Friendship and Ways to Truth


Book Description

The death of a friend is a source of pain and grief. For the author, it is also a chance to reflect on the role of friendship in our pursuit of truth. His essays explore friendship as the bond linking Christians, Muslims and Jews alike to the religious traditions embraced in the search for truth.




Praying the Truth


Book Description

We don't question our desire to be open with our close friends about our feelings, even if those feelings are difficult to express. We recognize that being honest with our loved ones will only deepen our bonds and help us feel peace in being able to express our innermost thoughts. Why then is it so challenging for us to come as we are, however we are, when approaching God in prayer? In Praying the Truth: Deepening Your Friendship with God through Honest Prayer, William A. Barry, SJ, helps us deepen our friendship with God by examining how to approach God, at any time and with any problem, in complete honesty. Fr. Barry reflects on how secrecy can hurt families, the Church, and ourselves and how what we are keeping secret can get in the way of our connection with God. He acknowledges that we may fear God’s reaction when revealing our most intimate truths; but just like with friendships, we risk not developing our relationship with God if we are dishonest about who we are and how we feel. Praying the Truth helps us realize that if we do not approach God in complete honesty, we may be holding back a part of ourselves that needs to be healed. By learning how to communicate honestly with God, our friendship with God and our faith in God’s promise to love us unconditionally will be strengthened. "Thanks to Praying the Truth, I am beginning to understand that prayer is simply hanging out with God! As I read this book, I felt as if the author seemed to be sitting beside me, just talking to me as I read." -- Anonymous reader




Friendship's Offering


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When Words Matter Most


Book Description

When a friend or family member is struggling spiritually, do you ever feel uncertain about what to say? You may sense your loved ones need to hear biblical encouragement or advice but, feeling inadequate for the task, you might simply commiserate or say nothing. God calls you to something more. In When Words Matter Most, Cheryl Marshall and Caroline Newheiser help you discern spiritual needs and give biblical, heartfelt guidance. Through real-life stories and carefully chosen Scripture passages, they model what to say to those who are worried, weary, wayward, or weeping. You'll learn how to speak truth to others in your sphere of influence and strengthen the body of Christ as a whole.




Made for Friendship


Book Description

God made you for friendship. Friendship is one of the deepest pleasures of life. But in our busy, fast-paced, mobile world, we've lost this rich view of friendship and instead settled for shallow acquaintances based on little more than similar tastes or shared interests. Helping us recapture a vision of true friendship, pastor Drew Hunter explores God's design for friendship and what it really looks like in practice—giving us practical advice to cultivate the kinds of true friendships that lead to true and life-giving joy.




Friendship's Offering


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Truth & Beauty


Book Description

"A loving testament to the work and reward of the best friendships, the kind where your arms can’t distinguish burden from embrace.” — People New York Times Bestselling author Ann Patchett’s first work of nonfiction chronicling her decades-long friendship with the critically acclaimed and recently deceased author, Lucy Grealy. Ann Patchett and the late Lucy Grealy met in college in 1981, and, after enrolling in the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, began a friendship that would be as defining to both of their lives as their work. In Gealy's critically acclaimed and hugely successful memoir, Autobiography of a Face, she wrote about losing part of her jaw to childhood cancer, years of chemotherapy and radiation, and endless reconstructive surgeries. In Truth & Beauty, the story isn't Lucy's life or Ann's life, but the parts of their lives they shared together. This is a portrait of unwavering commitment that spans twenty years, from the long cold winters of the Midwest, to surgical wards, to book parties in New York. Through love, fame, drugs, and despair, this is what it means to be part of two lives that are intertwined...and what happens when one is left behind. This is a tender, brutal book about loving the person we cannot save. It is about loyalty and being uplifted by the sheer effervescence of someone who knew how to live life to the fullest.




The Odd-fellows' Offering


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