The Messenger

This authoritative account of the first Native American woman to be declared a saint by the Church is sure to inspire you. Discover an extraordinary young woman who was called by Pope Blessed John Paul II, God's "bountiful gift" to His Church and a "sweet, frail yet strong figure of a young woman who died when she was only twenty-four years old: Kateri Tekakwitha, the 'Lily of the Mohawks.'"

The daughter of a Mohawk chief and a Roman Catholic mother, Kateri (baptized Catherine) Tekakwitha (1656-1680) forms a unique bridge between the Native American community and the Church. Kateri was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1980 and canonized in 2012 by Pope Benedict XVI.

Kateri Tekakwitha's faith and love for Christ in the face of overwhelming hostility and her own debilitating illnesses will encourage you as you seek God's grace to overcome challenges in your own life! She is a powerful role model for converts to the Church, young people striving for chastity, and anyone looking to deepen their own prayer life. She is also a shining example that God's call to holiness is truly universal and is heard by men and women in all walks of life and all ages.

Written by experienced and prolific authors Matthew and Margaret Bunson, St. Kateri: Lily of the Mohawks is the most definitive biography of Kateri Tekakwitha.

Experience the extraordinary stories of the French Jesuit missionaries, the famed Blackrobes," in the wilderness of North America and the heroic conversions of the Native Americans to the Catholic faith. Follow Kateri's life from when she contracted smallpox as a toddler – a disease that swept through her village – claiming her family and leaving her severely disfigured and half-blinded. Drawn to the Catholic faith by the Bible stories and teachings of the French Jesuits, Kateri amazed them by her perfection of the virtues, her mystical prayer life, and her total love for Christ. Her last words were: "Jesus, I love you."

Kateri Tekakwitha's life of faith is an inspiration to everyone!

Pope Pius X111 is dying. A kindly but uninspiring man, elected by default, he left the running of the Church to Secretary of State, Cardinal Enrico Manzu who is secretly fronting a gigantic money laundering scam – with people outside the Vatican. When the Pope dies Manzu will have to get a new Pope who will – unwittingly – sign a Power of Attorney, which will enable him to carry on business as usual. The stranglehold of the Curia has split the church in two. With priests leaving in their thousands, the Pope’s refusal to permit married or women priests or deal with family planning, divorce and paedophilia: the church is in terminal decline.

Cardinal Angelo Crosoli in Florence, old and ill, knows this will be the last chance of electing a truly Christian Pope if the Church is to be saved. He knows who he wants, but can he do it?

One father, his children, and the loving life they share as a family. . . .

Like all parents, Jorge Ramos is concerned about how his two children are absorbing the world around them. A loving and thoughtful father though he is, he wonders if he has done enough to prepare them for the future. He questions if they know enough about him as a person, and the family to which they belong.

The Gift of Time is a moving and personal book in which one father reflects upon the world we live in and shares his love for his children in a series of letters that touch on everything from love and divorce to soccer and e-mail. Through his experience as a journalist who has seen both the horrors and the greatness that people are capable of, he offers his children the sound advice they need not only to live but to thrive in today's world.

In a heartfelt and direct tone that has gained him the love and admiration of millions of fans across the country, Ramos writes about the issues that plague every parent's mind. In The Gift of Time, Ramos speaks both to his children and to the future generations of Americans on what they can expect, and what is expected of them, as they embark on their journey toward adulthood.

Near-death experiences, or NDEs, are controversial. Thousands of people have had them, but many in the scientific community have argued that they are impossible. Dr. Eben Alexander was one of those people.

A highly trained neurosurgeon who had operated on thousands of brains in the course of his career, Alexander knew that what people of faith call the “soul” is really a product of brain chemistry. NDEs, he would have been the first to explain, might feel real to the people having them, but in truth they are simply fantasies produced by brains under extreme stress.

Then came the day when Dr. Alexander’s own brain was attacked by an extremely rare illness. The part of the brain that controls thought and emotion—and in essence makes us human— shut down completely. For seven days Alexander lay in a hospital bed in a deep coma. Then, as his doctors weighed the possibility of stopping treatment, Alexander’s eyes popped open. He had come back.

Alexander’s recovery is by all accounts a medical miracle. But the real miracle of his story lies elsewhere. While his body lay in coma, Alexander journeyed beyond this world and encountered an angelic being who guided him into the deepest realms of super-physical existence. There he met, and spoke with, the Divine source of the universe itself.

This story sounds like the wild and wonderful imaginings of a skilled fantasy writer. But it is not fantasy. Before Alexander underwent his journey, he could not reconcile his knowledge of neuroscience with any belief in heaven, God, or the soul. That difficulty with belief created an empty space that no professional triumph could erase. Today he is a doctor who believes that true health can be achieved only when we realize that God and the soul are real and that death is not the end of personal existence but only a transition.

This story would be remarkable no matter who it happened to. That it happened to Dr. Alexander makes it revolutionary. No scientist or person of faith will be able to ignore it. Reading it will change your life.

God So Loved You is a 40 day devotional inspired by Max Lucado and 3:16.