Ignatius Press Podcast

Join us as Kathryn Lopez from the National Review Institute interviews Marcus Grodi, author of Life from Our Land: https://www.ignatius.com/Life-from-Our-Land-P1484.aspx

Voices from every direction beckon us, even push us, toward better and faster technology, with the promise of more wealth, more pleasure, and, consequently, more happiness.

But have we become so bewitched by the siren song of material progress that we've lost the ability not just to achieve, but to discern what true happiness is? What criteria do we use to plan for the future, for retirement? At the end of our earthly lives, how will we measure our fruitfulness?

In this book Marcus Grodi discusses what he and his family discovered, mostly by surprise, after moving from the city to twenty-five acres of Ohio farmland. This move involved a radical shift in priorities for all of them, but mostly it helped them to discover some critical truths about our relationship to nature and to nature's Creator that apply regardless of where a person lives. He offers wonderful reflections on his going- back-to-the-land experience as a metaphor for drawing closer to God.

Jen Nilsson has an MBA, a nice condo, and a fast-track job at a tech start-up in Silicon Valley. If her big product launch goes well next month, she may finally land the marketing director job she's been gunning for. But then her younger sister, Katie, just out of college and estranged from their newly devout parents, blows through the front door, dumping cardboard boxes and a lifetime of personal drama onto Jen's just-swept floor.

Family is family, and Jen lets her sister, the embodiment of all that annoys her, move in. Maybe she'll turn aimless Katie into a model adult. But when Jen's own well-laid career plans hurtle off the tracks—a corporate buyout, a layoff, and a disastrous business trip to China—she turns more and more to Katie for support and begins to reassess the place of family, and love, in her life.

If You Can Get It explores the quirks and the humanity of the twenty-first-century business world but finds its heart in the deepening relationship of two sisters as different as Elinor and Marianne of Sense and Sensibility.

https://www.ignatius.com/If-You-Can-Get-It-P3662.aspx

Ahead of the FATIMA movie release on August 28, 2020, we interviewed Paul Senz, author of "Fatima: 100 Questions and Answers on the Marian Apparitions", a companion to the film.

Book: https://www.ignatius.com/Fatima-P3661.aspx

Movie: https://www.fatimathemovie.com/

From May to October, 1917, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared six times to three shepherd children in the tiny village of Fatima, Portugal. What started as a private matter was soon known all over town, throughout the country, and around the world. These apparitions are fascinating, and have gripped the imagination of people all over the world, from simple believers to academic theologians; from skeptics to the curious; from scientists to popes.

Fatima: 100 Questions and Answers on the Marian Apparitions utilizes a question-and-answer format to explore the context of these apparitions, why they were so engrossing at the time, what they have meant to the Church and the world in the century since they happened, and why the requests of Our Lady are so important today.

Questions include:

• Who were these children?
• Why would Mary appear to them?
• What were the so-called “Secrets of Fatima”?
• What really happened during the Miracle of the Sun?
• In what ways were the children persecuted by the powerful Freemasons in the Portuguese government?
• Did the children see a vision that predicted the attempted assassination of St. John Paul II?
• And many more.

The major new feature film, Fatima, tells the story of these apparitions in a narrative and with a limited amount of screen time. As a companion to the film, this book offers the reader greater context and answers many of the questions that the viewer may have about this amazing story.

Despite signs in recent decades of a crisis in the Church, a countercurrent of intense interest in prayer and a close relationship with God is clearly at work today. A deeper esteem for contemplation has accompanied this turning to prayer, and many people desire spiritual direction and guidance.

Written by a recognized expert on contemplative prayer, this book concentrates on the interior hardships experienced by souls who give themselves to God wholeheartedly. More than a summary of the symptoms of interior trial, these poignant observations are the fruit of the author's many years in retreat work. Personal experience, not simply knowledge of the spiritual tradition, inform his concise, carefully crafted comments.

Throughout the book, the writing invites the reader to ponder the subject of spiritual darkness, perplexity, and other struggles in the spiritual life always in the light of the loving God, who draws souls into greater surrender to himself.

https://www.ignatius.com/Contemplative-Enigmas-P3491.aspx

Join us as we discuss "Common Sense Catholicism: How to Resolve Our Cultural Crisis" with Bill Donohue.

https://www.ignatius.com/Common-Sense-Catholicism-P3154.aspx

This work analyzes how the three key elements of a democratic society—freedom, equality, and fraternity—have been misconstrued by intellectuals and policy makers who do not respect the limitations of the human condition. Their lack of common sense has resulted in social and cultural problems rather than solutions to them. By contrast, the social teachings of the Catholic Church mesh nicely with the demands of human nature, and as such they offer the right remedy to our cultural crisis.

Freedom defined as radical individualism has eclipsed the understanding that real rights are tethered to responsibilities. Equality defined as radical egalitarianism yields little in the way of equality and much in the way of state-sponsored social discord. And fraternity without the foundation of familial bonds and religious communities leaves people isolated and disoriented. Catholic teaching offers much wisdom to remedy our insufficient understanding of the elements needed for a free and flourishing society. Its common sense is greatly needed to help modern Americans rediscover the true meaning of their highest ideals.