The SAINT BONAVENTURE’S PARISH BOOK CLUB is a casual group which meets informally every other month. The Parish Book Club does not follow a formal curriculum (such as The Great Books Club); the members of the Book Club select the works which they will read. Selections are made by Club member recommendation as well as from Parish member recommendations – if you know of a good read, please pass word along! Selections are made from both spiritual and secular authors, and reflect a wide range of backgrounds and preferences.
The Club meets on the second Monday of alternate months, meeting in January, March, May, July, September and November. Meetings occur in the Parish Hall, and commence at 6:30 in the evening. Light refreshments are generally served, and drop-in visitors are always welcome (attendance is not required, and you may feel free to come and go as you wish, in accordance with the selections that you may enjoy or wish to discuss).
Past Parish Book Club selections include:
The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
An Infernal Document, this short novel is a collection of correspondences from the demon Screwtape to his nephew Wormwood, instructing the young demon on the best manner in which to ensnare a Christian soul.
Silence by Shusaku Endo
The story of Fr. Rodrigues, a Jesuit Missionary who travels to Japan in 1638, a period of great persecution and trial, which resonates with the theme of a silent God who accompanies us through adversity.
The Four Witnesses: The Early Church in Her Own Words by Rod Bennett
This book is a journey of discovery of ancient and beautiful truths through the lives of four great saints of the early Church—Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Justin Martyr, and Irenaeus of Lyons.
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
Sure, you’ve seen the movie 97 times, but have you ever read the book?
The Complete Stories by Flannery O’Connor
The collected short stories of this Catholic writer of the early 20th Century, in the “Southern Gothic” style, are keenly observed revelations of human foibles and the search for redemption.
Faithful Dissenters: Stories of Men & Women Who Loved and Changed the Church by Robert McClory
An exploration of the dissenting tradition in the Church through the lives of such as: Galileo, Cardinal John Henry Newman, St. Catherine of Siena, Fr. Matteo Ricci, and St. Hildegard of Bingen, among others.
Grandmother and the Priests (Taylor Caldwell)
One of the hidden treasures of Caldwell’s prolific library, this book of short stories, set in early 20th Century Britain, is filled with tales of moral crisis, Irish harpists, reluctant saints, hidden miracles, religious oppression, and a remarkable young girl.
St. Thomas More: Model for Modern Catholics (John Fink)
A selection of the Knights of Columbus “Supreme Knight’s Book Club” this book offers insight into the life of a faithful husband, father and scholar who has rightfully been called “a man for all seasons.”
Dear and Glorious Physician (Taylor Caldwell)
Another of Caldwell’s classics, this novel tells the story of Lucanus, Greek physician of the ancient Mediterranean, who traveled the roads of Judea asking, “what manner of man was my Lord?”
The Dumb Ox: The Biography of St. Thomas Aquinas, by G.K. Chesterton
When Thomas failed his first theological disputation, Albert Magnus prophetically exclaimed: "We call him the dumb ox, but in his teaching he will one day produce such a bellowing that it will be heard throughout the world." Chesterton’s biography of the great Saint tells the story of his life and reveals the foundations of his thought.
A Morbid Taste for Bones, by Ellis Peters
Meet the most estimable Brother Cadfael, a Benedictine monk living in the 1130s and tending to his herb gardens when he is called to make sense of a murderous mystery. This is the first novel in the Brother Cadfael series which was popularized for television in the 1990s, staring Derek Jacobi in the titular role.
Theophilus, by Michael D. O’Brien
This book speculates upon the identity of the individual to whom St. Luke’s Gospel, as well his Acts of the Apostles, is written. O’Brien contemplates Theophilus as St. Luke’s adoptive father, concerned about that questionable group of spurious individuals whom his son has “fallen in with”: the early Christian community. Theophilus sets out to keep Luke from “throwing his life away”, and begins the first steps on what becomes his own personal apocalypse
The Seven Storey Mountain: An Autobiography of Faith, by Thomas Merton
The 1948 autobiography of (a then 31 years old) Thomas Merton, Trappist Monk and noted spiritual author of the 40’s, 50’s and 60’s, which reflects upon his youth and quest for his faith in God, leading to his conversion to Roman Catholicism at age 23, and his subsequent decision to enter the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani near Bardstwon, KY. Over 60 years after its printing, Merton’s first book remains perhaps his most beloved, and is included on both 100 Christian Works that Changed the Century (William Petersen) and The National Review’s list of 100 top non-fiction works of the 20th Century.
