A Summer Round-Up

Books, podcasts, & other links I’ve loved (plus a visual pun...can you find it?)

If you’ve known me for longer than five minutes, you know summer is my favorite season. 

I love the heat, crave the light, and daydream about living somewhere warm year-round. Till then I will savor summer’s long evenings and endless sun, ever more poignant given the latest doomsday report on the state of our planet.

Tending and thanking God for this corner of creation presses ever more urgently as a spiritual practice…

First, a reader shout-out

Lacey created the beautiful image below for your phone’s lock screen or wallpaper. These are the 3 questions I posed in an earlier newsletter that I try to ask myself every time I sign on social media. Lacey, thank you for helping us to use this as a quick examen to keep discerning how we’re using our time wisely online.

Save the image to use for yourself!

Second, podcasts

I loved this episode of Ave Spotlight with Chenele Shaw and Tommy Tighe on saints who struggled with mental illness.

Check out my colleague (and co-author!) Kathleen Cahalan talking about vocation and calling on the Collegeville Institute’s Unlikely Conversations.

I got the chance to have two great conversations on podcasts lately, too: 

• Messy Jesus Business with Sister Julia Walsh. We talked about finding God in the mess--of parenting, of grief, of ordinary life.

• Church Life ND with Leonard J. DeLorenzo. We dove into the depths: heaven, death, our relationship with our beloved dead. 

Third, columns

In the midst of all the angry takes on communion and politics, I decided to tell the truth slant: A theology of gift and grandparents.

I also tackled a thorny theological question I often get from anxious parents: How to answer kids when prayers go unanswered?

And it’s never too late to start seeking: seven surprising places to find God this summer.

Fourth, books 

For the umpteenth time I dipped back into Madeline L’Engle’s A Circle of Quiet this summer, forever my patron saint of mother-writers. 

I’m savoring Patricia Hampl’s I Could Tell You Stories: Sojourns in the Land of Memory on memoir writing as I inch my way toward discovering what my latest book is becoming. 

Tish Harrison Warren’s Prayer In The Night: For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep has been a thoughtful nightstand companion as I nurse or sleep (or don’t sleep).

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What’s the best thing you’ve read or heard this summer? I want to hear from you: an unforgettable book, a thought-provoking article, or an inspiring podcast.

Peace,

Laura

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Find my books here: Everyday Sacrament | Grieving Together | Prayers for Pregnancy & Birth | To Bless Our Callings | Living Your Discipleship

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