Religious aspects of sexuality, gender and relationships Books

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Book SynopsisAre you a stay-at-home mom? We know your tireless work serving your children, managing your home and navigating your family schedule often gets underappreciated. You need a devotional that understands what you''re experiencing, affirms your value amidst the chaos and invites you to recharge through God’s Word. 100 Devotions for the Stay-at-Home Mom invites you on a journey that brings you peace and deepens your faith while speaking to relevant topics such as raising children, self-care, empathy, sympathy, balance, maintaining hope, and getting rest. Inside this beautiful devotional you’ll find: 100 Bible-based devotions Colorfully-designed interiors A presentation page offering space to write a personal note for gifting Each day includes: A relevant Bible verse Inspirational devotion A personalized prayer Journaling lines to express your thoughtsThis 100-

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Book SynopsisA Premarital Guide for Blended Family CouplesIf you want to enter a blended family marriage well, this is the book for you. Aimed at engaged or pre-engaged couples who have at least one child from a previous relationship, Preparing to Blend offers wise counsel on parenting, finances, establishing family identity, and daily routines for your new life together. Within these pages you will learn how to:· predict common issues· define expectations · create solutionsYou, your soon-to-be-spouse, and your children will benefit from exercises designed to accelerate family bonding and help you better understand each other. There is even a chapter to help you plan your wedding with your children in mind, so you can build a strong future together. Preparing to Blend is also an ideal premarital counseling tool for marriage coaches, mentors, and pastors wanting to prepare c

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Book SynopsisExploring the timeless wisdom of Proverbs 31, Bible teacher Elizabeth George reveals how you can become a woman of true beauty—a woman who desires to honor God in all that she says and does. Experience a richer spiritual walk as you embrace God's design.

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Book SynopsisUsing information from a national remarriage survey, leading experts show couples how to strengthen their new marriage and overcome common challenges.

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Book SynopsisThe popular and bestselling marriage book that has changed millions of couples' lives is now the inspiration for a powerful video curriculum for your church or small group. Six sessions.

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Book SynopsisMany of us believe we are saved by grace--but for too many, that''s the last time grace defines our life. Instead of walking in grace every day, we strive to be good, believing that the Christian life means hard work with an unshakable good mood. When we fail to measure up to our own impossible standards, we hide behind our good-girl masks, determined to keep our weakness a secret.In Grace for the Good Girl, Emily P. Freeman invites women to let go of the try-hard life and realize that in Christ we are free to receive from him rather than constantly try to achieve for him. With an open hand and a whimsical style, Emily encourages women to move from hiding behind masks and do-good performances to the freedom of a life hidden with Christ in God.

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Book SynopsisWomen long for deep and lasting friendships but often find them challenging to make. The private angst they feel regarding friendship often translates into their own insecurity and isolation. Christine Hoover offers women a fresh, biblical vision for friendship that allows for the messiness of our lives and the realities of our schedules. She shows women- what''s holding them back from developing satisfying friendships- how to make and deepen friendships - how to overcome insecurity, self-imposed isolation, and past hurts- how to embrace the people God has already placed in their lives as potential friends- and how to revel in the beauty and joy of everyday friendshipWith stories of real friendships and guidance drawn from Scripture, Hoover encourages women to intentionally and purposefully invest in one of the most rewarding relationships God has given us.

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Book SynopsisSpring, summer, winter, fall. Marriages are perpetually in a state of transition, continually moving from one season to anotherperhaps not annually, as in nature, but just as certainly and consistently. Sometimes we find ourselves in winterdiscouraged, detached, and dissatisfied; other times, we experience springtime with its openness, hope, and anticipation. On other occasions, we bask in the warmth of summercomfortable, relaxed, enjoying life. And then comes fall with its uncertainty, negligence, and apprehension. The cycle repeats itself many times throughout the life of a marriage, just as the seasons repeat themselves in nature.The seasons of marriage come and go. Each one holds the potential for emotional health and happiness, and each one has its challenges. The purpose of this book is to describe these recurring seasons of marriage, help you and your spouse identify which season your marriage is in, and show you how to enhance your marriage in all four seasons.

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a huge range and FREE tracked UK delivery on ALL orders.

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Book SynopsisYour life does not have to be filled with disagreement and combativeness. Discover how you can listen with grace, communicate with kindness, and open yourself up to rewarding relationships that might not have existed otherwise.

