In this volume a master of hagiography presents thirty seven new Blesseds and five Saints beatified and canonized by Pope John Paul II. These are new faces, some of them our contemporaries, who followed Christ under circumstances that were completely different from those of the saints of earlier ages who had the privilege of living in a world that was still more or less whole. The short biographies each include an illustration of the saint, and part of the homily given by the Pope at the canonization or beatification. In this book you will meet men and women who come from eras of great conflict, who in a heroic way remained faithful to Christ and to His Church, and so have become, as Vatican II says, "companions of our human condition". When the prophet Elijah on his forty-day journey to Mount Horeb collapsed in exhaustion, an angel came to him and strengthened him. The Saints have the power and the duty to help us, to set us aright and teach us strategy for our battle with the powers of darkness. Let us get to know them, so that we can call on them by name.

Discipline problems, self-doubt, tense meetings, classroom stress . . . Couldn’t every teacher use some saintly help? Every teacher can think of at least one mentor who has served as an inspiration over the years. However, many teachers—even those with a Catholic faith—might not have considered that saints can serve as mentors. Author and teacher Susan H. Swetnam believes that saints aren’t only good teachers—they’re the best teachers. In My Best Teachers Were Saints, Swetnam focuses on fifty-two saints—many of them teachers—who faced challenges similar to those that nearly all educators face today, from indifferent students and recalcitrant colleagues to their own limitations and feelings of isolation. With the examples of saints such as Augustine, Ignatius of Loyola, and Scholastica, Swetnam eagerly shares how their words and deeds helped immensely in her own career as a teacher and how they can aid and inspire other educators as well. Anyone involved in education—whether teaching religion or mathematics, kindergartners or graduate students—will discover within these pages a treasure trove of saintly help that is sure to prove that the best teachers are in fact saints!

Kirkus Discoveries book review: Part devotional guide, part encyclopedia, Saints and Blesseds of the Americas will find a welcome place on the shelves of a new generation of Catholics. Ewalds tidy collection provides an exhaustive, country-by-country listing of all the Catholic saints and blesseds of the Western world. In Catholic theology, saints serve as intercessors between humanity and God; blessedsthose who have undergone the process of beatificationare only one step away from becoming saints. Believers pray to either for aid in any number of life pursuits. Perhaps the most gratifying aspect of this catalogue is the fact that it is extremely up to date. Ewald provides not only the saints and blesseds of old but also those recently beatified and canonized. For example, he presents the Blessed Lindalva Justo de Oliveira, martyred in 1993 and beatified by Pope Benedict XVI just last year. This is a timely reference guide at least in part because the previous popeJohn Paul IIwas a prolific supporter of the path to sainthood. According to the Vatican, Pope John Paul II beatified and canonized more individuals than all the popes of the past five centuries combined. Thus, Ewald fulfills an important role in bringing his devout readership up to speed. But currentness is not the volumes only strength. Ewald paints quick but thorough sketches of his many subjects. His brief biographies never run much more than a page or two, but he has an eye for the fine points, and his portraits are always extremely pertinentthere are as few wasted details as there are wasted words. However, though his book serves best as a reference volume, it also provides a surprisingly gratifying reading experience. Ewald has the skill of a storyteller, and each biography features a neat narrative arc. A helpful compendium to the heroes of the American Catholic Church. Ewald, Fr. Daniel P. SAINTS AND BLESSEDS OF THE AMERICAS Xlibris (318 pp.) 2008 ISBN: 978-1-4363-6762-2 Paper: 978-1-4363-6761-5 Kirkus Discoveries, Nielsen Business Media, 770 Broadway, New York, NY 10003 [email protected]