Living the Call. Michael Novak
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1 - Taking Our Knowledge and Putting It to Use in the World
CHAPTER 2 - Teach Our Children to Follow the Right Path
CHAPTER 3 - The Child of Immigrants Gives Back
CHAPTER 4 - A Life of Service—Not Far from Home
CHAPTER 5 - Passing by Injustice—and Then Stopping to Do Something about It
CHAPTER 7 - “This Is My Perfect Job!”
CHAPTER 8 - The Business of the Church
CHAPTER 9 - “My Credentials Are My Baptism”
CHAPTER 11 - Surrounded by Poverty, a Soul Is Enriched
CHAPTER 12 - In Love and Death, Helping Others Find Peace
CHAPTER 13 - After the Waters Recede: Leading the Next Generation to Shore
CHAPTER 14 - The Soul of Laypeople
CHAPTER 15 - First Comes Love—God’s for Us
CHAPTER 17 - Into the Presence of God
CHAPTER 19 - Imbibing the Wisdom of the Ages—Spiritual Readings for the Lay Catholic
CHAPTER 20 - Getting away from It All—Spiritual Retreats
CHAPTER 21 - Are You Ready for Commitment? A Look at Oblates and Associates
CHAPTER 22 - Single or Married—Answering God’s Call
CHAPTER 23 - Teach All Nations!
CHAPTER 24 - To Rebuild All Things in Christ
Praise for Living the Call
Every Christian has the right and duty to participate in the Church’s evangelical mission to spread the Gospel of the King- dom of God. Simon and Novak explain why, and how, that mission can be lived today.
—George Weigel, Distinguished Senior Fellow,
Ethics and Public Policy Center
Nothing can advance the Kingdom of God more than Christians getting out of the pews and into the world. Living the Call is an inspiring guide to do just that.
—Chuck Colson, Founder, Prison Fellowship and the
Chuck Colson Center for Christian Worldview
Living the Call inspires readers with particular stories of ordinary yet heroic virtue, while guiding us to further participation in that which is good and noble. It is uplifting and practical.
—Edwin Feulner, President, The Heritage Foundation
Bill Simon and Michael Novak show us how laypeople are fulfilling their baptismal call: to bring Christ to the world. Some do this within Church structures, most in the public square. I found their concluding account of the spiritual resources which support this call riveting.
—Fr. John Jay Hughes, Author, No Ordinary Fool: A Testimony to Grace
For my wife, Cindy, a constant source of respect, admiration, and love.
—Bill
For Karen Laub-Novak, Artist of the Dark Night, fun-loving and carrier of joy.
—Michael
A WORD FROM BILL
Thirty years ago, if you had told me I was going to write a book about opportunities for lay Catholics to become more involved in the Church, I would have chuckled and said, “Not likely” or maybe, more emphatically, “Highly unlikely.”
I grew up the oldest of seven children in an Irish Catholic family, going to church every Sunday. I even had a sort of evangelical experience while I was working at a hospital during high school. But my young adulthood, which I sometimes jokingly refer to as my “George W. Bush phase,” was not a model of religious piety. I worked hard, but I did a lot of partying too. I got married at 27 and was divorced by the time I was 32.
I still have some trouble piecing together how I got so lost in my 20s. But slowly, I returned to the Church. After an annulment, I remarried, and though my wife didn’t convert to Catholicism until 15 years later, we raised our three children in the Catholic faith. My churchgoing and sacramental life