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Encountering Artificial Intelligence: Ethical and Anthropological Explorations.
Noreen L. Herzfeld, Matthew J. Gaudet, Paul Scherz, and Jordan J. Wales
What does it mean to consider the world of AI through a Christian lens? Rapid developments in AI continue to reshape society, raising new ethical questions and challenging our understanding of the human person. Encountering Artificial Intelligence draws on Pope Francis's discussion of a culture of encounter and broader themes in Catholic social thought in order to examine how current AI applications affect human relationships in various social spheres and offers concrete recommendations for better implementation. The document also explores questions regarding personhood, consciousness, and the kinds of relationships humans might have with even the most advanced AI. Through these discussions, the document investigates the theoretical and practical challenges to interpersonal encounter raised by the age of AI. --From the Publisher's website
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Be Transformed: A Biblical Journey toward a More Just World
Micah D. Kiel
Discover the ways Catholic social teaching and its biblical roots can guide us toward authentic Christian living in a world in need of profound change.
The goal of every Christian life is to be shaped and transformed by God. In Scripture we are reminded that transformation requires sacrifice and that if we care about the poor, the environment, and those in prison, we need to be transformed into agents of justice. But how are we to take up that responsibility in a world dominated by greed, division, environmental destruction, and violence?
In Be Transformed, Micah Kiel brings together Catholic social teaching and its biblical roots and applies them to instances of injustice in our world today. When understood together, Catholic social teaching and Scripture create authentically Christian ways to live in a world in need of profound change. Be Transformed is an accessible guide that encourages readers to break open their hearts and minds to the possibility of life-giving transformation. By applying art, history, tradition, and Scripture to modern issues, readers will be challenged and empowered to consult these traditions in a meaningful way, every day.
--From publisher's website
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Speak Lord Your Servant is Listening: Reflections on Faithful Communication in a Digital Age
Daniella Zsupan-Jerome
In step with the Spirit, how can we communicate faithfully as we encounter one another online?
Communicating faith is about living it, and sharing it with others, in word, and witness of life. These days, many people find themselves navigating the joys and struggles of life through screens and scrolling digital devices. As pilgrims on the journey, we are called to be intentional about how we share our stories and may wonder how our presence in digital spaces invites faithfulness. How can we communicate authentically as we encounter one another online? In Speak Lord, Your Servant Is Listening, pastoral theologian Daniella Zsupan-Jerome invites readers on a retreat—rooted in the Benedictine tradition—that promotes a spirituality of communication built on listening, engagement with the Word, and hospitality to others.
Intended as a devotional resource for all faithful communicators, Speak Lord, Your Servant Is Listening is a lectio divina-based guide that invites prayer and reflection around the theme of communication in the Bible. Through the lens of Scripture, readers will discover what each selected passage reveals about communication, and in particular, the realities of digital culture today. It is for anyone seeking a more life-giving way of being connected with one another faithfully out of a sense of Spirit and communion.
From publisher's website
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Mary and the Liturgical Year : a Pastoral Resource
Katharine E. Harmon
In Mary and the Liturgical Year: A Pastoral Resource, liturgical scholar and professor Katharine E. Harmon offers an engaging survey of Mary's role in the Church's liturgical prayer from the first days of the early Church to our own day. In this unique resource, Harmon examines the twelve prominent Marian solemnities, feasts, and memorials celebrated throughout the liturgical year. Pastoral ministers, theology students, and persons seeking to reflect on Mary as a source of wisdom and faith will discover the riches of Marian theology and will come to understand how Mary always leads us to a deeper and more intimate relationship with her son, Jesus. --From publisher's website
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Religious and Cultural Implications of Technology-Mediated Relationships in a Post-Pandemic World.
Noreen L. Herzfeld, Ilia Delio, and Robert Nicastro
"This book offers a variety of positions on how technology is influencing religious communal and cultural life. There is no doubt that our interaction with technology will shape the human community up ahead. These essays provide a basis for thoughtful choice and action"-- Provided by publisher.
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Glorify the Lord by Your Life: Catholic Social Teaching and the Liturgy
Bernard F. Evans
This resource provides a unique approach for understanding the important connection between the liturgy and the seven primary themes of Catholic social teaching. -- Publisher's website
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Reading the Bible in the Age of Francis
Micah D. Kiel
Pope Francis has taken the world by storm. He is the most prominent Christian voice in our world today. How does he incorporate Scripture into his ministry and what does Scripture say about those things he emphasizes? This book will explore within Scripture the bedrock themes of Francis' time as Pope, such as the poor, women, a God of surprises, mercy, the environment, and excessive legalism. What we find is that a diversity of biblical perspectives provide deep theological support or precedent for Francis' agenda. Both Francis and Scripture call Christians today to live in dramatically new ways in our world. -- Provided by publisher.
