Introduction to the Devout Life

Introduction to the Devout Life
Author: Saint Francis De Sales
Publisher: Ignatius Press
Total Pages: 276
Release: 2015-06-08
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1681497220

Written over 400 years ago, Introduction to the Devout Life is still one of the most popular books for those pursuing holiness. St. Francis de Sales explains how to turn that desire for sanctity into resolutions that yield grace-filled results. Themes include: Pursuing a devout life whole-heartedly Incorporating prayer and sacraments into a busy schedule Growing in virtue Battling wisely against temptation Making spiritual progress through daily, monthly, and yearly exercises Whether you are just beginning your spiritual journey or are more advanced in the spiritual life, you’ll be able to apply this timeless wisdom immediately. Let St. Francis de Sales illumine the path to holiness and strengthen your desire to walk that road with the Lord. St. Francis de Sales (1567–1622) was the Bishop of Geneva and a renowned spiritual director. Preaching during the Counter-Reformation, he is estimated to have converted 70,000 Calvinists in his short lifetime. He was a fervent proponent of the universal call to holiness and spent much of his time guiding lay people on the road to sanctity. Declared a Doctor of the Church by Pope Pius IX in 1877, St. Francis is still helping to form saints through his many writings, of which Introduction to the Devout Life is the most famous.

Online with Saints

Online with Saints
Author: Michel Remery
Publisher: Our Sunday Visitor
Total Pages: 545
Release: 2020-10-05
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1681926830

Imagine you could meet a saint. Whom would you choose? Online with Saints invites you to virtually encounter more than one hundred saints from around the world. Women and men, carpenters and scholars, mothers and popes, princes and paupers. This book is filled with the stories of real people who strived for holiness in their everyday lives. Their stories are linked to modern questions, and together with these saints you can find the answers. The accompanying free app Online with Saints contains social media profiles for 100-plus saints, with fascinating biographical facts, quotes, prayers, and captivating evidence of their personal faith and love of God and neighbor. The app provides an augmented reality encounter. Use your phone to scan the image of a saint in the book, then watch the saint tell his or her story. Every saint has a unique story to tell about his or her journey to heaven. Each found his or her vocation in life in a different way. Their lives remind us that God has a plan for each and every one of us. If we are prepared to follow his will, he will make saints of us, too.

Consoling Thoughts on Trials of an Interior Life

Consoling Thoughts on Trials of an Interior Life
Author: St. Francis de Sales
Publisher: TAN Books
Total Pages: 152
Release: 2013-01-24
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1618901435

In Consoling Thoughts on Trials of an Interior Life St. Francis de Sales, beloved Doctor of the Church, gives us treasured insight from the master of spiritual direction. How can the soul persevere in piety in the midst of affliction? How should we conduct ourselves when suffering interior trials? How can we profit from our own faults? St. Francis de Sales explains all this and more. In this masterful collection, St. Francis speaks to every soul on the riches to be gained from suffering trials and temptations, the advantages we can draw from our own defects, and how to choose and carry the best crosses. Also included are uplifting passages on suffering sadness, or what we would now call depression. Readers of Consoling Thoughts will experience firsthand why St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622) is known to history as the Gentle Saint. St. Francis was Bishop of Geneva and a tireless preacher, who yet made time to correspond with numerous souls who wrote him for his insight and guidance. His Consoling Thoughts are compiled from these letters as well as from his other spiritual works.

Lift Up Your Heart

Lift Up Your Heart
Author: Fr. John Burns
Publisher: Ave Maria Press
Total Pages: 192
Release: 2017-04-28
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1594717214

