Showing results by author "Ronald Rolheiser" in All Categories

These days, it's hard to say the word “chastity” without a cringe. But in this book, beloved teacher Fr. Ronald Rolheiser boldly champions the notion of chastity in its fullest meaning: respect, patience, reverence, and a God-given gift of propriety in every area of life—not just in the area of sex.

What is a monastery? A monastery is a place set apart—a place to learn the blessings of powerlessness, and that time is not ours but God's. Our home and our duties can, just like a monastery, teach us those things. The vocation of monastic men and women is to physically withdraw from the world. But the principle is equally valid for those of us who cannot go off to monasteries. Certain vocations offer the same kind of opportunity for contemplation, and provide a desert for reflection.

For most religious people, the words God and sex never go together. God is conceived of as holy, pure, sexless, and as morally above the raw desires that so powerfully beset us. Sex, on the other hand, is conceived of as earthy and unholy, something we must snatch, and not without guilt, from the gods. Christianity has struggled mightily with sex; so too have most other religions. And yet when we look at sexual desire and ask where it comes from, there can be only one answer.

Recent events have shown again how suicide touches all of us—often when we least expect it. But how to unpack the grief that follows such a painful, and often stigmatized, death? Ron Rolheiser can help.

In this highly anticipated conclusion to his trilogy the spiritual classics, The Holy Longing and Sacred Fire, and with characteristic attentiveness and care, Father Rolheiser accompanies listeners on a spiritual journey through life's final years and its "mellowing of souls." In these years, bitterness can give way to forgiveness, mere imagination to profound and subtle faith, wishful optimism to virtuous hope, and control to surrender. Listeners will learn to see in Jesus a model for a spirituality of passivity, and find in him the courage to overcome the darkest nights of faith.