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Guide for Celebrating the Liturgy of the Hours
Anthony Ruff OSB
Throughout the history of the Church, Christians have consecrated time by pausing at various moments throughout the day to pray the Liturgy of the Hours, also known as the Divine Office. Day after day, hour after hour, Christians unite their hearts with Christ and his Church as they pray the Divine Office. This book will assist parish communities and groups of Christians who wish to gather to pray the Liturgy of the Hours.
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The Collegeville chant psalter : for Sundays, solemnities, and major feast days
Anthony Ruff OSB
Collection of responsorial psalms, ordered by psalm number. Contains psalm tones with pointing, and antiphons, both with keyboard accompaniment.
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God’s Word, Your World, 2017-2018: Reflections to Share with Catholic Youth
Jeffrey J. Kaster
Those who work with Catholic teens know that they are a unique group with profound capabilities and tremendous challenges. It is hard to know how to approach teens, and as a result, many parishes wind up retaining a small group of core youth ministry members while the rest of the parish teens seem to disappear. How can parishes talk to teenagers, especially those who don’t seem to be listening? God’s Word, Your World! provides you with the ability to “speak teen,” communicating with all teens in your parish on their level. This CD-ROM contains one-page, Lectionary-based digital reproducible handouts for every Sunday and Holyday of Obligation from the first Sunday in September 2017 through the last Sunday in August, 2018. Each digital reproducible contains a Scripture reflection, a suggestion for action, and journaling questions. They can be printed out for handouts, e-mailed, blogged, put on a parish website, or shared on Facebook. This gives you a way to meet teens where they are and communicate about the things that they are facing in their daily lives.
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The Stories We Live: Finding God's Calling All Around Us
Kathleen A. Cahalan
"Christian vocation," says Kathleen Cahalan, "is about connecting our stories with God's story." In The Stories We Live Cahalan rejuvenates and transforms vocation from a static concept to a living, dynamic reality.
Incorporating biblical texts, her own experience, and the personal stories of others, Cahalan discusses how each of us is called by God, to follow, as we are, from grief, for service, in suffering, through others, within God. Readers of this book will discover an exciting new vocabulary of vocation and find a fresh vision for God's calling in their lives.
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Integrating Work in Theological Education
Kathleen A. Cahalan, Edward Foley, and Gordon S. Mikoski
If only we could do a better job of helping students at "connecting the dots," theological educators commonly lament. Integration, often proposed as a solution to the woes of professional education for ministry, would help students integrate knowledge, skills, spirituality, and integrity. When these remain disconnected, incompetence ensues, and the cost runs high for churches, denominations, and ministers themselves. However, we fail in thinking that integrating work is for students alone. It is a multifaceted, constructive process of learning that is contextual, reflective, and dialogical. It aims toward important ends--competent leaders who can guide Christian communities today. It entails rhythms, not stages, and dynamic movement, including disintegration. Integrating work is learning in motion, across domains, and among and between persons. It is social and communal, born of a life of learning together for faculty, staff, administrators and students. It is work that bridges the long-standing gaps between school, ministry practice, and life. It's a verb, not a noun. Here a diverse group of theological educators, through descriptive case studies, theological reflection, and theory building, offer a distinctive contribution to understanding integrating work and how best to achieve it across three domains: in community, curriculums, and courses.
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Calling All Years Good: Christian Vocation Throughout Life's Seasons
Kathleen A. Cahalan and Bonnie J. Miller-Mclemore
A uniquely comprehensive discussion of vocation from infancy to old age
Do infants have a vocation? Do Alzheimer's patients? In popular culture, vocation is often reduced to adult work or church ministry. Rarely do we consider childhood or old age as crucial times for commencing or culminating a life of faith in response to God's calling. This book addresses that gap by showing how vocation emerges and evolves over the course of an entire lifetime. The authors cover six of life's distinct seasons, weaving together personal narrative, developmental theory, case studies, and spiritual practices. Calling All Years Good grounds the discussion of vocation in concrete realities and builds a cohesive framework for understanding calling throughout all of life.
