Through a penetrating analysis of reason and intellect, spiritual imagination, and the light of faith, this book addresses fundamental questions pertaining to our search for meaning.

Change carries us into uncharted territory. We can often feel adrift in such borderlands. Scripture, however, offers rich resources for navigating these times. The biblical narrative of the great fifty days from Easter to Pentecost, forms a map for the adventure of spiritual growth. Tracking the tumultuous and deeply human journey of the disciples through these days, Borderlands is for all who are experiencing periods of transition or who seek to progress in their faith. Poetic and passionate in language, and authentic about the challenges posed by change, this frank book aims to inspire and stir our appetite for passing from one life stage to another. Combining revealing insights from literature, psychology and other fields, Mark Brickman offers an incisive reading of Scripture that can enrich life in flux. Be equipped for a transformative journey into deeper identification with Christ and the fullness of life that he brings

Quill and Cross in the Borderlands examines nearly four hundred years of history, folklore, literature, and art concerning the seventeenth-century Spanish nun and writer Sor María de Jesús de Ágreda, identified as the legendary “Lady in Blue” who miraculously appeared to tribes in colonial-era New Mexico and taught them the rudiments of the Catholic faith. Sor María, an author of mystical Marian works, became renowned not only for her alleged spiritual travel from her cloister in Spain to the New World, but also for her writing, studied and implemented by Franciscans on both sides of the ocean. Working from original historical accounts, archival research, and a wealth of literature on the legend and the historical figure alike, Anna M. Nogar meticulously examines how and why the legend and the person became intertwined in Catholic consciousness and social praxis. In addition to the influence of the narrative of the Lady in Blue in colonial Mexico, Nogar addresses Sor María’s importance as an author of spiritual texts that influenced many spheres of New Spanish and Spanish society. Quill and Cross in the Borderlands focuses on the reading and interpretation of her works, especially in New Spain, where they were widely printed and disseminated. Over time, in the developing folklore of the Indo-Hispano populations of the present-day U.S. Southwest and the borderlands, the historical Sor María and her writings virtually disappeared from view, and the Lady in Blue became a prominent folk figure, appearing in folk stories and popular histories. These folk accounts drew the Lady in Blue into the present day, where she appears in artwork, literature, theater, and public ritual. Nogar’s examination of these contemporary renderings leads to a reconsideration of the ambiguities that lie at the heart of the narrative. Quill and Cross in the Borderlands documents the material legacy of a legend that has survived and thrived for hundreds of years, and at the same time rediscovers the historical basis of a hidden writer. This book will interest scholars and researchers of colonial Latin American literature, early modern women writers, folklore and ethnopoetics, and Mexican American cultural studies.

Environmental practices among Mexican American woman have spurred a reconsideration of ecofeminism among Chicana feminists. Christina Holmes examines ecological themes across the arts, Chicana activism, and direct action groups to reveal how Chicanas can craft alternative models for ecofeminist processes. Holmes revisits key debates to analyze issues surrounding embodiment, women's connections to nature, and spirituality's role in ecofeminist philosophy and practice. By doing so, she challenges Chicanas to escape the narrow frameworks of the past in favor of an inclusive model of environmental feminism that alleviates Western biases. Holmes uses readings of theory, elaborations of ecological narratives in Chicana cultural productions, histories of human and environmental rights struggles in the Southwest, and a description of an activist exemplar to underscore the importance of living with decolonializing feminist commitment in body, nature, and spirit.

Jillian Guzmán, who is nine years old at the beginning of the book, communicates through drawings rather than speech as she travels with her mother, Angie O'Malley, throughout the borderlands of Arizona and northwestern Mexico. Later she creates survival maps for border crossers and paints murals at the Casa de los Olvidados, a refuge in Sonora run by the traditional healer Juana of God. These darkly funny tales, focusing on Mexican-American, Euro-American, and Mexican characters, feature visionary experiences, ghosts, faith healers, a deer's head that speaks, a dog who channels spirits of the dead--and a young woman whose drawings begin to create realities instead of just reflecting them.

Fleshing the Spirit brings together established and new writers to explore the relationships between the physical body, the spirit and spirituality, and social justice activism. The anthology incorporates different genres of writing—such as poetry, testimonials, critical essays, and historical analysis—and stimulates the reader to engage spirituality in a critical, personal, and creative way.