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Q&A with Monsignor Soseman, author of “Reflections from Rome” and Book Signing

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Following is my e-interview with Monsignor Richard Soseman, author of Reflections from Rome: Practical Thoughts on Faith & Family.  Reflections from Rome was the book I reviewed in my September column for The Catholic Post.

As I mentioned in my review, and as regular readers of this blog will recall, Monsignor Soseman and I have been friends for a long time, even pre-dating his friendship with the esteemed Brandon Vogt.  You can read all about that here.  So we had fun here in this interview.  Thank you, Monsignor, for being such a willing interview subject, and for letting me compare your book to eating tapas. Since you’ve spent a lot of time in Spain, I thought you wouldn’t mind.

Local readers will want to know that Monsignor will be doing a book signing at Lagron-Miller Company in Peoria on Saturday, September 14 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.   Our family will be stopping by!

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Monsignor, tell “Reading Catholic” readers more about yourself and your work.

I am a priest of the Diocese of Peoria, ordained in 1992. Since January, 2008 I have been an Official of the Congregation for the Clergy at the Vatican.

Q. This book grew out of the “Faith” posts that you’ve been sharing on Facebook for some time. How/when did you start doing the Facebook reflections, and how does the book differ from those?

During the Year for Priests (2009-2010), we started an online group called “I Will Offer My Lent for Priests.” The Congregation for the Clergy tries to stress how important it is to pray for the sanctification of priests. For that group, I began to write a daily reflection, and have continued that practice since then.

In the book, then, I have collected and edited articles and essays I have written for various media.

Q. As I wrote in my review, I found your book to be like “tapas” those Spanish appetizer-y dishes. When I saw this quote in the “tapas” wikipedia entry: “The serving of tapas is designed to encourage conversation because people are not so focused upon eating an entire meal that is set before them.”

Do you think that is a good analogy for what you are trying to accomplish?

I would say it is a good analogy. My hope is that, in reading the short meditations, people will be inspired by the Holy Spirit to discover ways in which they can live more faithfully. Each reflections starts with an image, an example from my family life, from Church history, or an experience I have had in Rome, which then remind us of some element of the spiritual life or some element of faith. So many people have let me know that the examples I make resonate with their own experiences, and have encouraged me to collect them into a book, I was happy to do so. Sometimes what I write about seem to be non sequiturs, sometimes humorous images or contradictions and then all is resolved in the example from the faith.

Q. Do you have a favorite reflection shared in the book? I marked probably a dozen, but “Ligonberries” and “Whether, Weather, Wither” were two of my favorites.

Ha! I should have expected a Weather Channel junkie like you to enjoy the latter reflection. Some people who I call “weather junkies” in the essay will change all of their plans based on what they think the weather might do. I encourage people who are living faithful lives not to be to scrupulous or overly concerned about past decisions they have made, but to look forward to living in fidelity into the future. In the former essay, I use a humorous point about Italian language to remind people that we should want to get to know all we can about God, because we love him and as humans we are driven to know all we can about the object of our love.

Q.  Can you talk more about your work at the Vatican and what your office does?

The Congregation for the Clergy assists the Holy Father in supervision of Priests and Deacons throughout the world. The “Year for Priests” was our project, as was the recently revised “Directory for Life and Ministry of Priests.” As an Official, I study the issues assigned to me by the Superiors, and make my recommendations on what action the Congregation might take in the situation, if any.

Q.  What is next for you? Do you plan to write another book?

Over the last several years, I have written prefaces for several books, and will probably continue that work. Also, in Princeville we published the “Princes Prayer Book” for teens, which I continue to hand out to American teenagers who are visiting Rome. I also write essays for a cycling website in season, and have been asked to collect those essays, as well as more reflections on faith.

Finally, I am working on a book on Venerable Fulton J. Sheen. My main work remains, of course, at the Congegation, and I also teach college students a course on St. Paul, and work with liturgy at the Pontifical North American College.

 

Picture Book Monday: Five by Margaret Wise Brown

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Picture Book Monday starts today.  I explain about it here.

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Years ago, a friend’s dear young daughter–about two years old at the time– was hospitalized for a life-threatening infection. I went to visit the family in the hospital, and the little girl was just so forlorn, so small on the hospital bed.

So I told her hello, and I asked if she might like a story (and mentally berating myself for not bringing a book as a gift).

