The highly esteemed Catholic convert, writer and apologist Ronald Knox, a master of the English language, was well regarded for his gifts both of writing and preaching. This volume combines both skills as it is a collection of his homilies on all the important themes of the spiritual and moral life, and on his favorite saints, men and women of history who were "inflamed with the love of Christ". In his always descriptive, profound and witty style, Knox covers a very wide variety of pastoral themes for Christian living and growth in spiritual perfection. Themes such as "The Fatherhood of God", "The Sermon on the Mount", "The Gifts of God", "The Triumph of Suffering", "The Divine Sacrifice", and dozens more. In his "occasional" sermons on saints and Christian heroes, he shows how these heroes of history struggled with many of the same spiritual battles that modern believers encounter daily, and overcame them with faith, courage, character and virtue. These are the shining witnesses of the truth and charity we all seek to emulate.

The sermons of Ronald Knox, in Evelyn Waugh's estimation, contain the very best of his literary talent and pastoral sensibility. "Prepared, revised and rehearsed with every refinement of taste and skill," the sermons convey their instruction simply and directly: refreshingly conversational in tone, faithfully and knowledgably reliant on Sacred Scripture, and profoundly powerful in content, allusion, and spiritual consolation. Occasional Sermons presents ninety-one examples of this excellent preaching with all the sermons from Knox's records given for notable events. Falling under the three headings of saints, occasions, and panegyrics, the sermons take as their subjects-to name but a few-Thérèse of Lisieux and Charles Borromeo, Gregory the Great and Thomas Aquinas, Philip Neri and the English Martyrs; coronations, ordinations, and centenaries, jubilees, anniversaries of parishes, cathedrals, and conversions; and, in poignant tribute, G. K. Chesterton, Hilaire Belloc, and Knox's ordination classmate, Fr. Henry Harrington. This volume in particular proves the point expressed by Waugh that the good Monsignor had "created a new and entirely individual form for the traditional art" of preaching. Unique, from one to the next, in construction and content, Ronald Knox's Occasional Sermons are wholly similar in generously offering to its readers spiritual insight and wisdom under the beacon-light of Catholic doctrine.

The sermons of Ronald Knox, in Evelyn Waugh's estimation, contain the very best of his literary talent and pastoral sensibility. "Prepared, revised and rehearsed with every refinement of taste and skill," the sermons convey their instruction simply and directly: refreshingly conversational in tone, faithfully and knowledgably reliant on Sacred Scripture, and profoundly powerful in content, allusion, and spiritual consolation. Pastoral Sermons presents one hundred and eight superb examples of this excellent preaching. Covering nine discrete topics ("Our Father"; "The Temptations of Christ"; "The Sermon on the Mount"; "The Mystery of the Kingdom"; "The Harvest of the Cross"; "The Cross of Christ"; "The Eucharist"; "Feasts and Seasons of the Year"; and "St Paul's Gospel"), Knox fulfills his duty as a Christian teacher, instructing his listeners in the truths of the faith, the saving graces of the sacraments (especially the Eucharist), and the joyful message of Christ's own words and deeds. Comparable only with Newman's Oxford sermons in their scope and brilliance-in the words of the volume's editor, Philip Caraman, S.J.-Ronald Knox's Pastoral Sermons is a peerless manual of meditation whose balanced and graceful instructions are certain to direct its readers toward that charity and freedom which characterizes the life lived in-and for-the Lord Jesus Christ.