In classic Barbara Johnson style, these hilarious pages will show readers how to put life's trials into perspective and remember that there is a wonderful life awaiting them in heaven.

“Between Heaven and Mirth will make any reader smile. . . . Father Martin reminds us that happiness is the good God’s own goal for us.” —Timothy M. Dolan, Archbishop of New York From The Colbert Report’s “official chaplain” James Martin, SJ, author of the New York Times bestselling The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything, comes a revolutionary look at how joy, humor, and laughter can change our lives and save our spirits. A Jesuit priest with a busy media ministry, Martin understands the intersections between spirituality and daily life. In Between Heaven and Mirth, he uses scriptural passages, the lives of the saints, the spiritual teachings of other traditions, and his own personal reflections to show us why joy is the inevitable result of faith, because a healthy spirituality and a healthy sense of humor go hand-in-hand with God's great plan for humankind.

The parables of Jesus are of untiring interest because they have the intriguing capacity to dole out their meaning here a little, there a little, new new insights revealed by changing times. Here, master Bible expositor Earl Palmer finds in them the truths awaiting our generation, and presents those truths with a gifted sense of illustration and application. Partly because their veiled nature, the parables never grow old. Far from what we sometimes hear, they are not little stories so simple that they can make truth transparent, so anyone can understand. Jesus used parables so that the truth will actually be hidden from those who had rather not see it in the first place (Matthew 13:11-15). But for those who long for the truth, it is there for the discovering.

Since 1988 the Holy Spirit has been taking me to Heaven. Jesus would show me various fun places and allowed me to do fun things. I asked, "Why was He showing me these places? Daddy / God said, "Because people think all they do here is float around wearing diapers, eating grapes, or doing nothing but bowing before Me. I have planned for each person, in detail, what makes them happy to be here with Me. So you are to tell them HEAVEN IS real and FUN, and Jesus is coming soon " Come slide down the treehouse slide with Jesus Play with Jesus in the river Play in the snow Ride a rollercoaster See where the babies go that were aborted Where did your pet come from Play Gel Balls with Jesus and others Jerry and Kim Robinson have five children, seven grandchildren, and have more on the way. Kim leads a Sozo Ministry; healing hearts is her passion. They live on the outskirts of town where she enjoys raising her chickens and photography. Jerry is retired, loves golf, and is an amazing cook."

A mother would help her daughter, Sarah, who was three, say her nightly prayers. As most children do, she would have to bless every family member, every friend, and every animal she ever saw. For several weeks, after they had finished the nightly prayer, Sarah would say, 'And all girls.' As this soon became part of her nightly routine to include this at the end, the mother's curiosity got the best of her, and she asked her, 'Sarah, why do you always add the part about all girls?' Her response, 'Because we always finish our prayers by saying, 'All men'!' Children have a wonderful sense of humor and can easily make us laugh. Barbara Cozad'sLaughter from Heavenprovides a special insight into the minds of young children and their innocence through learning, making mistakes, and growing up. Submerge yourself into this compilation of jokes, commentary, and Bible verses to understand how easy it is to feel the warmth of God radiating through His children. God does have a sense of humor and it's time that we learn to laugh along with Him.

The Humor of Christ inspires Christians to redraw their pictures of Christ and to add a persistent biblical detail, the note of humor. Throughout the Gospels, Christ employed humor for the sake of truth and many of his teachings, when seen in this light, become brilliantly clear for the first time. Irony, satire, paradox, even laughter itself help clarify Christ's famous parables, His brief sayings, and important events in His life.

In this refreshing new take on spirituality, bestselling author Deepak Chopra uses a fictional tale of a comedian and his unlikely mentor to show us a path back to hope, joy, and even enlightenment—with a lot of laughter along the way. Meet Mickey Fellows. A successful L.A. comedian, he’s just a regular guy, with his fair share of fears, egocentricities, and addictions. After his father’s death, Mickey meets a mysterious stranger named Francisco, who changes his life forever. The two begin an ongoing discussion about the true nature of being. Reluctantly at first, Mickey accepts the stranger’s help and starts to explore his own life in an effort to answer the riddles Francisco poses. Mickey starts to look at those aspects of himself that he has hidden behind a wall of wisecracks all his life. Eventually Mickey realizes that authentic humor opens him up to the power of spirit—allowing him to finally make real connections with people. After taking the reader on a journey with Mickey, Chopra then spells out the lessons that Mickey’s story imparts to us: ten reasons to be optimistic, even in our challenging world. Chopra believes that the healthiest response to life is laughter from the heart, and even in the face of global turmoil, we can cultivate an internal sense of optimism. Rich with humor and practical advice, Why Is God Laughing? shows us without a doubt that there is always a reason to be grateful, that every possibility holds the promise of abundance, and that obstacles are simply opportunities in disguise. In the end, we really don’t need a reason to be happy. The power of happiness lies within each of us, just waiting to be unleashed. And Mickey Fellows’s journey shows us the way.

"Christian laughter is a maze: you could easily get snarled up within it." So says Michael A. Screech in his note to readers preceding this collection of fifty-three elegant and pithy essays. As Screech reveals, the question of whether laughter is acceptable to the god of the Old and New Testaments is a dangerous one. But we are fortunate in our gu

Winner of the 2016 Religious Communication Association Book of the Year Award In God Mocks, Terry Lindvall ventures into the muddy and dangerous realm of religious satire, chronicling its evolution from the biblical wit and humor of the Hebrew prophets through the Roman Era and the Middle Ages all the way up to the present. He takes the reader on a journey through the work of Chaucer and his Canterbury Tales, Cervantes, Jonathan Swift, and Mark Twain, and ending with the mediated entertainment of modern wags like Stephen Colbert. Lindvall finds that there is a method to the madness of these mockers: true satire, he argues, is at its heart moral outrage expressed in laughter. But there are remarkable differences in how these religious satirists express their outrage.The changing costumes of religious satirists fit their times. The earthy coarse language of Martin Luther and Sir Thomas More during the carnival spirit of the late medieval period was refined with the enlightened wit of Alexander Pope. The sacrilege of Monty Python does not translate well to the ironic voices of Soren Kierkegaard. The religious satirist does not even need to be part of the community of faith. All he needs is an eye and ear for the folly and chicanery of religious poseurs. To follow the paths of the satirist, writes Lindvall, is to encounter the odd and peculiar treasures who are God’s mouthpieces. In God Mocks, he offers an engaging look at their religious use of humor toward moral ends.