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Book SynopsisI wouldn't trade my life for anyone else's. If I could choose not to have cancer, and continue my life as it was, I wouldn't do it. Matt Gauger.You're twenty-two, in love, and just starting a career. The last thing you're worried about is the purpose of life (whatever that means) and when you're going to die. If you think about such things, you certainly don't talk about them. With his sociable personality and love of music and basketball, Matt had plenty of friends but didn't really stand out from the crowd. Then, a month before his wedding, he was diagnosed with cancer. Six months later he was dead. But Six Months to Live isn't really about dying. It's the story of how Matt and his family and friends struggled to accept his suffering, and how it changed each of them. It's about facing (rather than avoiding) life's most important questions, and instead of going through the motions living life to the full.Trade ReviewA little book, but a grand witness . . . Matt’s story reminds us that though dying is a gritty and painful process, death does not have the final word. --Gerald L. Sittser, authorAn extraordinary account – simple and profound. Matt’s struggle is one we will all eventually have to go through. --Francis S. MacNutt, author, HealingIt is a tragedy when a life is cut this short, though in being compressed it becomes like a diamond. Through the clarity of this prism we can see a life lived for God, and lived well. --Frederica Mathewes-Green, columnistCompelling…Six Months to Live captures the essence of dying with dignity and grace. I have never read a book about dying that left me with such a feeling of peace. --Judy Lentz, former CEO, Hospice and Palliative Nurses AssociationSix Months to Live tears at the soul and leaves the reader determined to take a new direction…If you don’t read another book this year, read this one. --The OklahomanDeep, fascinating, theologically rich… --Christianity TodaySecularists often ask why the good die young, and sometimes very young. Daniel Hallock’s Six Months to Live: Learning from a Young Man with Cancer is a good book to give those facing a death sentence. --Marvin Olasky, WORLD MagazinePowerful…It is rare to be invited on such and intimate journey. --N. Gordon Cosby, fouinder, Church of the SaviorMatt Gauger, the subject of this slim, poignant book, suddenly found himself dying of cancer at age 22. Hallock gives readers an intimate account of events, beginning with the robust, athletic young man's descent into unmanageable pain, followed by a serious diagnosis and months of reckoning with end-of-life issues. The text features long quotations from interviews with and diaries of those closest to Gauger among them his wife, parents, brother and doctor and in doing so paints the emotional, spiritual and physical landscape within which this drama unfolded. Hallock admirably avoids hagiography, as do Gauger's loved ones, and instead reveals the ennobling effect dying had on Gauger. --Publishers WeeklyTable of ContentsContents Preface 1. The Blow 2. Gobbler 3. Cynthia 4. Life with Chemo 5. Back to the Front 6. Learning to Let Go 7. Before Morning 8. Ties that Bind 9. New Seeds Coda

