In a conversation about his teaching and preaching style, Michael Curry notes with a laugh that hymns and songs of faith were always a part of the mix. “I learned what I believed in the songs I heard my family—especially my grandmother—sing. We sang our faith every day.” Out of that strong foundation, Bishop Curry shares the music of his childhood—the songs that have grown with him to shape an adult and vibrant faith.

Should Rica invite her mother to her wedding? In her early early forties and about to remarry, Rica Ramos realizes that starting over could mean leaving her mother behind. She longs to heal the relationship, but her mother still refuses to acknowledge the sexual abuse Rica suffered at the hands of her stepfather, or her own culpability throughout the years. With old traumas resurfacing and a new life unfolding before her, Rica grasps the power of unspoken grief—and the potential to suffer or heal. Will she and her mother ever cross the chasm between them, or are some secrets meant to stay buried? As Rica navigates her options, she faces two ultimate choices: submit to a culture that shames daughters for not honoring their mothers, or muster the courage to go her own way. Offering a bold and lucid look at mother-daughter relationships, Nobody's Daughter underscores every woman’s right to truth and validation.

The Word in Season is a quarterly Christian devotional that connects faith and life in a timely reflection for each day. These messages and prayers are based on scripture readings from Revised Common Lectionary Daily Readings. Each day offers a Bible verse, a personal commentary or meditation, a suggested prayer concern, and a unique prayer. Various writers contribute to each issue, offering a variety of perspectives.

Get to know two trailblazing Episcopalians as they talk informally about things that matter to them. As a teenager, Michael Curry served as a part of the “Youth Presence” at General Convention 1979. While there, he met Barbara Harris, not yet a priest. The story of their friendship is one that tracks the history of the Episcopal Church over the intervening years. In this volume, the two talk about a wide range of topics—their families and the strong women who shaped them, the vocation of the priesthood and the episcopacy, and social justice, among others—in a conversation facilitated and edited by Fredrica Harris Thompsett.

The Crooked House A woman appears at the old house a war veteran has purchased and is rehabbing, wins his friendship, and moves in with him, only to destroy him and move on. The Man We Never Knew A reputable woman weakens under the influence of alcohol and sextwicelosing her career, family, everything!

Playing is vital to the social, physical, cognitive, and spiritual development of young children. Yet cries for more "academic preschools" and demands for "higher test scores" are forcing play out of many early childhood environments. Play will show early childhood educators what they can do about it. It explains how play promotes school readiness and is filled with anecdotes, stories, and true-to-life experiences. Lisa Murphy has been involved with early childhood education for over twenty years, teaching and working with children in various environments. She is the founder and CEO of Ooey Gooey, Inc.

In 1970 Yung Yung arrives in New York City where it is rare to see a young Asian woman outside of Chinatown. Modern Dance icon Martha Graham has recruited Yung Yung while on a visit to Taipei where the brilliant young dancers journey begins. Yung Yung, who could not imagine life beyond the bamboo forest, is suddenly free of the political dictator Chiang Kai-shek and the backstage parents shed supported since early childhood. In this memoir, we experience the fall and resurrection of a professional dancer/choreographer who, with the help of Martha Graham and an unconventional psychotherapist Shepard Hoodwin, escapes outer and inner tyranny Mark Sackeroff (Temple University).

The instant New York Times bestseller and companion book to the PBS series. “Absolutely brilliant . . . A necessary and moving work.” —Eddie S. Glaude, Jr., author of Begin Again “Engaging. . . . In Gates’s telling, the Black church shines bright even as the nation itself moves uncertainly through the gloaming, seeking justice on earth—as it is in heaven.” —Jon Meacham, New York Times Book Review From the New York Times bestselling author of Stony the Road and The Black Box, and one of our most important voices on the African American experience, comes a powerful new history of the Black church as a foundation of Black life and a driving force in the larger freedom struggle in America. For the young Henry Louis Gates, Jr., growing up in a small, residentially segregated West Virginia town, the church was a center of gravity—an intimate place where voices rose up in song and neighbors gathered to celebrate life's blessings and offer comfort amid its trials and tribulations. In this tender and expansive reckoning with the meaning of the Black Church in America, Gates takes us on a journey spanning more than five centuries, from the intersection of Christianity and the transatlantic slave trade to today’s political landscape. At road’s end, and after Gates’s distinctive meditation on the churches of his childhood, we emerge with a new understanding of the importance of African American religion to the larger national narrative—as a center of resistance to slavery and white supremacy, as a magnet for political mobilization, as an incubator of musical and oratorical talent that would transform the culture, and as a crucible for working through the Black community’s most critical personal and social issues. In a country that has historically afforded its citizens from the African diaspora tragically few safe spaces, the Black Church has always been more than a sanctuary. This fact was never lost on white supremacists: from the earliest days of slavery, when enslaved people were allowed to worship at all, their meetinghouses were subject to surveillance and destruction. Long after slavery’s formal eradication, church burnings and bombings by anti-Black racists continued, a hallmark of the violent effort to suppress the African American struggle for equality. The past often isn’t even past—Dylann Roof committed his slaughter in the Mother Emanuel AME Church 193 years after it was first burned down by white citizens of Charleston, South Carolina, following a thwarted slave rebellion. But as Gates brilliantly shows, the Black church has never been only one thing. Its story lies at the heart of the Black political struggle, and it has produced many of the Black community’s most notable leaders. At the same time, some churches and denominations have eschewed political engagement and exemplified practices of exclusion and intolerance that have caused polarization and pain. Those tensions remain today, as a rising generation demands freedom and dignity for all within and beyond their communities, regardless of race, sex, or gender. Still, as a source of faith and refuge, spiritual sustenance and struggle against society’s darkest forces, the Black Church has been central, as this enthralling history makes vividly clear.

Do you want to know what to do when your baby seems to be inconsolable? Want to know what to do on those car trips to relieve the boredom or the impending melt down? Sing! Yep, simple as that just sing. Even when you don’t remember the words or have one of those annoying ear worm phrases going through you mind – use it. The first of its kind Song Mamma is the collaboration of 14 everyday Mums using their voices to soothe, connect and have fun with their child. A mother singing to her child is nothing new, it’s a tradition in fact but as modern Mums we increasingly outsource for expert help, but what if we looked to this tradition and within for some of the answers? Join these 14 Song Mammas as they inspire you with their love and courage and share with you their stories, images and songs.

Discover why playing is school readiness with this updated guide. Timely research and new stories highlight how play is vital to the social, physical, cognitive, and spiritual development of children. Learn the seven meaningful experiences we should provide children with every day and why they are so important.