I wonder if anyone remembers SparkNotes. SparkNotes were big back in middle school—they were more or less the same thing as Cliff’s Notes. At first it was a website where you did quizzes like “How evil are you?” and “Who’s…
At the time this was written, Friday of last week, my coworkers and I were attending When Faith Meets Pedagogy up at the International Plaza Hotel in Toronto. It’s a very big and very busy religious education conference, with over…
In 1930, an Englishman named Edmond K. Blyth was driving home from a visit to Liverpool Cathedral. He’d been a soldier in the First World War, and three of his friends from when he was a cadet—John Bennett, Arthur Bailey…
The Internet has failed me. To be fair, the Internet fails me on a regular basis. Today, though, the Internet has failed me in a professional sense: I can’t find the clip on YouTube I was looking for. I’m not…
In one of my favourite fantasy novels, Thief of Time by Terry Pratchett—this relates to The Unfolding Journey, I promise—two people are sitting in a beautiful landscape magically removed from the normal world. There is wind and sunlight in the…
On Wednesday night a group of us from Novalis were invited to a film screening at the TIFF Bell Lightbox, hosted by the Jesuit community in Toronto. There was good wine, beef and shrimp sliders (for us), popcorn (not for…
I had a lot of opportunity to get acquainted with our newest book Faith and Literature Matters this past week. We have review copies of all our books to be sent out, to newspapers and online blogs. It could be more accurately…
Reading this book was like sitting down and having coffee with a priest. It was simple and casual—no big words, no endless Bible quotes, no tedious sermons. I felt perfectly at home. Fr. Rolheiser is the author of seven previous…
“Uh-oh,” I thought, looking at the cover of Do Monkeys Go to Heaven? It shows a monkey with a halo above its head, sitting and looking unimpressed with the reader, along with the title and the author’s name. I hadn’t…
“Oh, so that’s what a scapular is!” Growing up in a north Toronto neighbourhood, I’ve gone to an Anglican church all my life—a small church, full of the feeling of being tucked away in safety and quiet. Anglicanism occupies a…