The Heroic Face of Innocence: Three Stories by Georges Bernanos (Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1999 150 pages, $13.00)
Bernanos is best known for his novel Diary of a Country Priest. This volume collects three of his shorter works: Joan, Heretic and Saint; Sermon of an Agnostic on the Feast of St.
Thérèse and Dialogues of the Carmelites. The title of the volume refers to a constant theme of Bernanos' work—that the endless and monstrous challenges faced by each person in this fallen world, especially in the 20th century, can be successfully met only with a specific kind of heroism, the heroism it would take to really follow the admonition of Christ, “Unless you become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”
Excerpt from
“Supposing, my brothers, that I were consumptive, and I wished to drink the waters of Lourdes, and doctors suggested that they should dilute in it some drug of their own. ‘My dear doctors,’ I would reply, ‘you have said I was incurable. Let me try my luck undisturbed. In this matter, which is strictly between myself and Our Lady, if I need any go-between, you can be sure I won't be asking the pharmacist.’”
Some of the other volumes in the Eerdmans' series: The Portal of the Mystery of Hope by Charles Peguy; Prayer: the Mission of the Church by Jean Danielou; The Discovery of God by Henri de Lubac.
How to Love as Jesus Loves: Unlocking the Treasures Of Christ's Sacred Heart by Father Francis P. Donnelly, SJ (Sophia Institute Press, 1999 152 pages, $13.95)
In this series of 18 meditations on the Sacred Heart, originally published in 1911, Father Donnelly presents Christ's personal love for every soul. He encourages the reader to turn to Jesus as the divine source of love who can give each person strength to love others in the everyday circumstances of life.
Excerpt:
“In the fire of Christ's word are blended the flames of two loves. In the beating of His heart, the ear can detect the harmony of two sounds: the melody of the greatest love that ever throbbed in man, and its harmonic melody of infinitely higher octaves, the love of God. Every word, then, of Christ was far from idleness. It was possessed of a divine energy. It was the coinage of the gold of Christ's Heart.”
Some of the other titles reprinted by Sophia Institute Press: Comfort for the Sick and Dying, And for Those Who Love Them, by David L. Greenstock from a 1956 original; How to Live Nobly and Well: Timeless Principles for Achieving True Success and Lasting Happiness, by Jesuit Father Edward F. Garesché from a 1931 original; The School of Mary: Forty Essential Lessons for Sinners, from the Blessed Mother Herself, by John A. Kane from a 1942 original.
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