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Book SynopsisThe term ars erotica refers to the styles and techniques of lovemaking with the honorific title of art. But in what sense are these practices artistic and how do they contribute to the aesthetics and ethics of self-cultivation in the art of living? In this book, Richard Shusterman offers a critical, comparative analysis of the erotic theories proposed by the most influential premodern cultural traditions that shaped our contemporary world. Beginning with ancient Greece, whose god of desiring love gave eroticism its name, Shusterman examines the Judaeo-Christian biblical tradition and the classical erotic theories of Chinese, Indian, Islamic, and Japanese cultures, before concluding with medieval and Renaissance Europe. His exploration of their errors and insights shows how we could improve the quality of life and love today. By using the engine of eros to cultivate qualities of sensitivity, grace, skill, and self-mastery, we can reimagine a richer, more positive vision of sex educationTrade Review'With a panoramic horizon that draws upon the full compass of sexual culture, world philosopher Richard Shusterman in his Ars Erotica elevates and ennobles sexuality by finding the crucial isomorphisms between deference and a situated, contrapuntal musicality, between artistry and the intensity of pleasure, between sensual imagination and intelligent practice. Shusterman continues his somaesthetic revolution by taking the stodgy professional discipline to task with a sex education that seeks to refine rather than contain, and to elevate rather than ignore this vital aspect of the human experience.' Roger T. Ames, Peking University'The unending struggle to reconcile the 'base' demands of the desiring body with the elevating aspirations of culture defines human history. Drawing on his pioneering work in somaesthetics, Richard Shusterman displays extraordinary erudition in presenting the ways in which seven great civilizations have fashioned an ars erotica seeking to do justice to both.' Martin Jay, University of California, Berkeley'In the impressive and ground-breaking new book, Ars Erotica: Sex and Somaesthetic in the Classical Arts of Love, the somaesthetic philosopher and historian, Richard Shusterman, captures the human somaesthetic expressions and movements in time and cultures in all its width, through what he calls Ars Erotica … Ars Erotica should be read as a book of enlightenment to everyone who wants to enrich their knowledge of somaesthetic and aesthetics art of living and who further want to understand more of the hidden power of gender and erotic visions.' Line Joranger, Psychology of Women Quarterly'Richard Shusterman's latest book is a tour de force through the broad (multi)cultural and temporal horizon of his investigation. In this connection, vagueness is factored in, for all the careful legitimization of terminology at the beginning of the volume, especially the option for ars erotica, Shusterman must ultimately present a whole realm of love forms, physical as well as idealized and even mystical in nature. Above all, this investigation, which promises to become a standard work, makes the originally somewhat abstract program of somaesthetics tangible and convincing.' Madalina Diaconu, Polylog'The historical and geographical scope of the book is breath-taking … The complexity and detail of the material addressed entail that Ars Erotica may be read in a number of ways … and … has consequences for how we live our lives and care for our bodies. The extraordinary scholarship, and indeed courage, of Ars Erotica demands the initiation of much needed debates, not least with feminist and queer theorists. It is an important text, and is so beyond its place in the development of aesthetics or indeed somaesthetics. It should, as Shusterman hopes, serve in developing the understanding, criticism, and ultimately practice, of our own sexual cultures and their inherent aesthetics.' The British Journal of Aesthetics'… An absolutely trailblazing work … Ars Erotica sheds light on a path worthy of future study and it has definitely established Shusterman's role in the history of aesthetics as a major one.' Max Ryynänen, Slovak Journal of Aesthetics'A look at other cultures and other times can provide, as this book suggests, ample resources for a broader, deeper, erotic vision to enrich the field of aesthetics and our art of living.' Mark Tschaepe, Metaphilosophy'Richard Shusterman's Ars Erotica ambitiously romps through history to explore the idea of sex as an artistic skill honed by study and training.' Matthew Crippen, Society'Shusterman understands that many of his subjects require background discussions, discussions of, say, the nature of the relevant society or theological issues, which he then provides. This book therefore is a wide-ranging accomplishment; I learned much from it. It will function well as a basis for further reflections and a springboard to future syntheses.' Mark Masterson, Journal of the History of SexualityTable of Contents1. Ars Erotica and the question of aesthetics; 2. Dialectics of desire and virtue; 3. The biblical tradition; 4. Chinese Qi erotics; 5. Lovemaking as aesthetic education; 6. Fragrance, veils, and violence; 7. From romantic refinement to courtesan conoisseurship; 8. Commingling, complexity, and conflict.

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Book SynopsisThis collection of essays by Jewish, Christian, and Muslim scholars underscores the significance of sustained and serious ethical, inter-religious, and interdisciplinary reflection on children. Essays in the first half of the volume discuss fundamental beliefs and practices within the religious traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam regarding children, adult obligations to them, and a child's own obligations to others. The second half of the volume focuses on selected contemporary challenges regarding children and faithful responses to them. Marcia J. Bunge brings together scholars from various disciplines and diverse strands within these three religious traditions, representing several views on essential questions about the nature and status of children and adult-child relationships and responsibilities. The volume not only contributes to intellectual inquiry regarding children in the specific areas of ethics, religious studies, children's rights, and childhood studies, but alsTrade Review'… the book brings the three traditions into conjunction with one another, with the aim of drawing upon the wisdom of each tradition - and one another's traditions as well … Highly recommended …' L. J. Alderink, ChoiceTable of ContentsIntroduction Marcia J. Bunge; Part I. Religious Understandings of Children: Central Beliefs and Practices: 1. The concept of the child embedded in Jewish law Elliot N. Dorff; 2. Children's spirituality in the Jewish narrative tradition Sandy Eisenberg Sasso; 3. Christian understandings of children: central biblical themes and resources Marcia J. Bunge; 4. Human dignity and social responsibility: Catholic social thought on children William Werpehowski; 5. Islam, children, and modernity - a Qur'anic perspective Farid Esack; 6. Muslim youth and religious identity: classical perspectives and contemporary challenges Marcia Hermansen; 7. Imagining childism: how childhood should transform religious ethics John Wall; 8. Talking about childhood and engaging with children: a Christian perspective on interfaith dialogue Nelly Van Doorn-Harder; Part II. Responsibilities of Children and Adults: Selected Contemporary Issues and Challenges: 9. Work, labor, and chores: Christian ethical reflection on children and vocation Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore; 10. Honor your father and your mother - a Christian perspective in dialogue with contemporary psychological theories Annemie Dillen; 11. Will I have Jewish grandchildren? Cultural transmission and ethical and religious concerns among ethnoreligious minorities Sylvia Barack-Fishman; 12. Linking past and present: educating Muslim children in diverse cultural contexts Lily Zakiyah Munir and Azim Nanji; 13. Orphans and adoption: biblical themes, Christian initiatives, and contemporary ethical concerns Keith Graber Miller; 14. Second-hand children: a Jewish ethics of foster care in an age of desire Laurie Zoloth; 15. Christianity's mixed contributions to children's rights: traditional teachings, modern doubts Don S. Browning and John Witte, Jr; 16. Children's rights in modern Islamic and international law: changes in Muslim moral imaginaries Ebrahim Moosa.

