Art Religion

For the first time in any modern language, a female scholar and translator reimagines The Art of War. Sun Tzu’s ancient book of strategy and psychology has as much to tell us today as when it was first written 2,500 years ago. In a world forever at odds, his rules for anticipating the motivations and strategies of our competitors never cease to inspire leaders of all kinds.

In this memoir of the craft, Ben Palpant unpacks a lifetime of wisdom gained through the long, hard work of learning to write and to live well. Delivered as a series of letters from father to daughter, he patiently and gracefully paints a vision of what it means to enter into one's creative work as an act of generative obedience - an act that blesses the writer, the work itself, and the world that receives it.

Movies do more than tell a good story. They are expressions of raw emotion, naked vulnerability, and unbridled rage. They often function in the same way as prayers, communicating our deepest longings and joys to a God who hears each and every one. In this captivating book, Filmspotting co-host Josh Larsen brings a critic's unique perspective to how movies function as expressions to God of lament, praise, joy, confession, and more.

Each of us, even the most simple, is called to a journey. We may be asked to leave behind everything we have grown dependent on. And when this is the case, the tale of Frodo and his friends offers hope that we will be given the strength and the help we need to overcome every obstacle and defeat every foe. This book is meant to help you find the way.

The Art of Power presents 9 life-changing lessons from timeless classics abridged and introduced by PEN Award-winning historian and New Thought scholar Mitch Horowitz, including The Prince by Niccolò Machiavelli, The Gospel of Wealth by Andrew Carnegie, The Magic Ladder to Success and The Master Key to Riches by Napoleon Hill, The Million Dollar Secret Hidden in Your Mind by Anthony Norvell, Power & Wealth by Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Richest Man in Babylon by George S. Clason, and more.

With His gentle hand He wounded my neck And caused all my senses to be suspended. Part poetic masterpiece, part mystic treatise, The Dark Night of the Soul by 16th century Carmelite monk, St. John of the Cross, addresses the feeling of being forgotten by the Presence of the Almighty that every Christian, desirous of walking more closely with God must pass through in order to learn to walk by faith and not by sight.

Three months into her pregnancy with her first child, Hilary Yancey received a phone call that changed everything. As she learned the diagnosis - cleft lip and palate, a missing right eye, possible breathing complications - Hilary began to pray in earnest. Even in the midst of these findings, she prayed that God would heal her son. God could do a miracle unlike anything she had seen. Only when Hilary held her baby, Jack, in her arms for the first time did she realize God had given her something drastically different than what she had demanded.

In this volume in IVP Academic's Studies in Theology and the Arts series, theologian Michael Bruner explores O'Connor's theological aesthetic and argues that she reveals what discipleship to Christ entails by subverting the traditional understandings of beauty, truth, and goodness through her fiction.

Join Father Paul Pearson of the Oratory as he guides you on a spiritual journey through one of the great classics of Christian literature, Dante’s Purgatorio. Purgatory is the least understood of the three possible “destinations” when we die (though unlike Heaven or Hell it is not an eternal one) and is mysterious to many Christians and even to many Catholics today. As he did in his first volume in the Spiritual Direction from Dante trilogy, Avoiding the Inferno, Father Pearson adroitly draws out the great spiritual insights hidden in The Divine Comedy.

A sermon preached at the funeral of The Right Honorable Lady Mary Vere on January 10, 1671. Puritan William Gurnall speaks of the rewards that Christ’s faithful servants will receive in heaven.

Aquinas at Prayer draws attention to important aspects of Aquinas's life and work which have been all too often overlooked or forgotten. Today Aquinas is almost exclusively regarded as an outstanding scholastic philosopher and theologian. But what is little known is that Aquinas was, first and last, a teacher of the Bible - a Master of the Sacred Page. Moreover there is a distinctly mystical character to his theology. And, as a writer, he was not only a poet but, arguably, the greatest Latin poet of the Middle Ages.

Dr. Zacharias T. Fomum is a minister of the word, and a scientist. He combines the teaching of organic chemistry at the University of Yaounde, Cameroon, West Africa, with the spiritual ministry of teaching the word in many countries. He searches out facts and presents them in a teachable format.

Featuring a preface by C. S. Lewis biographer and editor Walter Hooper, Richard Platt’s As One Devil to Another takes up where the legendary Narnia author’s Screwtape Letters left off. In this gripping work, senior devil Slashreap corresponds with his protégé Scardagger. As Satan’s underlings exchange dark musings, light is shed on human failings, the nature of evil, and God’s divine intent.

What happens when we push past the surface and allow real, grounded, mutually challenging, and edifying friendships to develop? We need only look at the little-known friendship between eminent Christian thinkers Dorothy L. Sayers and C. S. Lewis to find out. Born out of a fan letter that celebrated mystery novelist Sayers wrote to Lewis as his star was just beginning to rise, this friendship between a married woman and a longtime bachelor developed over years of correspondence as the two discovered their mutual admiration of each other's writing, thinking, and faith.

We are living in a time of constant technological advancement. While improving our lives in many ways, technological progress also makes us accessible and so easily distractible and interruptible throughout the day.

With his characteristic clarity and elegance A. C. Grayling takes the listener from the worldviews and moralities before the age of the Buddha, Confucius and Socrates, through Christianity's dominance of the European mind, to the Renaissance and Enlightenment, and on to Mill, Nietzsche, Sartre and philosophy today. And, since the story of philosophy is incomplete without mention of the great philosophical traditions of India, China and the Persian-Arabic world, he gives a comparative survey of them, too.

Japanese by birth but transplanted to Europe in adulthood, Miki Sakamoto has spent a lifetime tending her garden and reflecting on its mysteries. Why do primulas bloom in snow? Do the trees really ‘talk’ to one another? What are the blackbirds saying today? And is there a mindful way to deal with an aphid infestation? From rising early to walk barefoot on the grass each morning, to afternoons and evenings spent sipping tea in her gazebo or watching fireflies as she recalls her childhood in Japan, Sakamoto shares observations from a life spent in contemplation – and cultivation – of nature.

Salle Merrill-Redfield, the gifted creator of meditations to accompany The Celestine Prophecy and The Tenth Insight by her husband James Redfield, lends her expertise to introducing beginners to the art of meditation. These fifteen-minute meditations serve as an introduction to the fundamentals of meditative practice - breathing, relaxation, and creative visualization. Each session uses guided imagery to take the listener on a soothing journey that will reduce anxiety and promote spiritual awareness.

Do you want to manifest more abundance in all areas of your life? Inside this book, you will discover the best methods to help you align your mindset and actions to the energy of abundance, love, and success (in a very practical way!).

Leave a living legacy. Tension between older and younger generations has always existed - especially in the church. We have struggled with this for years, building up resentments and crippling those on both sides of the fight. We resist the thought that emerging and established leaders can, and must, work together. But these are critical days, and the church needs large-hearted leadership willing to move beyond personal struggles and emotional triggers for the sake of others.