Mussar is an illuminating, approachable, and highly practical set of teachings for cultivating personal growth and spiritual realization in the midst of day-to-day life. Here is an accessible and inspiring introduction to this Jewish spiritual path, which until lately has been best known in the world of Orthodox Judaism. The core teaching of Mussar is that our deepest essence is inherently pure and holy, but this inner radiance is obscured by extremes of emotion, desire, and bad habits. Our work in life is to uncover the brilliant light of the soul. The Mussar masters developed transformative teachings and practices—some of which are contemplative, some of which focus on how we relate to others in daily life—to help us to heal and refine ourselves.

A look at the practical meaning of holiness for today’s disciples. George Lyons seeks to bring the power of the scriptural theme of holiness to everyday life. Believing Romans 12:1-2 and Ephesians 4:1-6 to be the key passage to the understanding of holy living in the marketplace, the author guides the reader across the bridge of the centuries-from understanding to the meaning of the ancient text to the application of it’s principles in today’s world. Dr. Lyons suggests that perhaps we have spent too much time encouraging individuals to embark on the journey of holiness and too little time describing the landmarks along the way. Join him as he explores intriguing points of interest on the journey. Paper.

Framed around one ordinary day, this book explores daily life through the lens of liturgy, small practices, and habits that form us. Each chapter looks at something author Tish Harrison Warren does in a day—making the bed, brushing her teeth, losing her keys—and relates it to spiritual practice as well as to our Sunday worship.

This is intended to be a very simple book, an elementary treatment of a few basic ideas in Christian spirituality. Hence it should be useful to any Christian, and indeed to anyone who wants to acquaint himself with some principles of the interior life as it is understood in the Catholic Church. Nothing is here said of such subjects as “contemplation” or even “mental prayer.” And yet the book emphasizes what is at once the most common and the most mysterious aspect in the Christian life: grace, the power and the light of God in us, purifying our hearts, transforming us in Christ, making us true sons of God, enabling us to act in the world as his instruments for the good of all men and for his glory. This is therefore a meditation on some fundamental themes appropriate to the active life. It must be said at once that the active life is essential to every Christian. Clearly the active life must mean more than the life which is led in religious institutes of men and women who teach, care for the sick, and so on. (When one is talking of the “active life” as opposed to the “contemplative life,” this is the usual reference.) Here action is not looked at in opposition to contemplation, but as an expression of charity and as a necessary consequence of union with God by baptism.

These pages help Catholics draw closer to God through work. From Pope John Paul II's saintly teacher Stefan Cardinal Wyszynski comes wise counsel and practical advice for transforming any workplace into a workshop for sanctity.

Studies in the letter to the Colossians Practical steps towards growing in Christlikeness How our holiness affects others