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Yearnings: Embracing the
Sacred Messiness of Life, by Irwin Kula. Hyperion,
2006.
Written by an 8th generation rabbi, this book presents ways to embrace the day to day living often hidden in the Old Testament. He answers questions readers would never think of asking; he writes of mistakes, passions and doubts and other topics. This author is passionate about his subject and he believes everyone can become all one wants to be. His chapters are rooted in the
Jewish tradition, of which he is knowledgeable and conversant. Kula writes from his heart, and shares his own sorrows and joys in interesting ways. Even though Kula writes from a Jewish perspective, his book speaks to persons of any religious denomination or those with no affiliation. What is truth? Who is God? What does it mean to love God and humanity and all of creation? Is what God gives for me today sufficient? Kula speaks to those in sorrow, to those suffering in a bad marriage, to those
who just lost a child or a livelihood. He addresses the married, the single, those eager for intimacy and pleasure. Kula’s seven chapters deal with yearnings for truth, meaning, the Way, love, create, happiness, and transcendence. In one favorite chapter he deals with “Dayenu”, meaning “it’s enough for us”. In this chapter he speaks eloquently on the importance of gratitude for even the least of a day’s blessings. And even if his father-in-law was dying of cancer on the day of his
granddaughter’s wedding, it “was enough” that he did DANCE on that day. Nothing else mattered. The memory of that dance was sufficient and emphasized God’s bountifulness.
(Thanks to Sr. Irene Hartman OP for this
review.) Paperback, Kindle, Hardback
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St. Teresa of Los Andes: April 12. 1900 - 20.
One needn’t live a long life to leave a deep imprint. Teresa of Los Andes is proof of that.
As a young girl growing up
in the early 1900’s in Santiago, Chile, Juana Fernandez read an autobiography of a French-born saint—Thérèse, popularly known as the Little Flower. The experience deepened her desire to serve God and clarified the path she would follow. At age 19 Juana became a Carmelite nun, taking the name of Teresa.
The convent offered
the simple lifestyle Teresa desired and the joy of living in a community of women completely devoted to God. She focused her days on prayer and sacrifice. “I am God’s,” she wrote in her diary. “He created me and is my beginning and my end.”
Toward the end of her short life, Teresa began an apostolate of letter-writing,
sharing her thoughts on the spiritual life with many people. At age 20 she contracted typhus and quickly took her final vows. She died a short time later, during Holy Week.
Known as the “Flower of the Andes,” Teresa remains popular with the estimated 100,000 pilgrims who visit her shrine in Los Andes each year. Canonized
in 1993 by Pope John Paul II, she is Chile’s first saint.
Calendar of Saints
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