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READING & DISCUSSION GUIDE:

Provided (for free!) by HarperOne, this small group guide is for New York Times Bestseller, The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life by James Martin, SJ.

To access the questions for personal or small group use, just click here: READING & DISCUSSION GUIDE: The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything

The session topics are as follows:

• Chapter 1. A Way of Proceeding: What is Ignatian Spirituality?
• Chapter 2. The Six Paths: Spiritual, Religious, Spiritual but Not Religious, and Everything in Between
• Chapter 3. What Do You Want? Desire and the Spiritual Life
• Chapter 4. Beautiful Yesterdays: Finding God and Letting God Find You
• Chapter 5. Beginning to Pray: So I’ve Found God…Now What?
• Chapter 6. Friendship With God: Father Barry’s Insight
• Chapter 7. God Meets You Where You Are: Ignatian Traditions of Prayer
• Chapter 8. The Simple Life: The Surprising Freedom of Downward Mobility
• Chapter 9. Like the Angels? Chastity, Celibacy, and Love
• Chapter 10. More by Deeds Than by Words: Friendship and Love
• Chapter 11. Surrendering to the Future: Obedience, Acceptance, and Suffering
• Chapter 12. What Should I Do? The Ignatian Way of Making Decisions
• Chapter 13. Be Who You Is! Work, Job, Career, Vocation…and Life

BONUS MATERIAL: Free Episodes from CatholicTV.com based on The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything:

From June 2011 to February 2012, James Martin, SJ produced three Blink episodes on CatholicTV.com, all based on his book, The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything: A Spirituality for Real Life. According to CatholicTV.com,

Each episode of Blink is a half hour full of insight, information and faith, Blink with Catholics from around the country sharing their belief, their life and their wisdom. Each “show” consists of short segments on a variety of topics presented by different hosts. An exciting thirty minutes of short bursts…information for Catholics of every age! CatholicTV is a 24/7 television network that broadcasts local and national religious programming and live events for the Catholic church in America.

I’ve listed the three episodes below, with the running time of each of the segments. If you choose to use this in a small group setting, you could ask members to watch 2 segments a day during the week as a supplement to a relevant chapter (i.e., you might watch “Ways of Prayer” in the week before you discuss Chapter 5 of the book, “Beginning to Pray.”)

[UPDATE 5/26/15: While the first two episodes listed below (“Ways of Prayer” and “Joy, Humor and Laughter in the Spiritual Life” are no longer available on CatholicTV.com, I did manage to find the third episode, “Jesus and Joy” on their YouTube Channel. If anyone happens to find the missing episodes posted again, let me know and I’ll be happy to update my links.]

Ways of Prayer

1. Practicing Lectio Divina (2:03)
2. Easiest Prayer Ever (2:51)
3. Trying Out Ignatian Contemplation (2:31)
4. What is Prayer? (2:03)
5. Centering Prayer (2:14)
6. Nature Prayer (1:57)
7. The Mass as Prayer (1:58)
8. Adoration of the Blessed Sacrament (2:04)
9. The Rosary (2:10)
10. Smiling With God in Prayer (2:03)

Joy, Humor, and Laughter in the Spiritual Life

1. Joy Evangelizes (1:19)
2. Humor is Human (1:16)
3. Jesus Used Humor (1:31)
4. Prophetic Humor (1:26)
5. Humor Deepens Relationships (1:31)
6. Humor Shows Hospitality (2:15)
7. Laughter Can Be Healing (1:54)
8. Humor Opens Our Minds (1:17)
9. Joy, Humor, Laughter Are Fun (1:09)

Jesus and Joy

1. Jesus As a Witty Storyteller (2:52)
2. Was Jesus a Funny Guy? (2:02)
3. Is Christianity Gloomy? (2:40)
4. Is Christianity Joyless? (1:49)
5. Jesus’ Life Was About Joy (2:14)
6. Jesus’ Sense of Humor (1:30)
7. Jesus, Nathaniel, and a Sense of Humor (2:21)

Image courtesy of Chaiwat / FreeDigitalPhotos.net