Jesus and I remains a delightful catechism used to prepare both older and younger children for their First Confession and First Holy Communion. In use for decades, the content is solid yet presented in a manner that is clear and usable with young students. Gentle black and white drawings appeal to more sensitive and/or younger children who shy away from more graphic pictures in modern texts.

Jesus and I is organized into very short lessons that lend themselves to direct, oral teaching and discussion. It is designed to be used BY the teacher WITH the student, not by handing the book to the student to read and fill in answers by himself. The book begins with several pages of prayers that we should know by heart. The lesson titles are phrases from these prayers, and the lesson content explains that particular phrase. For example, the lesson titled "Angel of God, my guardian dear" explains Catholic teachings on angels. The lesson titled "And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus" explains the Incarnation. As the children memorize their prayers, they are also being taught what the prayers mean.

Each lesson begins with a narrative written in simple, short sentences. This is followed by the "How Many Can You Answer?" section of questions for the youngest students. Next are the "Can You Also Answer These?" questions for older students, which come from the First Communion Catechism in use when the book was originally written. The book ends with sections on "When I Go to Confession" and "When I Go to Holy Communion" followed by a summary of all of the First Communion Catechism questions.

It's rather lovely, I think that the Pope uses in his own book a phrase (which he applies to the parables of Jesus) which aptly describes this fascinating book: "...it not only or even primarily adds to what we know, but it changes our lives." In Jesus of Nazareth, Our Holy Father presents a vision of primary events of the Gospels (this volume covers significant stories chronologically from the Baptism of Our Lord through the Transfiguration - a second volume is expected in the future). He delves into these Gospel stories (many of which are commonly taken for granted - both because we've heard these stories since we were young and because we're missing some of the background details that add depth and additional significance to these stories) to help bring Our Lord to life for modern readers. Here are the basic Gospel stories that are covered in the text: The Baptism of Jesus The Temptations of Jesus The Kingdom of God The Sermon on the Mount The Lord's Prayer The Disciples The Parables (with an emphasis on The Good Samaritan, The Prodigal Sun and the Rich Man and Lazarus) Images from St. John's Gospel (Water, Vine and Wine, Bread, and the Shepherd) Peter's Confession The Transfiguration Jesus Declares His Identity (The Son of Man, The Son, "I Am") Here's a sampling of the style and content of the book, taken from the chapter on the Our Father in which the Pope discusses what we mean by "Hallowed be Thy Name".

God establishes a relationship between himself and us. He puts himself within reach of our invocation. He enters into relationship with us and enables us to be in relationship with him. Yet this means that in some sense he hands himself over to our human world. He has made himself accessible and, therefore, vulnerable as well. He assumes the risk of relationship, of communion, with us. The process that was brought to completion in the Incarnation had begun with the giving of the divine name.... God has now truly made himself accessible in his incarnate Son. He has become a part of our world: he has, as it were, put himself into our hands. This enables us to understand what the petition for the sanctification of the divine name means. The name of God can now be misused and so God himself can be sullied. The name of God can be co-opted for our purposes and so the image of God can also be distorted. The more he gives himself into our hands, the more we can obscure his light; the closer he is, the more our misuse can disfigure him. Martin Buber once said that when we consider all the ways in which God's name has been so shamefully misused, we almost despair of uttering it ourselves. But to keep it silent would be an outright refusal of the love with which God comes to us. Buber says that our only recourse is to try as reverently as possible to pick up and purify the polluted fragments of the divine name. But there is no way we can do that alone. All we can do is plead with him not to allow the light of his name to be destroyed in the world.

He elucidates the various Gospel stories from many angles, though certain patterns emerge. In many places, he discusses and refutes modern theories about the Life of Christ (many of which have the common thread of doubting the historical validity of the Gospels). These are usually the most difficult portions of the book to follow. I found it helpful to underline principal portions in order to keep a particular thread fresh in my memory. Brief notes on the various threads might also be helpful. He also references Eastern imagery from traditional icons and what we have learned from Tradition (from the teachings of the Church Fathers) about the various Gospel passages. This is a life-changing book. There are many stories, like the Transfiguration, that I had little understanding of to begin with and will never hear or think about in the same way again. I studied this over the course of a school year with a group of high school students. We studied approximately 10 to 15 pages at a time and discussed everything in depth. I don't think it's a book that most high schoolers could read on their own. Reading it in chunks together allowed us to delve into it more deeply (I'm certain that I got more out of it than I would have if I had read it on my own.) The discussions provided an opportunity to clarify confusing parts of the text (many times I was able to provide some helpful background info such as an explanation of a philosophical idea). The students really enjoyed the book and got a lot out of it. Besides the obvious benefits of the content of the book itself, they're now less intimidated by an "intellectual" book and understand that it's okay to just make a beginning in reading such a book and that it's perfectly normal to get more out of such a book every time they read it. For those who might be interested, I wrote a number of blog posts on this book while I was studying it. You can read them here.

