Drita: An Albanian Girl Discovers Her Ancestors' Faith
Written by Renee Ritsi
Illustrated by Cameron Thorpe
After suffering for decades under religious persecution, Albanians and other Eastern European Christians were allowed to worship more openly following the fall of communism in the 1990's. In the new picture book, Drita: An Albanian Girl Discovers Her Ancestors' Faith, author Renee Ritsi offers readers a vivid picture of the world of an Albanian girl who finds the Orthodox Christian faith of her ancestors. As this beautifully illustrated story opens, we meet Drita, a young Albanian girl whose family has lived for years under repressive communist rule. After decades of religious oppression, Drita is finally able to discover the faith of her ancestors. As she experiences God’s love for her through the example of her grandparents and the teachings of missionaries, she turns her heart toward Christ. At the story’s joyful conclusion, Drita is surrounded by her grandparents and friends as she is baptized.
Baby Moses and Moses' Flight from Egypt
Two books in the new Old Testament Stories for Children series
Written by Mother Melania
Illustrated by Bonnie Gillis
While adult readers enjoy the new Complete Orthodox Study Bible, children can enjoy the Orthodox perspective on classic Bible stories with the new Old Testament Stories for Children series. Launched with the release of the picture books Baby Moses and Moses’ Flight from Egypt, the series uses simple verse and colorful, semi-iconographic illustrations that are both sweet and reverent to introduce children and their parents to the profound truths revealed in the pages of the Old Testament. Everywhere in the Old Testament, the Fathers of the Church see Christ, the Theotokos, and the Church revealed. The Fathers always understood the Old Testament in light of the New. Moses in the basket is a “type” of baptism. Jacob crossed his hands to bless Joseph’s younger son (Ephraim) over his older son (Manasseh)—a prefiguring both of the Cross and of the surpassing of the Old Covenant by the New. The series will continue with several Moses stories and include others that are also associated with Christ’s Pascha: Jonah and the fish, the Three Youths in the furnace, and Elijah raising the widow’s son.
Lynette's Hope: The Witness of Lynette Katherine Hoppe's Life and Death
Edited by Fr. Luke A. Veronis
Lynette Katherine Hoppe's life and death touched hundreds, if not thousands of lives as she served as a missionary in Albania, tragically succumbing to cancer in 2006. In Lynette's Hope: The Witness of Lynette Katherine Hoppe's Life and Death, close family friend and fellow OCMC missionary Fr. Luke Veronis retells the story of her life, and then lets her writing speak for itself. In poignant, honest prose, Lynette's diaries, newsletters and website chronicled her struggles in the "valley of the shadow" as she faced impending death. In the midst of such heartache -- a young missionary wife and mother ill and dying -- how did she live? How did she die? The answers to those questions will move readers to agree with those who witnessed her passing, that truly hers was a "beautiful death." No one who reads Lynette's Hope will come away untouched; all will be stirred to a new resolve to live life as she did, in the presence of God, with joy and faith.
Shepherding the Flock: The Pastoral Epistles of St. Paul the Apostle to Timothy and to Titus
Part of the Orthodox Bible Study Companion Series
By Fr. Lawrence Farley
The latest volume in Fr. Lawrence Farley’s Orthodox Bible Study Companion Series, Shepherding the Flock: The Pastoral Epistles of St. Paul the Apostle to Timothy and to Titus, combines a fresh, literal translation of the pastoral epistles with verse-by-verse commentary written “for the average layman, for the non-professional who feels a bit intimidated by the presence of copious footnotes, long bibliographies, and all those other things which so enrich the lives of academics” (from the series introduction). Arranged in brief pericopes of text with commentary following, Shepherding the Flock presents a traditional Orthodox interpretation of the scriptures along with historical, linguistic, and contextual details that bring Paul’s epistles to life for the contemporary reader. St. Paul’s epistles to Timothy and Titus contain the apostle’s instructions to the pastors under his care about how they, in turn, should care for their flocks in wisdom and love. As the last epistles St. Paul wrote in anticipation of his martyrdom, they “remain as a testimony to his pastoral love and as an inspiration for those in the Church, both the shepherds and the flock, to walk in holiness and love themselves.”
Now available at conciliarpress.com, amazon.com and at bookstores everywhere.
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