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Empirical Foundations of the Common Good: What Theology Can Learn from Social Science
Daniel K. Finn
The idea of the common good was borrowed by the Fathers of the early Catholic Church from the rich philosophical traditions of ancient Greece and Rome. It has been a fundamental part of Catholic thinking about social, political, and economic life throughout the Catholic intellectual tradition, from Augustine and Aquinas to modern Catholic social thought in the encyclicals of popes in recent centuries. Yet this history has been rooted in the traditions of philosophy and theology. With the rise of the social sciences in the nineteenth century as distinct disciplines no longer limited to the methods of their philosophical origins, humanity has learned a great deal more about the human condition. Empirical Foundations of the Common Good asks two questions: what have the social sciences learned about the common good? how might theology alter its understanding of the common good in light of that insight?
In this volume, six social scientists, with backgrounds in economics, political science, sociology, and policy analysis, speak about what their disciplines have to contribute to discussions within Catholic social thought about the common good. Two theologians then respond by examining the insights of social science and exploring how Catholic social thought can integrate social scientific insights into its understanding of the common good. This volume's interplay of social scientific and religious views is a unique contribution to contemporary discussion of what constitutes "the common good."
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Religion and the New Technologies
Noreen L. Herzfeld
Noreen Herzfeld's featured article: https://doi.org/10.3390/books978-3-03842-531-1
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Apocalyptic Ecology: The Book of Revelation, the Earth, and the Future
Micah D. Kiel and Barbara R. Rossing
The author of the book of Revelation struggled, as we do today, to live out a Christian faith in the context of an empire that trampled and destroyed the earth and its creatures. In this book, Micah D. Kiel will look at how and why Revelation was written, along with how it has been interpreted across the centuries, to come to an understanding of its potential contribution to a modern environmental ethic. While the book of Revelation is replete with images of destruction of the earth, Kiel shows readers, through Revelation's ancient context, a message of hope that calls for the care of and respect for the environment.
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United in Christ: Preparing the Liturgy of the Word at Catholic Weddings
Leisa Anslinger, Jennifer Kerr Breedlove, Charles A. Bobertz, Mary A. Ehle, Christopher J. Ferraro, Mary G. Fox, Corinna Laughlin, and Biagio Mazza
United in Christ: Preparing the Liturgy of the Word at Catholic Weddings is perfect for parish staffs to provide couples with a high quality and pastoral resource for preparing all aspects of the Liturgy of the Word for their wedding. This includes:
- Full texts of the readings from The Order of Celebrating Matrimony in sense line format
- Pastoral Scripture commentary written by married Catholic scholars and liturgical ministers
- Reading suggestions for a cohesive and unified Liturgy of the Word
- Reasons a couple might select a particular reading
- Guidance for writing the Prayer of the Faithful with sample texts
- Full texts of the consent, blessing and exchange of rings, and the Nuptial Blessing
- Selection form to turn in to the pastor, deacon, or liturgist
United in Christ presents a focused and simple resource to help couples select the most necessary parts of the wedding liturgy. The commentaries explain the meaning of the Scripture text through the lens of the needs of the couple.
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The Gospel of Mark: A Liturgical Reading
Charles A. Bobertz
Long before the Gospel writers put pen to papyrus, the earliest Christians participated in powerful rituals that fundamentally shaped their understanding of God, Christ, and the world in which they lived. This volume offers a liturgical reading of the Gospel of Mark, arguing that the Gospel is a narrative interpretation of early Christian ritual. The Gospel begins with Jesus's baptism by John and ends with Jesus and his disciples gathered for the Lord's Supper. In between, the narrative story of Jesus unfolds as the beloved Son is sent to gather not just the Jews but Gentiles and women to the table of the one loaf. This fresh, responsible, and creative proposal shows how cultural anthropology and ritual studies elucidate ancient texts, revealing how the rituals of baptism and the Lord's Supper shaped the earliest Christians and impacted their understanding of Jesus. In addition to scholars, professors, and students, its ecclesial and pastoral ramifications will be of interest to pastors and church leaders.
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Calling in Today's World
Kathleen A. Cahalan
Comparative religious insights into the meaning of vocation in today's world
The concept of "vocation" or "calling" is a distinctively Christian concern, grounded in the long-held belief that we find our meaning, purpose, and fulfillment in God. But what about religions other than Christianity? What does it mean for someone from another faith tradition to understand calling or vocation?
In this book contributors with expertise in Catholic and Protestant Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Daoism, and secular humanism explore the idea of calling from these eight faith perspectives. The contributors search their respective traditions' sacred texts, key figures, practices, and concepts for wisdom on the meaning of vocation. Greater understanding of diverse faith traditions, say Kathleen Cahalan and Douglas Schuurman, will hopefully increase and improve efforts to build a better, more humane world.
