Recommendations from the editors of America magazine, plus some poetry too!
Poetry
Posted inFaith, The Good Word
Is the Gospel propaganda?
Strictly speaking, anyone spreading ideas, good or bad, engages in propaganda. Preaching is propaganda. St. Paul wrote propaganda.
Posted inArts & Culture, Poetry
My Arms Are Empty: A Song of Lamentation for Ahmaud Arbery
Our scars pulse with the rage that cannot sound
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
Review: Paul Mariani’s life in verse
Paul Mariani’s poems ask, “Does God know us only by the names our parents gave us?,” another reminder of how the human and eternal meet.
Posted inFaith, Faith in Focus
Living with pre-grief amid a pandemic
Pre-grief is not the absence of hope. Somehow, we can mourn what is passing away even while we work to preserve it.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
The Catholic Book Club: From contemporary poetry to a study of Mary Magdalene
We have found at the Catholic Book Club that different genres and authors inspire different readers and broad variations in discussion, another reason to mix it up a bit in terms of genres and styles. Our two most recent selections have been no exception.
Posted inArts & Culture, Poetry
The Sand and the Stars
Well, I am shy of miracles
and shy of the talk of miracles.
Posted inArts & Culture, Poetry
The Manatee
After the word is forgotten and discovered,
and streamed until it’s nothing,
she is not here.
Posted inArts & Culture, Poetry
Kicking the Can Down the Road
it has / become the norm / to claim your side / just scored.
Posted inArts & Culture, Books
Review: Paul Mariani on why poetry sustains us
The “Catholic sacramental perspective,” as Mariani terms it, urges the poet to recognize in even “the meanest thing” some glimmer “of inestimable worth,” some sign of the Creator.