three murders of his own. Nefarious could as easily be titled Interview with the Demon. This is a talky film, much of it devoted to Dr. Martin and Nefarious debating theology and morality inside a prison interview room. Martin is an atheist who tries to poke holes in Nefarious's supernatural claims, thus proving that Brady is feigning his possession. The demon in turn challenges Martin's rational world view and secular humanism. At one point, Martin calls for the prison chaplain. Nefarious reacts with hostility, until he realizes that the chaplain is a modern minister who doesn't believe in demons. Calming down, Nefarious says he wishes he'd met the chaplain earlier. "We're good," he tells him. “Claiming to be wise, they become fools… and exchange the truth about God for a lie and worship and serve the creature (desire and impulse) rather than the Creator” (Romans 1:22-25).

Viewing options:
Free on Prime Video to members
Free on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=XqfluzLvAPM
Purchase DVD at $9 here: https://www.amazon.com/Nefarious-DVD-Chuck-Konzelman/dp/B0C6FMBCSF

2.    Three Homilies Concerning the Power of Demons by St. John Chrysostom
Translated by Thomas Peele Brandram 35 pages
Recommendation and discussion leader: Bob Weil

These homilies deal with errors against which Chrysostom throughout his life most strenuously contended. In an age of great depravity there seem to have been many who tried to excuse the weak resistance which they made to evil, both in themselves, and in others, by maintaining that the world was abandoned to the dominion of devils, or to the irresistible course of fate. To counteract the disastrous effects of such philosophy, which surrendered man to the current of his passions, it was necessary to insist very boldly and resolutely on the essential freedom of the will, on moral responsibility, and the duty of vigorous exertion in resisting temptation. No one however has described in more forcible language the powerful hold of sin upon human nature, and the insufficiency of man to shake it off without the assistance of divine grace. 
Summary by Rev. W. R. W. Stephens

Free audiobook online: https://archive.org/details/homilies_demons_2305_librivox
Free PDF download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/x6kcs0s0qhvmij9yo5fde/DEMONS-MENTAL_ILLNESS_study_10_20_19b.pdf?rlkey=e4lqu5dtg5xxuedyb18vlt5p8&dl=0

3.    Demons and Mental Illness in the Bible  by Mark Kern – 11 pages
Recommendation and discussion leader: Bob Weil
                                                                    
Free PDF download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/x6kcs0s0qhvmij9yo5fde/DEMONS-MENTAL_ILLNESS_study_10_20_19b.pdf?rlkey=e4lqu5dtg5xxuedyb18vlt5p8&dl=0
Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
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Reading: "Love and the Postmodern Predicament: Rediscovering the Real in Beauty, Goodness, and Truth" 
by D. C. Schindler 
Veritas (Paperback) – May 16, 2018 - $21 (Kindle - $10) (166 pages)
Recommendation and discussion leader: Bob Weil

The computer has increasingly become the principal model for the mind, which means our most basic experience of "reality" is as mediated through a screen, or stored in a cloud. As a result, we are losing a sense of the concrete and imposing presence of the real, and the fundamental claim it makes on us, a claim that Iris Murdoch once described as the essence of love. In response to this postmodern predicament, the present book aims to draw on the classical philosophical tradition in order to articulate a robust philosophical anthropology, and a new appreciation of the importance of the "transcendental properties" of being: beauty, goodness, and truth.

Reading options:
Amazon purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Love-Postmodern-Predicament-Rediscovering-Goodness/dp/1532648731 

Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
RSVP: Once you've registered, please RSVP for each meeting no less than five days beforehand using the reminder email that you will receive in advance of each meeting. This allows us to properly account for refreshments and munchies

Readings: 

1.    No One Can Harm the Man Who Does Not Harm Himself
by Saint John Chrysostom
Publisher: ‎Ignatius Press (July 11, 2022) – 26 pages 
Recommendation and discussion leader: Patrick Loveless

“St John Chrysostom was an exemplar of the Christian tradition on forgiving the unrepentant under all circumstances (unreserved, unconditional forgiveness of one’s enemies and active persecutors, even without their seeking it), in his life as much as in his teaching. His views on forgiveness are neatly summarized in his comment on 1 Samuel/1 Kingdoms 24:1–7, where a beleaguered David finds his mortal enemy Saul asleep in a cave and spares his life. For Chrysostom, this was more than a simple act of mercy: it was a demonstration of what he called a “strange and new kind of philosophy” (Καινόν καὶ παράδοξον φιλοσοφίας τρόπον); the very “philosophy” that was expressed in Christ’s commandments to love our enemies and turn the other cheek.”
-    from “A ‘Strange New Philosophy’ of Forgiveness: Insights from St. John Chrysostom on Forgiving the Unrepentent” by Samuel Kaldas (St Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 63:3 (2019) p. 261)

