The Journey of Our Love (Pauline Books and Media)

When we think of Catholic saints, we think of great men and women of the Faith who lived centuries before us, died for the Faith in some way, and lived the life of a celibate. This is generally a fair assessment. Most of our saints are religious in some form or another, be they popes, priests, monks, nuns, etc. There are very few married saints, and even then, most of the married saints chose to live celibate lives as brother and sister. What about saints for the rest of us? What about the married man or woman who aspires to sainthood? Where is he to look for inspiration and example? Allow me to introduce you to St. Gianna Beretta Molla.

Before I review the book, The Journey of Our Love, I would like to share some background on St. Gianna Beretta Molla. She was born in Magenta, Italy in 1922 and was the 10th of 13 children. In 1942, she began to study medicine and received her diploma in 1949. In December of 1954, she met Pietro Molla. They became engaged in April 1955 and were married in September 1955 as well. They had three children Pierluigi born in 1956, Mariolina born in 1957, and Laura born in 1959. In 1961, St. Gianna became pregnant again but developed a fibroma on her uterus which left her with three options - abortion, hysterectomy (which would have terminated the pregnancy), and removal of the fibroma. She opted to remove only the fibroma, but still had complications throughout the pregnancy. On Holy Saturday of 1962, she gave birth to their fourth child Gianna Emanuela. Seven days later, St. Gianna Beretta died of septic peritonitis.

Now for the review. The Journey of Our Love is the personal correspondence of St. Gianna Beretta Molla and her husband Pietro Molla. The book is divided into five parts - Introduction (which includes information I covered above, the content of their letters, and their spirituality), Engagement Letters, Letters in the First Year of Marriage, Letters from Pietro's Trip to the United States, and Letters of Maturity. Some gems in this book are that Pietro Molla wrote a preface to his wife's letters, and their daughter, Gianna Emanuela, wrote a preface to Pietro's letters. The chronology of the husband and wife in the end is also extremely useful for putting the letters in the proper context of their lives.

There is no way to legitimately review this book. As these are personal letters between husband and wife, all you can do is read them and appreciate them. I would hate for someone to critique the life and/or love between my wife and I, so I will show St. Gianna Beretta and Pietro Molla the same respect. With that being said, the letters were beautiful to read. There was humor, joy, and most of all love. It was clear reading the letters that these two people loved each other and weren't afraid to show it. The letters also showed a growing maturity both individually and in their love.

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed reading this book. In a culture where the definition of marriage has been twisted, divorce rates are high, and people don't even know what love is anymore, this was a welcome and encouraging read. Saint Gianna Beretta Molla is a worthy saint, but in my opinion (and I'm sure many others), her husband Pietro Molla is also a worthy saint. Let us pray for his eventual sainthood. May we use them as a model for married love. Let us hold true to our beliefs like Saint Gianna. Let us fight for the unborn. And let us always say an emphatic YES to life.

This book was provided to me for free by Pauline Books and Media in exchange for an honest review. If you found this review helpful, please click here and hit Yes!

Only Love Can Save Us (Our Sunday Visitor)

As everyone should be aware by now, Pope Francis became the third pope to win Time's 2013 Person of the Year. I have mixed feelings over this. On the one hand, it's a great testament to him and the attention he has received for focusing on the poor and neglected of the world. On the other hand, liberal media likes to spin things their own way with sound bytes and quotes from his writings taken out of context. What is a Catholic to do if he wants to know what Pope Francis actually has to say on certain issues? There is only one solution, and that is to put down the newspaper, cut off the TV and read his actual words.

Only Love Can Save Us is the second published collection of letters, homilies, and talks that Pope Francis gave before he was elected Pope Francis. The first anthology was titled Encountering Christ and drew mainly on homilies for specific feasts, like Ash Wednesday, Easter Vigil, and Corpus Christi. This book, however, focuses its selections on Pope Francis' words on love and charity. As can be expected, there is some overlap between the two. After all, you can't encounter Christ without love and charity. Therefore, you will notice that Only Love Can Save Us talks # I, XV, and XVI are also found in Encountering Christ.

The most interesting of the chapters to me was "Chapter XI: Freely You Have Received, Freely Give." In this Lenten letter, which only spans three pages, Cardinal Bergoglio discusses complacency in life. I use the term discuss very loosely, as it is more of an exhortation against growing complacent. "We get used to waking up each day as though this is the only way things can be. We grow accustomed to violence as something that is never missing from the news. We get used to the habitual landscape of poverty and misery as we walk the streets of our cities. We get used to youngsters shedding their blood and women picking up what others have discarded and carting it off. We get used to living in a pagan society where kids no longer know how to pray or make the Sign of the Cross. This complacency numbs our hearts, destroying any capacity for that sense of wonder which renews our hope. We are unable to recognize evil and fight against it."

If you are looking for a clear representation of what Pope Francis believes, then look no further than this book. With topics such as marriage, children, the elderly, etc., all covered through the lens of love, you will be inspired to do more and be more for others. We can't just sit back and expect the world to get better on its own. We can't expect the hungry to be fed, the naked to be clothed, and the sick to be treated without Christian charity. Only Love Can Save Us is the wake-up call we all need to hear.

This book was provided to me free by Our Sunday Visitor. If you found this review helpful, please click the link and hit Yes!

All the Way to Heaven (Image Books)

If you want to know, and I mean really know, a historical figure, read what they personally wrote. Although their writings of fiction and/or nonfiction are edifying to read, they will only provide you with a glimpse of their lives as they wanted it to be seen.  To truly understand them, you need to read what they really wrote, like letters or personal correspondence. In these very personal writings, they bare their soul and reveal a side of them you might have never seen otherwise. This is true of Dorothy Day's letters, as can be seen in the book All the Way to Heaven.

All the Way to Heaven is an anthology of letters written by Dorothy Day from 1923 to 1980. I did some research to find out the year in which she was born (which was 1897 if you were wondering). This means that these letters began when she was approximately 26 and continued til February of 1980, when she was 82 years old. This is impressive in and of itself. Like most twenty-somethings, her early letters deal with love and relationships. This first series was written ten years before she established the Catholic Worker movement. By reading these letters, we are able to see her life before God got a hold of her.

We then see a dramatic shift in the next series of letters.  By this time, she had become the leader of a lay movement and was addressing issues of labor and social justice. her focus had shifted towards helping others and away from herself. The rest of the letters continue to show her spiritual growth and maturity, as well as the advancement of her newspaper and the cause for which she fought her whole life - social justice. Besides writing to ordinary lay people interested in her cause, Dorothy Day also wrote to some of the most important people in her day, including bishops and Thomas Merton.

I did not read all the letters, as they span nearly 600 pages. However, during the ones I did read, I found myself wishing to read the responses she received to these letters. I feel it would have fleshed out the dialogue more and made for more interesting reading. I did like that there was an index at the end, as it was helpful if you were looking for a letter to a specific individual. While this book isn't technically a biography, it feels biographical in a way as you read through it. Overall, I give this book 4 out of 5 stars. I received this book for free from WaterBrook Multnomah Publishing Group for this review.

If you found this review helpful click here, and hit Yes. If you would like to know more about check out the links below:

• Book Site
• More Info
• Read Chapter One
• Author Bio