Between Heaven and Mirth
Why Joy, Humor, and Laughter Are at the Heart of the Spiritual Life
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- 125,00 kr
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“Between Heaven and Mirth will make any reader smile. . . . Father Martin reminds us that happiness is the good God’s own goal for us.” —Timothy M. Dolan, Archbishop of New York
From The Colbert Report’s “official chaplain” James Martin, SJ, author of the New York Times bestselling The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything, comes a revolutionary look at how joy, humor, and laughter can change our lives and save our spirits.
A Jesuit priest with a busy media ministry, Martin understands the intersections between spirituality and daily life. In Between Heaven and Mirth, he uses scriptural passages, the lives of the saints, the spiritual teachings of other traditions, and his own personal reflections to show us why joy is the inevitable result of faith, because a healthy spirituality and a healthy sense of humor go hand-in-hand with God's great plan for humankind.
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"So a humor book and a serious theology book meet up in a bar..." Martin, a Jesuit who is something of a regular on Comedy Central's The Colbert Report, makes a strong case for the necessity of humor in the spiritual life, offering what he calls "a serious argument for joy." Weaving funny anecdotes and jokes with biblical and historical research and interviews with scholars, Martin does much to rescue the Christian tradition from joylessness. In his telling, church history is filled with levity if you only know where to look his portrayal of St. Teresa of Avila shows her to have been downright hilarious, and Jesus himself drew upon humor in ways we don't always appreciate when we read the Gospels today. Rather than laughter's trivializing faith, Martin sees humor as a faithful response to God, a default stance that invites other people into God's family. Winsome and comical but also provocative and thoughtful, Martin's book is a breath of fresh air for those who would take religion and themselves too seriously.