Reading options:
Purchase on Amazon at $5.99:
https://www.amazon.com/One-Can-Harm-Does-Himself/dp/1088152902 ;
Free PDF download – No One Can Harm the Man Who Does Not Harm Himself
https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/hblo7ig01wnjibf2btglo/SAINT-CHRYSOSTOM-INTRO-No-One-Can-Harm-the-Man-Who-Does-Not-Harm-Himself.pdf?rlkey=53kjdqe5q4h2malexgaynph98&dl=0

2.    Address to Young Men: on the Right Use of Greek Literature
Treatise by Saint Basil the Great
Publisher: Henry Holt and Company (1902) – 30 pages
Recommendation and discussion leader: Father Hilgendorf

“Saint Basil’s letter ‘Address to the Young Men on How They Might Derive Benefit from Greek Literature’ has been the most widely read of any text by the Fathers, since the year 1459 when it was first published in a Latin translation. It has generated many editions and commentaries. Erasmus considered it unsurpassed by all the orators of antiquity. It constitutes a literary masterpiece equal to Demosthenes’ rhetoric and Plato’s dialectic. In St. Basil’s letter, virtue is depicted in the eyes of the young as a brilliant mosaic made of golden tiles of ancient Greek poets, orators and philosophers and a guide to Him who said: ‘I am the Way and the Truth and the Life.’ (John, 14:6). The question of what work of literature it is and to whom it was addressed remains until today an unsolved timeless enigma. Through this book, maybe for the first time, the answer to this enigma is brought to the readers’ judgement, based on revealing evidence taken from Saint Basil’s extant correspondence. The original text is also accompanied by enriched annotation and referrals to other ancient texts and is presented in English and the original Greek [in the for-purchase print version only].”

Reading options:
Amazon purchase (includes Greek original and new annotations / references) – $9.80: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B084YWMQNR ;  
Free PDF download (English only) https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/c0e1vfeagfjdz1goi2l4l/Address_to_Young_Men_on_the_Right_Use_of_Greek_Literature_St-Basil.pdf?rlkey=tiom5n5wtg2xhip4xtx0gp1jc&dl=0

Reading: He Leadeth Me: An Extraordinary Testament of Faith 
by Walter J. Ciszek S.J. (Author), Daniel L. Flaherty S.J. (Author) 
Image (Paperback) – $9 – 208 pages
Recommendation and discussion leader: Bob Weil

Captured by a Russian army during World War II and convicted of being a “Vatican spy,” Jesuit Father Walter J. Ciszek (author of With God in Russia) spent twenty-three agonizing years in Soviet prisons and the labor camps of Siberia. Only through an utter reliance on God’s will did he manage to endure the extreme hardship. He tells of the courage he found in prayer—a courage that eased the loneliness, the pain, the frustration, the anguish, the fears, the despair. For, as Ciszek relates, the solace of spiritual contemplation gave him an inner serenity upon which he was able to draw amidst the “arrogance of evil” that surrounded him. Ciszek learns to accept the inhuman work in the infamous Siberian salt mines as a labor pleasing to God. And through that experience, he was able to turn the adverse forces of circumstance into a source of positive value and a means of drawing closer to the compassionate and never-forsaking Divine Spirit.

He Leadeth Me is a book to inspire all Christians to greater faith and trust in God—even in their darkest hour. As the author asks, “What can ultimately trouble the soul that accepts every moment of every day as a gift from the hands of God and strives always to do his will?”

Reading options:
Amazon purchase: https://www.amazon.com/He-Leadeth-Me-Extraordinary-Testament/dp/0804141525

Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
RSVP: Once you've registered, please RSVP for each meeting no less than five days beforehand using the reminder email that you will receive in advance of each meeting. This allows us to properly account for refreshments and munchies

Reading: Reflections on the Psalms 
by C. S. Lewis (Author) 
HarperOne (Paperback), $11 – 192 pages
Recommendation and discussion leader: Nick Weil
In this wise and enlightening book, C. S. Lewis—the great British writer, scholar, lay theologian, broadcaster, Christian apologist, and bestselling author of Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, The Chronicles of Narnia, and many other beloved classics—examines the Psalms. As Lewis divines the meaning behind these timeless poetic verses, he makes clear their significance in our daily lives and reminds us of their power to illuminate moments of grace.
Reading options:
Amazon purchase: https://www.amazon.com/Reflections-Psalms-C-S-Lewis/dp/0062565486 ;
Free PDF download: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/gx3pv7o1sv8rjvmjlqxt3/Reflections_on_the_Psalms_C-S-Lewis.pdf?rlkey=iy90whflpygax69ssswatcc47&dl=0 ;
Location: To be announced in the next meeting reminder email after you register below.
RSVP: Please sign up below and RSVP for the next meeting using the reminder email that you will receive before each meeting.