Abbey Bookshelf: Pre-Lenten Edition

January 23, 2008 · by Christine

It is hard to believe that the Christian liturgical season of Lent is only two weeks away.  I asked for some input last week on your favorite Lenten resources, and didn’t hear much back, so I offer some of mine here and feel free to add yours in the comments or email me and I will add them to the body of the post.  Website links to resources are also welcome. 

Lent begins so very early this year that I feel like I am still in Advent and Christmas!  But I love the invitation of the 40 days of Lent to enter into a deeper way of being and like to prepare for it ahead of time.  So on to the book recommendations:

My favorite Lenten/Easter season resource is The Rising: Living the Mysteries of Lent, Easter, and Pentecost by Wendy Wright.  Wendy is a lay person who writes beautifully about the sacredness of ordinary experience.

Bread And Wine: Readings For Lent And Easter is a great collection of readings from a variety of writers like Dorothy Day, Madeleine L’Engle, C.S. Lewis, and Frederick Buechner.

You can’t go wrong with either of these books from the same series, which each focus on a single author — Henri Nouwen and Thomas Merton:

Lent And Easter Wisdom: Daily Scripture And Prayers Together With Nouwen’s Own Words

Lent and Easter Wisdom from Thomas Merton

I really enjoy Barbara Cawthorne Crafton’s very down-to-earth meditations and have found several very fruitful ones in her book: Living Lent: Meditations for These Forty Days

And this one I haven’t seen before, but I love things Benedictine, so I may order it and take a peek: Pilgrim Road: A Benedictine Journey Through Lent

Megan McKenna is a great storyteller and incorporates a justice perspective into her reflections: Lent: The Sunday Readings : Reflections and Stories (Lent)

I am still contemplating my practice for Lent.  I just discovered this book by Macrina Wiederkehr — Behold Your Life; A Pilgrimage Through Your Memories. I am intrigued because while it isn’t billed as a Lenten book, it is structured as a 40-day journey through your life story and memories. So it may be just the thing for me connected to my family systems work and with some sort of art journey, similar to what I did for Advent.

Lots of possibilities here, what are your suggestions?

I encourage to buy books at your locally-owned bookstore, but if you do go through Amazon, clicking on the links above helps to support the Abbey.

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*kigen suggests some music from Hildegard of Bingen, especially ORDO VIRTUTUM by Vox Animae.

*Suz reminded me of The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s Final Days in Jerusalem which I read last year and makes a great Holy Week meditation.

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** Visit this week’s Poetry Party! As usual, an abundance of poetic beauty to be found there**

**Come back tomorrow for my next Sacred Artist Interview with photographer Bill Hughlett**

-Christine Valters Paintner @ Abbey of the Arts

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Posted in Abbey Bookshelf | 5 Comments »

5 Responses to “Abbey Bookshelf: Pre-Lenten Edition”

  1. Kigen Says:
    January 23rd, 2008 at 8:20 am

    Christine,

    Thanks for these recommendations — they all look fantastic
    and I will order a couple today.

    I know the writings of Dorothy Day and Henri Nouwen. Day as
    the founder of the first soup kitchens in New York City, seems
    to me a marvellous person to get in touch with at this time.
    Henri Nowein’s essays are also informed by Eastern Spirituality,
    which I like much.

    For music, how about Hildegard’s ORDO VIRTUTUM!
    by Vox Animae

    Hildegard of Bingen. The Soul’s Journey: ORDO VIRTUTUM
    (Play of the Virtues). Performed by Vox Animae, directed by
    Michael Fields and Evelyn Tubb. Etcetera Record Co. (recorded
    1995) KTC 1203. (See sound samples at Amazon.) See also
    complete performance on DVD (2003) with Patricia Routledge.

    ~ Kigen

  2. Kigen Says:
    January 23rd, 2008 at 8:22 am

    Sorry, typo on repeat of Nouwen’s name!

  3. yolanda Says:
    January 23rd, 2008 at 12:43 pm

    Interesting list and I will check out some of these books.I didn’t realize that this year lent was so early.

  4. Suz Says:
    January 25th, 2008 at 4:06 pm

    I like The Last Week by Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan. If you have read any Borg, you now it is quite liberal but, for me, it provided a really fresh look on why Jesus gives up his life. I think I will reread it this year.

  5. How could I forget? | Abbey of the Arts Says:
    January 26th, 2008 at 4:35 pm

    [...] addition, Suz reminded me in the comments of my last Abbey Bookshelf post of The Last Week: What the Gospels Really Teach About Jesus’s Final Days in Jerusalem by Marcus [...]