'The Fig Tree' is a story about a little girl, Lydia, and her grandfather-who elegantly imparts a message of gratitude using the example of the backyard fig tree: 'Ms. Figgy.' As she returns home from a hard day at school, Lydia seeks the solace of her grandpa who is resting beneath the tree. Once she recounts the events of her day, Lydia's grandfather describes how he cares for the tree-likening its need for TLC to that provided to Lydia by her parents. As she listens, Lydia begins to forget about her own worries and instead takes notice of how Ms. Figgy has nurtured all sorts of critters with food and shelter throughout each season. And, with Grandpa's help, Lydia also reflects upon the many ways in which the tree has enhanced her own life since she was a baby. By illuminating the strength and majesty of the tree, Lydia begins to see it as so much more than just a tree. With its stunning illustrations, 'The Fig Tree' gives a young girl a new perspective on an old tree she had taken for granted; instead, seeing it through a lens of gratitude and wonder. Children will enjoy the artist's attention to detail while gaining an appreciation for nature, as well as the touching relationship between Lydia and her grandpa.

In Lessons From a Fig Tree, author Susan Dupré LaHaye compiles seven decades’ worth of collected prayers, poems, words of wisdom, and deep, personal spiritual explorations in a heartfelt expression of a long life well-lived. Telling the story of many a Cajun grandmother––past, present, and future—this memoir shares how LaHaye’s Bonne Famille Catholique lives the dream of rural “Cajuns,” loving their French heritage through music and food cooked in big pots, with the entire family living within six miles of her home on the Mamou prairie. It chronicles how she is guided by her Catholic faith, which she holds close to her heart and shares with everyone she meets. Through a compilation of essays that document revealing moments along her spiritual journey and her personal and professional life, LaHaye communicates hope, gratitude, and inner reflection that guides one to lasting, lifelong growth.

Catalog of Unabashed Gratitude is a sustained meditation on that which goes away—loved ones, the seasons, the earth as we know it—that tries to find solace in the processes of the garden and the orchard. That is, this is a book that studies the wisdom of the garden and orchard, those places where all—death, sorrow, loss—is converted into what might, with patience, nourish us.

The Jesus everybody likes, says Mark Strauss, is not the Jesus found in the Gospels. He preached about hell far more than the apostle Paul. He told his followers to hate their families. Not one of his twelve apostles was a woman. When we unpack these puzzling paradoxes and more, we gain greater insight into Jesus' countercultural message and mission.

Bible scholar Christian Brady, an expert on Old Testament lament, was as prepared as a person could be for the death of a child—which is to say, not nearly well enough. When his eight-year-old son died suddenly from a fast-moving blood infection, Brady heard the typical platitudes about accepting God's will and knew that quiet acceptance was not the only godly way to grieve. With deep faith, knowledge of Scripture, and the wisdom that comes only from experience, Brady guides readers grieving losses and setbacks of all kinds in voicing their lament to God, reflecting on the nature of human existence, and persevering in hope. Brady finds that rather than an image of God managing every event and action in our lives, the biblical account describes the very real world in which we all live, a world full of hardship and calamity that often comes unbidden and unmerited. Yet, it also is a world into which God lovingly intrudes to bring comfort, peace, and grace.

In this delightful and inspiring resource, we offer fifty prayerful reflection for the spiritual journey. These are original pieces by writers who, inspired by the Holy Spirit, have reflected deeply on Scripture and its meaning for daily life. Included writers are Amy Wellborn, Elizabeth-Anne Steward, Sr. Ruth Marlene Fox, OSB, Mitch Finley, Fr. Kenneth E. Grabner, Steve Givens, Sr. Joyce Rupp, OSM, Fr. M. Basil Pennington, OCSO, Kevin Perrotta, Karla Manternach, Sr. Macrina Wiederkehr, OSB, Sr. Melannie Svoboda, SND and many others. They share personal and prayerful reflections about everyday difficulties and achievements in their spiritual lives. These lovely vignettes move through the liturgical seasons of Advent, Lent, Easter, Special Days, and Ordinary Time. Each offers surprising insights about the power of faith and God's call to holiness through the ordinary actions and events of everyday life. This is a spiritual treasure and a wonderful gift book for all who strive to respond to God's word with open and grateful hearts.

A collection of daily devotional readings from Closer Walk magazine and the bestselling New International Version translation, written to help the reader develop a heart for God. Going through the entire New Testament in one year, these devotionals provide daily insights from great Christian leaders suce as A.B. Simpson, Charles Spurgeon, Peter Abelard, or Alexander McLaren.

A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK Winner of the 2022 BookTube Silver Medal in Fiction * Shortlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction "A wise novel of love and grief, roots and branches, displacement and home, faith and belief. Balm for our bruised times." -David Mitchell, author of Utopia Avenue A rich, magical new novel on belonging and identity, love and trauma, nature and renewal, from the Booker-shortlisted author of 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in This Strange World. Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both call home. In the taverna, hidden beneath garlands of garlic, chili peppers and creeping honeysuckle, Kostas and Defne grow in their forbidden love for each other. A fig tree stretches through a cavity in the roof, and this tree bears witness to their hushed, happy meetings and eventually, to their silent, surreptitious departures. The tree is there when war breaks out, when the capital is reduced to ashes and rubble, and when the teenagers vanish. Decades later, Kostas returns. He is a botanist looking for native species, but really, he's searching for lost love. Years later a Ficus carica grows in the back garden of a house in London where Ada Kazantzakis lives. This tree is her only connection to an island she has never visited--- her only connection to her family's troubled history and her complex identity as she seeks to untangle years of secrets to find her place in the world. A moving, beautifully written, and delicately constructed story of love, division, transcendence, history, and eco-consciousness, The Island of Missing Trees is Elif Shafak's best work yet.