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Christian Practical Wisdom: What It Is, Why It Matters
Kathleen A. Cahalan, Dorothy Bass, and Bon Miller
In this richly collaborative work, five distinguished scholars examine the oft-neglected embodied practical wisdom that is essential for true theological understanding and faithful Christian living. After first showing what Christian practical wisdom is and does in several real-life situations, the authors tell why such practical wisdom matters and how it operates, exploring reasons behind its decline in both the academy and the church and setting forth constructive cases for its renewal.
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Vatican I & Vatican II: Councils in the Living Tradition
Kristin Colberg
Vatican I and Vatican II represent two of the three ecumenical councils in modern times, yet relatively few studies have sought to understand their relation to one another. In fact, the councils are often positioned as mutually exclusive so that one must choose either Vatican I's or Vatican II's presentations of church and ecclesial authority. Failing to understand the relationship between these councils inhibits the church's self-understanding and risks misinterpreting key aspects of its own tradition; further, it limits the church's ability to teach effectively on topics of concern to modern women and men, such as authority, freedom, and ecclesiology. Vatican I and Vatican II: Councils in the Living Tradition uses the questions of what, why, and how the councils taught to frame and demonstrate significant points of continuity, complementarity, and difference between them. It argues that only by seeing both Vatican I and Vatican II as communicating vital dimensions of the Christian faith can the church's living tradition be fully appreciated and speak meaningfully to modern Christian women and men.
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Youth Ministry
Jeffrey J. Kaster
All church ministries are oriented toward fostering missionary discipleship. Youth ministry focuses this mission on young people. In this new book in the Collegeville Ministry series, Jeffrey Kaster explores leadership for youth ministry, Christian discipleship, conversion, the theological foundations for youth ministry, the importance of community and belonging, and vocational discernment. Kaster looks at the practice of vocational discernment and how it encourages youth ministry to continually help young people discern their gifts, connect them in service to meet the world's deep needs, and foster Christian discipleship. Youth ministry at its best mobilizes the faith community to support young people as they learn to live as disciples of Jesus Christ.
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Living Your Discipleship: Seven Ways to Express Your Deepest Calling
Kathleen A. Cahalan and Laura Kelly Fanucci
We hear a lot about discipleship, but what does it mean for us, really? This enlightening book can help you discover how God has called you to be a disciple, just as surely as Jesus called to fishermen on the Sea of Galilee. Through personal stories, Scripture readings, and prayer experiences, you’ll see how the roles and relationships in your own life bless you with not simply one, but many callings to heed God’s personal invitation. Through it all, you’ll find seven practical ways you can understand and live out your own call to discipleship as Follower, Witness, Forgiver, Worshiper, Neighbor, Prophet and Steward. As the authors tell us, we all have “call stories”—times when we’ve embraced or rejected God’s voice in our hearts. But sacred Scripture tells many stories of callings just like our own. And like us, the people in the Bible sometimes get it wrong. Yet God waits for each of us with love and tender patience. Whether you read this wonderful book on your own or with others in a group—RCIA, prayer circle, ministry team, faith sharing—it will help you grow in understanding and faithfulness as you discern and discover your unique place in God’s loving kingdom.
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Hear the Word of the Lord: The Lectionary in Catholic Ritual
Martin Connell
Steeped in the history and composition of the New Testament, Connell demonstrates the way in which a listening assembly serves as an essential component of both our experience and our understanding of Scripture. In offering a practical overview of the Lectionary, he guides readers to a greater appreciation for liturgical proclamation, which requires both a proclaimer and a listener to hear the word of the Lord
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Water Shaping Stone: Faith, Relationships, and Conscience Formation
Kathryn L. Cox
The Catholic Tradition requires the faithful to form and follow their conscience. This is the case even with the recognition that consciences can be malformed and one can make errs in practical judgments. Water Shaping Stone examines various aspects of this tradition regarding conscience by using, among other sources, twentieth-century magisterial documents, theologians' works, and Scripture.
Kathryn Lilla Cox argues that while the Magisterium retains teaching authority, and a responsibility to help form consciences through its teaching, focusing only on the Magisterium leads to incomplete formation. A more holistic vision of conscience formation means considering the formation of the moral agent to be a multifaceted process that draws on, for example, teaching, prayer, rituals, Scripture, practices, and virtues, along with relationships with the Triune God and communities of accountability. This vision of conscience formation retains the magisterial teaching authority while acknowledging discipleship as the theological basis for making and assessing practical judgments of conscience.