Sacred Rhythms: Arranging Our Lives for Spiritual Transformation, by Ruth Haley Barton. IVP Books.  2006.

Winner of a 2006 Logos Book Award.

    Taking notes from students from various universities and places of research, this book presents a guide for those serious in growing spiritually.  This book is arranged for personal use or to be used as part of group studies. The table of contents contains chapters on the following: longing for more, solitude, scripture, prayer, honoring the body, self-examination, discernment, Sabbath, and a rule of life. The author presents an opening query, "How can I get more people to join my church?"  She studied what in her church might be appealing to anyone, and decided that she needed to be more serious about her own spiritual growth.  "Who would want to sign up for this?"
   Aware that she needed to be open to the mystery of spiritual transformation, she set out, with the help of students, to make clear what and how this change could be brought about. Group sessions and invitations to community put the author on the right path. "May Jesus Christ himself meet us in the place of our spiritual seeking." The "Longing for more" chapter came about as the result of discernment concerning what way she and the group had developed a passion or needed to develop such a passion.
   Progressing through the various chapters, the author offers easy and sometimes difficult steps to begin the living of the spiritual transformation she so desired. She ends her book with a list of negative patterns and corresponding disciplines. For example: gossip/sins of speech versus silence, self-examination; anxiety and worry versus breath prayer, Scripture reflection; lack of faith versus prayer, Scripture.

 "These disciplines are the main way we offer our bodies to God as a living sacrifice." 

(Thanks to Sr. Irene Hartman OP for this review.)

St. Marguerite Bourgeoys (1620-1700): January 12

   "God closes a door and then opens a window," people sometimes say when dealing with their own disappointment or someone else's. That was certainly true in Marguerite's case. Children from European as well as Native American backgrounds in seventeenth-century Canada benefited from her great zeal and unshakable trust in God's providence.
   Born the sixth of 12 children in Troyes, France, Marguerite at the age of 20 believed that she was called to religious life. Her applications to the Carmelites and Poor Clares were unsuccessful. A priest friend suggested that perhaps God had other plans for her.
   In 1654, the governor of the French settlement in Canada visited his sister, an Augustinian canoness in Troyes. Marguerite belonged to a sodality connected to that convent. The governor invited her to come to Canada and start a school in Ville-Marie (eventually the city of Montreal). When she arrived, the colony numbered 200 people with a hospital and a Jesuit mission chapel.
   Soon after starting a school, she realized her need for coworkers. Returning to Troyes, she recruited a friend, Catherine Crolo, and two other young women. In 1667 they added classes at their school for Indian children. A second trip to France three years later resulted in six more young women and a letter from King Louis XIV, authorizing the school. The Congregation of Notre Dame was established in 1676 but its members did not make formal religious profession until 1698 when their Rule and constitutions were approved.
   Marguerite established a school for Indian girls in Montreal. At the age of 69, she walked from Montreal to Quebec in response to the bishop's request to establish a community of her sisters in that city. By the time she died, she was referred to as the "Mother of the Colony." Marguerite was canonized in 1982.