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Book SynopsisAs demonstrated in any conflict, war is violent and causes grave harms to innocent persons, even when fought in compliance with just war criteria. In this book, Rosemary Kellison presents a feminist critique of just war reasoning, with particular focus on the issue of responsibility for harm to noncombatants. Contemporary just war reasoning denies the violence of war by suggesting that many of the harms caused by war are necessary, though regrettable, injuries for which inflicting agents bear no responsibility. She challenges this narrow understanding of responsibility through a feminist ethical approach that emphasizes the relationality of humans and the resulting asymmetries in their relative power and vulnerability. According to this approach, the powerful individual and collective agents who inflict harm during war are responsible for recognizing and responding to the vulnerable persons they harm, and thereby reducing the likelihood of future violence.Kellison''s volume goes beyond abstract theoretical work to consider the real implications of an important ethical problem.Table of Contents1. Feminist ethics; 2. Necessity and the evasion of responsibility; 3. Relational personhood and the violence of war; 4. Intention matters; 5. From evading to expanding responsibility; 6. Taking responsibility for harmdoing in war.

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Book SynopsisA NATIONAL BESTSELLER!Journalist Sarah Stankorb outlines how access to the internet-its networks, freedom of expression, and resources for deeply researching and reporting on powerful church figures-allowed women to begin dismantling the false authority of evangelical communities that had long demanded their submission.A generation of American Christian girls was taught submitting to men is God's will. They were taught not to question the men in their families or their pastors. They were told to remain sexually pure and trained to feel shame if a man was tempted. Some of these girls were abused and assaulted. Some made to shrink down so small they became a shadow of themselves. To question their leaders was to question God.All the while, their male leaders built fiefdoms from megachurches and sprawling ministries. They influenced politics and policy. To protect their church's influence, these men covered up and hid abuse. American Christian patriarchy, as it rose in political power and cultural sway over the past four decades, hurt many faithful believers. Millions of Americans abandoned churches they once loved.Yet among those who stayed (and a few who still loved the church they fled), a brave group of women spoke up. They built online megaphones, using the democratizing power of technology to create long-overdue change.In Disobedient Women, journalist Sarah Stankorb gives long-overdue recognition for these everyday women as leaders and as voices for a different sort of faith. Their work has driven journalists to help bring abuse stories to national attention. Stankorb weaves together the efforts of these courageous voices in order to present a full, layered portrait of the treatment of women and the fight for change within the modern American church.Disobedient Women is not just a look at the women who have used the internet to bring down the religious power structures that were meant to keep them quiet, but also a picture of the large-scale changes that are happening within evangelical culture regarding women's roles, ultimately underscoring the ways technology has created a place for women to challenge traditional institutions from within.

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Book SynopsisYou Can Win Her Back Few challenges in life are as difficult as regaining a wife’s trust—and few are as ultimately worthwhile. Trust can be rebuilt in your marriage! With patient, loving, self-sacrificing effort, it’s possible that one day your wife will risk her heart with you again. And she may even have more respect and love for you than before. In Worthy of Her Trust, Jason Martinkus relates how he repaired his own marriage after revelations of sexual addiction. Along with Stephen Arterburn, Jason offers exercises and tools rooted in counseling principles to help your marriage begin again. This comprehensive guide discusses: · How to be truly and effectively transparent · Combating the “he must not love me” myth and other untruths· What to do about the Internet, office temptations, and travel· Encouragement for wives who wonder if trust can ever be restored · The “five-minute phone call” and other daily trust-building strategies· What meaningful forgiveness and restitution look like· The Amends Matrix—a concrete exercise to admit past wrongs and cast a vision for a faithful futureIncluding insights from Jason’s wife, Shelley, Worthy of Her Trust guides you through the process of rebuilding your relationship so it is stronger than ever.

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Book SynopsisIn this book, marriage mentor and coach Sara Malik shares what she has learnt whilst searching for marital solutions for the modern-day woman and shows wives of all ages how they can systematically create better marriages.Drawing upon Islamic principles, Jungian psychology and ancient wisdom, this book shows women how to reclaim their feminine identity whilst upholding women’s liberation. By manifesting their innate traits of leadership, love, wisdom and justice, women can create their own unique marriages, ultimately to emulate the Messenger of Allah, Muhammad ??? ???? ???? ????, who was a perfect embodiment of these four traits.

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Book SynopsisJust Gender Relations in Church and Society â more than just a Dream

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