Cover Story: Join us in launching ‘Now What? A Guide to the Gifts and Challenges of Aging’

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Join the Authors and Sponsoring Nonprofits in This Launch

You’ll Learn Ways to Help Others—and Your Own Family!

OUR COVER STORY this week is our launch announcement for one of the most important books we have published since our founding 15 years ago. This book is a practical guide to dozens of issues families face as we age. Millions of American families have discovered these challenges with little warning or help.

Over the past year, more than a dozen community agencies and nonprofits joined with 15 authors to share their expertise in creating a one-volume resource for families and caregivers. The book is called simply, Now What? A Guide to the Gifts and Challenges of Aging. And please note: This is about much more than the problems we may face in aging. This book represents a “strengths-based” encouragement for all of us to rethink and appreciate the gifts of aging, as well.

Please, click this link to visit the registration page for our national launch event at Noon (Eastern Time) on Tuesday March 23. The landing page explains more about the book. The event is free and is open to everyone. In this 45-minute event, you will meet some of the book’s expert authors and sponsors and will come away energized to help others. Tell friends about this opportunity by sharing the registration-page link: www.NowWhatBookLaunch.com

When you sign up, you will receive an email confirming your registration—and providing several options to connect to this Zoom gathering. Closer to the launch date, you will receive a reminder, as well.

Also on that page, you will find a link to pre-order this book on Amazon right now. If you order now, books will ship from Amazon on the launch date. Please, join us! You’ll learn how you can help others—and your family as well.

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More Good News and Views from Our Authors

Brenda Rosenberg: Girl Scouts Build Interfaith Unity

INTERFAITH PEACE ACTIVIST BRENDA ROSENBERG has been working with Girl Scouts to establish a widespread appreciation of religious diversity. This effort fits perfectly into the Girl Scouts’ longstanding encouragement of religious awareness through its My Promise, My Faith program. One year ago, our magazine covered a huge Michigan-wide event Brenda co-sponsored at the Detroit Institute of Arts to kick off this new effort to encourage interfaith awareness. This year, a special educational event celebrating religious diversity is scheduled for National Girl Scout Week, March 7-13, which includes what is sometimes called National Girl Scout Day. That’s March 12, each year. In 2021, that is the 109th anniversary of the date in 1912 when Juliette Gordon Low formally registered the organization.

Brenda explains that this year’s special interfaith event runs from March 11 through March 14—all online this year—and helps girls in grades 4 through 12 to earn their My Promise, My Faith pin. Brenda emailed us this week to ask ReadTheSpirit readers to spread the news to any girls who may want to register. “This event is not limited to current Girl Scouts,” she said. So, if you know a girl who would enjoy attending—please spread the news with this link to register.

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Suzy Farbman: ‘The soundtrack that makes up a life’

THIS WEEK, OUR GOD-SIGNS COLUMN by Suzy Farbman asks us to “listen” back on our journeys through this pandemic year through musical memories. For Suzy, those memories include the late great Leonard Cohen and New York-area drama critic Arlene Epstein.

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Larry Buxton: Welcoming guests

HOSPITALITY AMONG OUR AUTHORS continues to spread, this week, as Larry Buxton’s weekly Leading With Spirit video series welcomes a guest. That’s Larry at left (above) introducing his guest (at right)—and, by extension, he’s welcoming yet another guest as well: Lincoln scholar Duncan Newcomer. This national conversation among our authors raises fascinating questions about our lives together as Americans. And, “questions” may be a key to learning how to talk with each other without shouting, Larry Buxton tells us this week. He says, “A certain uncertainty is the road to wisdom.” Please, visit Larry’s website to watch this 4-minute video. While you’re there, sign up for a free email reminder, each week, of his latest Leading with Spirit messages.

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Ken Whitt: Talking with Authority

QUITE LITERALLY, our author Ken Whitt’s new book God Is Just Love is so newsworthy that he wound up talking with Authority this week. Authority online magazine, that is. This is becoming a popular online hub for stories that connect influential “thought leaders.” Authority is the brainchild of self-described “thought leader” and “positive influencer” Yitzi Weiner who wants to use the Internet to spread helpful information. Ken was interviewed in a series on “social impact authors” by Edward Sylvan, who also is a leading media influencer. In this online circle, Ken was lifted up in this inspiring profile because of his multi-faceted approach to helping families adapt to the world’s many challenges. Want to help with that kind of positive effort? Go read this story in Authority and share it with friends—better yet, hop over to Amazon and buy a copy of Ken’s book.

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Holidays & Festivals

St. Patrick’s Day

ST. PATRICK’S DAY may be a secular occasion in many communities, but it also has deep religious roots that matter to millions.

OUR COVERAGE OFTEN focuses on Catholic traditions—so, this year, we invited a Protestant-Anglican writer to reflect on the holiday. In her long and remarkable career, the Rev. Dr. Kate Jacobs has been both a leading Baptist and an Episcopalian. She sent us this fascinating column from her religious perspective on how St. Patrick’s legendary battle with serpents is relevant today.

