To read A Balm for Gilead is to want author/friar/physician Daniel Sulmasy and his disciples to be your doctor, nurse or therapist. A practitioner with a deep sense of spirituality who considers healing an encounter with the divine will not blame us for our bad habits, will not be repulsed by what illness does to our bodies, will not give up on us when treatments do not work and will see in us the opportunity to serve God.

Sulmasy takes his title from the spiritual sung in his Harlem parish:

There is a balm in Gilead

This memoir begins with Patricia Hampl rsquo s accidental viewing of the Matisse painting Woman Before an Aquarium which waylaid her on her way to the cafeteria of the Chicago Art Institute to meet a friend some 34 years ago She stood transfixed absorbing the portrait of a woman gazing at a goldf

The Conservative Soul is a dense passionate argument for a simple thesis In the United States true conservatism has been hijacked by the forces of fundamentalism rendering the Republican Party increasingly unacceptable to principled conservatives In Andrew Sullivan rsquo s narrative fundamenta

The Sulpician priest Gerald D Coleman is to be commended for this volume In it he shares with the Catholic community at large not only his long-term experiences as a rector professor and guide for seminary life but also his keen insights into the practical needs of priestly formation Catholic m

The distinguished political scientist and historian Jan Gross nails the title of his book with one word fear This is not the first time In 2001 he did the same with Neighbors another one-word title dripping with irony because the book told the story of the July 1941 gruesome murder of the Jew

As the generation that fought World War II began to pass from the scene a proliferation of memoirs oral histories and similar works appeared with the aim of communicating to a generation that had not witnessed it the experience and importance of the event Something like that is happening now tha