Pope Benedict XVI has given us a gift of a second volume illuminating the events of the life of Christ. The first volume,Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration was reviewed here. Like the first volume, it is a book written for adults, but may be appropriate for group study among teenagers, provided that expectations regarding understanding are kept reasonable. On the whole I found it to be easier to understand than the first volume because more time is spent on each event and a certain amount of healthy repetition aids in clarity of understanding. I led a study group for homeschooled teens on the first book and hope to do so with this one as well. I'd like to make it very clear that the teens in my group and I as their leader all got a lot out of the book, but didn't pretend, or even really attempt, to understand everything in the book. We studied one chapter per week and tended to focus on the additional significance and meaning that Pope Benedict brought out of each of the Gospel stories. There were some tough vocabulary words here and there, but the process of understanding became easier as we encountered the words multiple times (like eschatology). We also found that having the book available on audio and the inclusion of a glossary in the back of the book were quite helpful in making the book more accessible and understandable for our family. Both of these features are offered in this second volume as well! This is a beautiful and moving elucidation by the Holy Father of the events of Holy Week, beginning with Palm Sunday (including the entrance into Jerusalem and the cleansing of the Temple) and concluding with the Resurrection (with an epilogue on the Ascension and the Second Coming). There is a special emphasis on how each event of Christ's life fulfills prophecies and traditions from the Old Testament. The detailed deliberateness of this fulfillment on the part of Christ's actions are made particularly clear in his careful quoting of scripture at each event. There's a thread in this that gave me a new appreciation and reverence for the psalms. I'm always amazed at how reading Pope Benedict's writings (both before and after he became pope) challenge me - not only in forcing me to put in the effort to understanding, but also, in a more philosophical way, to expand the way I look at my faith and at the world through the lens of my faith. Here's a great example from the epilogue in regards to an appropriate attitude towards the Second Coming:

Faith in Christ's return is the second pillar of the Christian confession. He who took flesh and now retains his humanity forever, he who has eternally opened up within God a space for humanity, now calls the whole world into this open space in God, so that in the end God may be all in all and the Son may hand over to the Father the whole world that is gathered together in him. Herein is contained the certainty of hope that God will wipe away every tear, that nothing meaningless will remain, that every injustice will be remedied and justice restored. The triumph of love will be the last word of world history. Vigilance is demanded of Christians as the basic attitude for the 'interim time'. This vigilance means, on the one hand, that man does not lock himself into the here and now and concern himself only with tangible things, but that he raises his eyes above the present moment and its immediate urgency. Keeping one's gaze freely fixed upon God in order to receive from him the criterion of right action and the capacity for it - that is what matters. Vigilance means first of all openness to the good, to the truth, to God, in the midst of an often meaningless world and in the midst of the power of evil. It means that man tries with all his strength and with great sobriety to do what is right; it means that he lives, not according to his own wishes, but according to the signpost of faith.

Saint Joan of Arc is one of the most astonishing saints of all time. Prayerful, as all saints must be, humble, generous, and patient, Joan served God by leading the armies of France to boot the English from their soil in 1431. Not a usual task for a girl in her late teens, saint or not. And afterwards, to make it perfectly clear that the English were engaged in an act of godless aggression, Joan was burned as a witch after a trial that was unjust, illegal and cruel in every detail.

So who is qualified to tell this story? Another saint? A theologian? A soldier? What about just a good American story-teller -- indeed the best -- but a man with hardly any faith at all?

Mark Twain is most famous for his Mississippi River stories, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. It is not well enough known that his own favorite of all his works was the life of St. Joan of Arc, told from the fictional perspective (but this is the only fiction in the book) of a childhood companion who accompanied her on her wars, and then smuggled himself into her trials as a court reporter and was the last to touch her hand before she died.

Mark Twain really loved Joan and he dedicated the entire fiber of his wonderful talent to telling her story. I see him in the year 1910, knocking at the Pearly Gates, and I see Peter's hesitation, for Twain was after all, something of an unbelieving old cynic. But over Peter's shoulder, I see a slight and mischievous lass tugging his sleeve and saying with a grin, "Let him in, now, let him in!" while a Voice thunders from the Throne, "Any friend of Joan's is a friend of Mine."

Read it yourself, silently or aloud to the family, and see if you don't agree.