Our current (January, 2012) selection is:
Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy, by Eric Metaxas
As Adolf Hitler and the Nazis seduced a nation, bullied a continent, and attempted to exterminate the Jews of Europe, a small number of dissidents and saboteurs worked to dismantle the Third Reich from the inside. One of these individuals was Dietrich Bonhoeffer - a Lutheran pastor and theologian. In this New York Times best-selling biography, Eric Metaxas takes both strands of Bonhoeffer's life, the Christian and the resistance member, and draws them together to tell a searing story of incredible moral courage in the face of monstrous evil. Metaxas presents the fullest accounting of Bonhoeffer's heart-wrenching decision to leave the safe haven of America to return to Hitler's Germany, and sheds new light on Bonhoeffer's involvement in the famous Valkyrie plot to assassinate Hitler, and in "Operation 7," the effort to smuggle Jews into neutral Switzerland.
Coming selections of the St. Bonaventure’s Parish Book Club include:
March 2012 – Galileo’s Daughter: A Historical Memoir of Science, Faith & Love, by Dava Sobel
A great fascination with the famous Italian scientist and dissenter inspires Sobel’s dramatic biography, centered around over 120 letters to the scientist from his daughter, Sister Maria Celeste, a cloistered nun. Moving between Galileo's grand public life and Maria Celeste's sequestered world, Sobel illuminates the Florence of the Medicis and the papal court in Rome during the pivotal era when humanity's perception of its place in the cosmos was about to be overturned. During that same time, while the bubonic plague wreaked its terrible devastation and the Thirty Years' War tipped fortunes across Europe, Galileo sought to reconcile the Heaven he revered as a good Catholic with the heavens he revealed through his telescope.
May 2012 – Watership Down, by Richard Adams
This misleadingly labeled “children’s classic” has been a worldwide bestseller for over thirty years. The novel tells the tale of the journey of a band of rabbits, driven from their warrens the destructive intrusion of humans, and forced to flee across the English Downs. Led by a pair of stouthearted brothers, the creatures must pass through harrowing trials posed by predators and adversaries, overcoming hardship and persecution in order to gain a mysterious promised land and a more perfect society.
July 2012 – One Corpse Too Many, by Ellis Peters
For summer vacations and beach reading, return with the Book Club to 12th Century England and the intrepid gardener of Shrewsbury Abbey, Brother Cadfael. The good Benedictine once again finds himself seeking enlightening answers to curious questions as he pursues justice. An ingenious murderer has disposed of his victim on a battlefield, and Cadfael, discovering the body, must piece together wildly disparate clues to expose a killer’s black heart.
September 2012 – The Great Divorce, by CS Lewis
This short novella is one in which several residents of Hell (“a grey town”) take a bus ride to heaven, where they are greeted by the people who dwell there. The proposition given to them is that they are welcome to stay (in which case they begin to call the place they came from, not “Hell”, but, “Purgatory”), but the truth is that many simply don’t find Heaven to be to their taste. The book’s title refers to William Blake’s famous 18th century work, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, which Lewis once described as being a “disastrous error”. The novel itself draws heavily from Dante’s Divine Comedy and Bunyan’s The Pilgrim's Progress.
 

PARISH READING RACK - near choir area in church.

The Parish “Reading Rack” offers uplifting, economical books for sale to guide, inspire or entertain you and your family members of every age.  In addition to Bibles, prayer books and devotional materials, you’ll find copies of books read by our Parish Book Club (see our web page about the Parish Book Club for more info), writings of the Saints, books devoted to living the Catholic faith today, elderly & bereavement resources as well as coloring books, toddler board books, children’s books and teen books and resources.  

The Reading Rack is located adjacent to the choir area in a corner near the front of church.  New books are added every month.  For your convenience, copies of The Reading Rack Review are available at the doors of the church that offer a listing and brief description of the latest books added to the Reading Rack.  Check out the older copies of The Reading Rack Review listed here for books that may still be available for sale.

To buy a book, simply note the cost on the white label of the book and place your cash or check in the payment slot in the wall next to the Reading Rack.  For questions or more information, please call Wendy Pomeroy at 508-878-8674.