The Blessed Virgin Mary is uniquely associated with Catholicism, and the century preceding the Second Vatican Council was arguably the most fertile era for Catholic Marian studies. In 1964, Pope John Paul VI published the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, or Lumen Gentium (LG), the eighth chapter of which presents the most comprehensive magisterial teaching on the Blessed Virgin Mary. As part of its Marian Initiative, the Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame invited scholars to a conference held at Notre Dame in October 2013 to reflect the rich Marian legacy on the eve of the Second Vatican Council. The essays unanimously stress that the Blessed Virgin Mary is not merely a peripheral figure in Christian faith and in the panorama of theology. More than fifty years after Lumen Gentium, students of theology as well as Marian devotees take their bearings from this document in order to promote the person of Mary and the study of Mariology, as well as grow in authenti...
Sooner or later, sometime in your life you will endure pain and disappointment. Author Janet Smith believes that finding your deep Faith and giving it all to God will get you through. She says that Faith is not only a word or a belief and it is more than a feeling. Through the pain and disappointments of life, finding Faith at your lowest moments can put you back up on top of your life. In Finding Deeper Faith, the author explains that, though dreams can be lost and life is full of disappointment and pain, finding your scripture can carry you through. After Smith's twenty plus years of cancer, chemo, doctors, surgeries, and life's lows, she believes that God will carry you through if you only have Faith. She is thankful for doctors who love their practice and who do research on new treatments, the doctors who listen to your complaints and feelings and want the same outcome as you. The reader will find how Smith's doctors, family, and Faith turned her life around and gave ...