This week is our one-year anniversary of launching Days of Deepening Friendship with a new emphasis: “for women growing wiser.” We have tried to speak to issues that are of particular interest to women at midlife and onward—or, as we hear it put a lot these days—women in the second half of life. We hope to touch upon matters of the spirit, such as prayer, as well as practical matters, such as renegotiating relationships with adult children.
We are revving up for another year of ministry, and we’d like your feedback. Here are my questions for you.
- Which topics this past year were especially relevant to you?
- Which topics do you suggest we add for the coming year?
- Are there Loyola Press authors you’d like to know better? I’m happy to interview authors as they are available to do so, and then post those videos on the DDF site.
- Are there other features you’d like to see more often, such as author videos, book reviews, or posts from other bloggers?
We will begin the year—that is, September and October—by exploring the treasury of wisdom from our long history of women mystics and saints, from Julian of Norwich to Dorothy Day. I’m sure they will give us plenty to think about. Also, I expect that they will inspire us to more frequent prayer and more fervent living!
Peace to you,
Vinita and the DDF team
{ 12 comments… read them below or add one }
In this anniversary time of Vatican II, maybe you could include women who were involved as theologians or contributors to the writing of the articles.
THink this would be a great idea!
Your email is the only one i’ve been saving in a file since the beginning 5 or 6?? years ago. I look forward daily to each of your emails enjoying whatever you do. Not being a Catholic, all is new to me and so i enjoy it for its learing value as well as its spiritual. I love the prayers, poems, videos as well as the thoughts on what ever is going on in the world. So I’m happy with what you do. Just keep it up.
I love all your posts! in my part of the world very little is known about Hildgard of Bingen, could you add her to your list?
Maria—–Portugal
James Martin,sj is one of my favorites,My life with the Saints. He is so easy to relate to and down to earth. I’m hoping he will write something more, interview him and what may be up and coming. I am reading Sign of the Cross by Bert Ghezzi and this is a gem of a book. I gave a speech on it at coffee time at church we have lost some important truths and people like James and Bert bring us back to the wonder and awe of our beautiful and meaningful faith life. Thanks for shining a light on the beauty of believing!
It sounds wonderful. I love Hildegard! Here in Australia we finally have our first saint – St. Mary MacKillop of the Cross. Her story is a wonderful story of a strong woman who was vilified by the church but she stuck to her belief in what God wanted her to do and eventually she was recognised for her mission to provide education to the poor and isolated children of pioneer Australia. Perhaps her story could inspire those women who find it hard to be heard or feel isolated in their church communities. Thank you for your wonderful vocation to women everywhere…we really appreciate your insightfulness .
I’d like to see more discussions which pertain to people who, being of good health and high energy, refuse to succumb to societyy’s ageism culture. We are active in the workplace and community at large. We are legally seniors but we are not phsyically or psychologically ready for things soothing and relaxing and we either have or want to work for several years (believe it or not they work through their eighties around here for some reason and I do disagree with that concept since it takes away from young people trying to pay student loans and from others who have children to support).
Being older does not however make us all elder-wise in the workplace and we need to know for example how to work with older and younger people as well as clientelle of all ages and still maintain our Christian centre. Today’s culture makes that a great challenge. This is where we learn to, not know how to, keep our mouth shut and still maintain our sanity. We need help with that one. Our grannies didn’t work so they didn’t need to know that. We do.
This is a Year of Faith-I would like to see more on what we can do as adults and in formation that would help us grow in that faith that is such a blessing to each of us. How can we truly witness that faith to others and hear from you and the other authors what has worked in other parishes and other areas.
Thank YOU for having this forum for us-you have given me so much to think about!
This has been the year of inter-faith dialogue in our community, with many forums and talks taking place throughout the year and I think this is a subject you could introduce and perhaps interview some authors of inter-faith books. I believe it is absolutely essential for us to learn about our neighbors of other faiths, so we can learn to live and love in this world of such varying peoples.
Great idea and we can include the JWs since I like to look at similarities not differences. Many of their beliefs are like ours (marriage as sacrament, pro life, obedience of civil laws (authority).) When we look to and point out similarities between “us” and “them” we all see how there is no division. We are universal under God and God isn’t Catholic.
Happy Anniversary to Vinita and to your colleagues at DDF!
Yesterday, I had a moment to allow the Holy Spirit to direct me to open to the appropriate page in Days of Deepening Friendship to jumpstart my day.
I had a beautiful moment with your chapter on “Conversion”.
It was an “Ignatian” day at my parish yesterday. We presented an evening of Ignatian prayer…which began with a recitation of Psalm 139, and re-read by Vinita, courtesy of “youtube.” Then, we moved on to the Examen..followed by mirth, joy and sharing. Woman A: “Hey, I haven’t sinned yet today!” Woman B: “The day’s not over yet!”
Thank God, for faith…and joy!
Happy 1st Anniversary! I loved many of the writings/messages sent this last year. Vinita, I’m resigning as registrar of Holos University. I’m requesting a change of my e-mail to my home computer i.e. Vera Borgmeyer and the e-mail is Vborgmeyer@windstream.net . Would you do that for me please? Thanks and blessings for your 2nd year and beyond, Vera