Winner of a 2018 Catholic Press Association Award: First-Time Author, Spirituality Softcover (First Place) and a 2018 Association of Catholic Publishers Award: Inspirational (Second Place). For more than four-hundred years, Introduction to the Devout Life by Doctor of the Church St. Francis de Sales has been regarded as the essential guide to holiness and loving God. This spiritual classic takes on new life in Lift Up Your Heart, where Rev. John Burns has interpreted ten meditations for the modern reader and distilled them into a ten-day mini-retreat that can easily be completed in the midst of a busy life. This practical book goes right to the heart of helping you kick the habit of floating along on your spiritual journey to start actively pursuing holiness and devotion to God. During the course of the retreat, you'll learn the basics of forming a daily prayer routine, including how to offer yourself to God, meditate on his love, and maintain peace in the face of suffering and clarity in the midst of temptation. The meditations will help you: Adopt gratitude as a daily prayer practice. Examine and reorder your priorities and relationships to better reflect your love for God. Discern between good and evil in your life. Desire to love and serve as Jesus did. In a very real sense, Burns helps you take St. Francis de Sales as your spiritual director for ten days. As you do so, you’ll feel God’s fatherly love and restart your faith life, equipped with the tools to connect with God and live for heaven now.

The Story of a Soul

The Story of a Soul
Author: St. Thérèse of Lisieux
Publisher: TAN Books
Total Pages: 286
Release: 2010-04
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0895559676

The Story of a Soul conveys St. Thérèse of Lisieux's "Little Way" of spiritual childhood - her "elevator" to Heaven, as she called it. This method was approved by Pope Pius XI as a way for all to grow in holiness through unfailing confidence and childlike delight in God's merciful love. Again and again in this book, St. Thérèse shows us how her "Little Way" of love and trust comes straight from Sacred Scripture. This book belongs in every Catholic home, for Pope St Pius X stated St. Thérèse of Lisieux the "greatest Saint of modern times". This is the original TAN edition now with updated typesetting, fresh new cover, new size and quality binding, and the same trusted content.

Live Today Well

Live Today Well
Author: Fr. Thomas Dailey
Publisher: Sophia Institute Press
Total Pages: 225
Release: 2015-07-06
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 162282301X

Living the Christian life requires a strategy. Most of us won’t get to heaven through heroic feats of sanctity, but by learning to live the devout life through our everyday activities. St. Francis de Sales has developed for you a spiritual plan of action — a plan that will help you acquire holiness despite the many responsibilities and mundane realities that take up all your time and effort. In these pages, Fr. Thomas Dailey — an Oblate of St. Francis de Sales — gently guides you through St. Francis de Sales’s spiritual plan, showing how you can balance time devoted to God with the time needed to complete your many tasks each day. You’ll learn St. Francis de Sales’s technique of daily prayer and grace-filled awareness that will transform your life one day at a time — no matter how busy your lifestyle. From making a spiritual retreat during the day to fending off the many temptations you face, Live Today Wellwill help you commune with God throughout your day. And by practicing the little virtues you learn here, you’ll soon find yourself moving toward the heavenly heights as you become the saint you are called by God to be. You’ll also learn: Four ways to become aware of God’s presence Tips for spiritual time-management Simple methods of praying, whether in Church or not How to avoid the three dangerous tendencies that appear in conversations How to conquer your greatest temptations The one virtue which gives greatest assurance for reaching perfection The two critical elements of any good confession

The Twelve Steps to Holiness and Salvation

The Twelve Steps to Holiness and Salvation
Author: St. Alphonsus Liguori
Publisher: TAN Books
Total Pages: 203
Release: 1993-11
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1618909185

The 12 Steps to Holiness is compiled from the writings of St. Alphonsus Liguori and is rated as one of the most beautiful and inspiring books by numerous TAN readers. St. Alphonsus develops, in the most simple language, yet with the greatest learning, the 12 key virtues necessary for salvation: faith, hope, love of God, love of neighbor, poverty, chastity, obedience, meekness or humility, mortification, recollection, prayer and self-denial or love of the cross. This book is written with such an encompassing view that its message is for all—religious or layman, the young or the old, the pious or the wayward. The reader will marvel at the balance, the simplicity, the learning, the interest, the calm and the holy unction that penetrate this work. And he will find himself repeatedly marking significant passage and returning to them again and again for instruction and edification. Here is a book, quite simply, for everyone who would save his soul.