WANT MORE? INCLUDING RECIPES AND CRAFTS FOR KIDS? Holidays & Festivals columnist Stephanie Fenton previews the festival—with delicious and fun links as well. She also has links to three different versions of St. Patrick’s beloved “Breastplate” prayer—including the original Gaelic.

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Maha Shivaratri

THURSDAY, MARCH 11: Fasting, worship and ritual baths for Lord Shiva are followed by a nighttime vigil on Maha Shivaratri, a holiday observed across India and by Hindus around the world. Holidays & Festivals columnist Stephanie Fenton has the story for us.

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Judy’s Proofreading Day

MONDAY, MARCH 8, these days, is sometimes labeled “National Proofreading Day,” which shows what online entrepreneurs like Judy Beaver, aka “The Office Pro,” can do when they are determined to leave their mark—at least on some calendars. Judy dreamed up this “holiday” with a well-placed press release in 2012 for a noble purpose: She wanted an occasion each year when all “professionals” who write would be reminded of the importance of copy editors. From her Chicago base, Judy sells training services in writing and editing so the “holiday” was originally a clever sales pitch. After eight years, though, her holiday keeps showing up online. So, we are sending out a “thank you” to Judy—because we wholeheartedly agree with her instinct. Yes, everyone who writes needs and editor. In fact, that’s what our Dmitri Barvinok writes in this fun and informative Front Edge Publishing column about copy editing. This column already has become a favorite with readers—and editors!

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WANT TO SEE ALL THE UPCOMING HOLIDAYS & FESTIVALS?—It’s easy to find our annual calendar of global observances. Just visit  InterfaithHolidays.com

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Click this cover image from the March 2021 issue of Visual Parables Journal to learn about this new issue.

Faith & Film

ED McNULTY, for decades, has published reviews, magazine articles and books exploring connections between faith and film. Most of his work is freely published. Ed supports his work by selling the Visual Parables Journal, a monthly magazine packed with discussion guides to films. This resource is used coast-to-coast by individuals who love the movies and by educators, clergy and small-group leaders.

Among Ed’s free reviews and columns:

  1. THE DIG—Ed writes, “Director Simon Stone and writer Moira Buffini’s adaptation of John Preston’s fact-based novel deals with classism as well as archaeological excavation, friendship, and romance. Beautifully photographed, it could serve well as family entertainment in that one of the characters is a winsome boy eager to explore the world and who finds a substitute father in the main male character.”
  2. MANGROVE—”Americans have Aaron Sorkin’s social justice film The Trial of the Chicago 7 and now our British cousins have Steve McQueen’s masterful Mangrove, the true story of The Mangrove Nine. Just as Selma led to the passage of major voting legislation by exposing the depth and violence of racism, so the trial of West African-Brits brought about similar exposure and passage of anti-racist legislation in the UK.” The film is streaming now for free on Amazon Prime in the Small Axe series of films.
  3. AMAZON: SEE THE ENTIRE ‘SMALL AXE’ SERIES—Ed also reviews and recommends other films in Steve McQueen’s series of films, which are clustered under the series title Small Axe on Amazon Prime. After Mangrove, Ed’s other Small Axe reviews are Lovers Rock, Red, White and Blue, Alex Wheatle and Education.
  4. COME BEFORE WINTER—”There have been numerous films about the martyred German theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer, but Kevin Ekvall’s  2017 docudrama gives us an unusual take on him by pairing his story with that of a British team commissioned to broadcast anti-Hitler views and false stories to deceive the enemy.” The film also is streaming on Amazon.
  5. BOOGIE—”Director/writer Eddie Huang comes up with a new twist for a basketball film—a Chinese-American player. Alfred ‘Boogie’ Chin (Taylor Takahashi) is the player living in Queens, New York.”
  6. BOBBY JO: UNDER THE INFLUENCEThis is a thrilling documentary, well produced by Brent L. Jones, his wife Donna, and a skilled team of local cinematographers. It’s about the real-life hero Bobby Jo Reed, who moved from homeless to helper of hundreds.
  7. BLACK EARTH RISING—”NetflixWriter/director Hugo Blick’s suspenseful eight-part political thriller is set in the aftermath of the horrible Rwandan genocide of the 90s.
  8. DARA OF JASENOVAC—”Every year another filmmaker reveals new aspects of the Holocaust. Peter (Predrag) Antonijević’s Oscar-nominated film reveals that a vast number of Serbs also perished with other victims of Nazi hatred. This is the first film set in the Croatian extermination camp Jasenovac.”
  9. NOMADLAND—Ed give this 5 stars and writes, “Frances McDormand, optioning Jessica Bruder’s 2017 nonfiction book, Nomadland: Surviving America in the Twenty-First Century writer, made a wise choice when she joined forces with director/writer Chloé Zhao.”
  10. LAND—Five stars also go to this film. “Actress Robin Wright made a wise decision in choosing screenwriters Jesse Chatham and Erin Dignam to write the script for her directorial debut.”.

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