It’s a inspiring, eye-opening ‘family gift’ for the holidays!

COVER STORY—Have you already started your holiday shopping this year? A World of Faith is the perfect gift for individuals young and old—especially for families who welcome learning more about the inspiring, colorful diversity of our world’s many faith traditions. In fact, the book’s endorsements include a glowing recommendation by former president Jimmy Carter, who knows a bit about global peacemaking. Please enjoy this interview with the author and share this story with friends, this week.

Author Peggy Fletcher Stack tells us, “This book gives me hope—and my hope now is that children and parents and grandparents and teachers will be moved toward hope as they explore these pages.”

We heartily agree—and hope for interfaith peacemaking is sorely needed in our world right now!

News from Our Authors—

Suzy Farbman—

A GodSign from the natural world on a lake in Switzerland

OUR BELOVED GodSigns columnist Suzy Farbman returns from a journey to Europe with a story about an auspicious connection she made while visiting Switzerland.

Martin Davis—

A Creative Opening at Barnes & Noble

WE CONTINUE TO BE THANKFUL for the initiative by Martin Davis and other authors who are working with a Barnes & Noble store in Virginia. They have collectively demonstrated the value of organizing local author events within a BN store. Lots of our readers asked for more information about what’s happening with Barnes & Noble nationally to allow such regional innovation. Our Front Edge Publishing story, this week, reports further evidence of BN management’s commitment to local innovation. Please read this story and share it with friends to encourage further regional experiments with authors.

Howard Brown—

SPECIAL THANKS TO PODCAST LISTENERS who helped Howard Brown, this week, “blow way past” the milestone of 20,000 downloads we were marking in last week’s column, headlined: “Howard Brown’s Top 10 Tips for Building a Successful Podcast.”

And thanks to everyone who helped to amplify the news of that Top 10 column. It’s packed with helpful information for anyone who already has a podcast or is thinking about launching one. Many of our readers helped to spread the news about that column.

THIS WEEK, Howard keeps the sunshine flowing via his podcast by welcoming an expert on contemporary dating and the eternal search for True Love. You can enjoy that podcast No. 49 by visiting Howard’s website and clicking on “What Is True Love?”.

Holidays & Festivals

Pope Francis reminds us of St Thérèse of Liseux’s ‘Little Way’

LEAVE IT TO THE VATICAN to add a bit of an arcane historical reference to one of Pope Francis’s most eloquent apostolic letters. We explain more about Francis’s inspiring message—and the historical reference—in our Holidays & Festivals column.

WANT TO SEE ALL OF THE UPCOMING HOLIDAYS & FESTIVALS?—It’s easy to find our annual calendar of global observances. Just remember the web address: InterfaithHolidays.com

Click this movie poster to read Ed McNulty’s review of the film Flora and Son.

To learn more, click on this cover image from the October 2023 issue of Visual Parables Journal, edited by Edward McNulty and packed with reviews and discussion guides to movies, including The Swimmers, Amerikatsi, Fremont and Flora & Son.

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 film reviews and discussion guides. This resource is used nationwide by individuals who love the movies and by educators, clergy and small-group leaders.

Here are some of Ed’s most recent free reviews and columns:

THE ORIGIN OF EVIL—Ed writes, “The title of Sébastien Marnier’s intriguing thriller sounds like a metaphysical treatise examining the Genesis myth of the Fall, but it is far more prosaic, focusing upon the patriarch of a wealthy family and a long-lost illegitimate daughter trying to reconnect with her father.”
FLORA AND SON—”Director/writer John Carney has given us a delightful ode to mother-son relationship.”
FREETOWN—”Director Garrett Batty’s is a faith film but not one that preaches at you. His script, which he wrote with co-writer Melissa Leilani Larson, tells the true story of a small group of Liberian Morman missionaries caught up in one of the civil wars that ravished that nation.”
FREMONT—”Iranian filmmaker Babak Jalali’s film about a refugee from Afghanistan is the second immigrant or refugee film that I have seen within the same week. But it is as different from The Swimmers as possible.”
THE SWIMMERS—Ed highly recommends this film, based on a true story, about “two teenage girls who were among the Syrians forced to flee their war-torn nation and risk the dangerous waters of the Aegean Sea.”
THE INVENTOR—”The title of the new film by writer Jim Capobianco (and co-director with Pierre-Luc Granjon) refers to the 16th century genius Leonardo da Vinci, voiced in this delightful, animated film by Stephen Fry.”
THE LAST VOYAGE OF THE DEMETER—”André Øvredal’s horror film is based on just one chapter, the Captain’s Log, from Bram Stoker’s classic 1897 novel Dracula.”
WAR SAILOR—”Norwegian director/ writer Gunnar Vikene has given us a grim visual parable about an overlooked group of World War II combatants—Norwegian merchant sailors drafted into the war effort when Germany invaded their country.”