She didn’t respond.  So I closed my eyes and began:

In the great green room

There was a telephone

And a red balloon

And a picture of

the cow jumping over the moon

I knew the book by heart–surely I’m not the only parent out there who’s been asked to read a book so many times she can do it cold–and continued.

When I finished, her eyes were big, and they never left me.

“Would you like me to read it again?”

A nod.  And so I did.

The next day, I brought her mom her very own copy of Goodnight Moon, probably Margaret Wise Brown’s best-known and loved book.

If there is a more soothing bedtime story, I’d like to know what it is, so be sure to let me know in the comments.

Here’s what I love about Margaret Wise Brown at her best: she is a poet.  Her words often read like prayers.  There is humor and poignancy in her work.

She died very young and had an interesting and in some ways tragic life. I’ve got her biography, Awakened by the Moon, on hold at the library, and I will update this post after reading that. But regardless of her life, her books stand the test of time and reading aloud.

Most people will be familiar with Goodnight Moon and another of our favorites, The Runaway Bunny.

Our funny family story about The Runaway Bunny is that when I read it to my oldest, a girl, she insisted (as only an oldest, and a toddler–can) that the child bunny was in fact a girl bunny, no matter what the words said.  So that I had to substitute “she” for “he” and “her mother” for “his mother” and so forth throughout.

We stuck with our female runaway bunny until our third was born, and then he (being a strong personality) insisted it was a boy bunny, so back the original.

One of the most moving scenes in the play Wit (not for kids, but made into a beautiful movie with Emma Thompson in the main role of a demanding English professor dying of cancer) is when a visitor, her former mentor, reads her excerpts from The Runaway Bunny.

This may seem depressing, but that scene makes a person realize that The Runaway Bunny would not be a bad book to have read on one’s deathbed.

But I can still think of a better book for that purpose: MWB’s The Important Book, illustrated by Leonard Weisgard.

I almost always get emotional when I read The Important Book, for many reasons. It’s a prayer and a poem both, and Weisgard’s illustrations make it nearly perfect.

The frontspiece begins with a tiny illustration of a open book. On the right-hand side of the tiny open book is an illustration of a cricket. On the left-hand page are the words in cursive:“The important thing about a cricket is that it is black. It chirps, it hops, it jumps, and sings all through the summer night. But the important thing about a cricket is that it is black.”

And the book continues this way, though with full-size illustrations in the rest of the book. What makes—a spoon, an apple, the wind, the grass, a child’s shoe, much more, and finally, you–important.

I was so taken by this book that eventually, I made a “Grandpa and Grandma Important Book” for my in-laws. Each page of this scrapbook was about what made Grandpa or Grandma, their children and grandchildren important, with accompanying photos. (“The important thing about Grandma is that she makes the best chocolate milk.”)

I made it just before my father-in-law passed away, and now that both my in-laws are dead I treasure this “Important Book” as a family heirloom; it’s alongside our copy of The Important Book. And now I wish I had made one for my parents, but that one is in my heart.

Two other MWB books are well worth having. The Golden Egg Book is another nearly perfect bedtime book–perhaps especially during the Easter season–about both friendship, sleepiness, and adorable lifelike bunnies. Lovely illustrations by Leonard Weisgard again.

Finally, Nibble, Nibble: Poems for Children is sweet, and would be worthwhile to consider reading during April, National Poetry Month.

We’ve read many, many other Margaret Wise Brown books at our house, and we own probably half a dozen more book by her, but these are the ones I’d keep no matter what:

Goodnight Moon

The Runaway Bunny

The Important Book

The Golden Egg Book

Nibble, Nibble: Poems for Children

Do you have a favorite Margaret Wise Brown book?

Three Quotes for the Feast of St. Francis de Sales

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“Have patience with all things, But, first of all with yourself.”

––St Francis de Sales (from Catholic Digest’s Quiet Moment for today)

“I say that devotion must be practised in different ways by the nobleman and by the working man, by the servant and by the prince, by the widow, by the unmarried girl and by the married woman. But even this distinction is not sufficient; for the practice of devotion must be adapted to the strength, to the occupation and to the duties of each one in particular.
 

Tell me, please, my Philothea, whether it is proper for a bishop to want to lead a solitary life like a Carthusian; or for married people to be no more concerned than a Capuchin about increasing their income; or for a working man to spend his whole day in church like a religious; or on the other hand for a religious to be constantly exposed like a bishop to all the events and circumstances that bear on the needs of our neighbour. Is not this sort of devotion ridiculous, unorganised and intolerable? Yet this absurd error occurs very frequently, but in no way does true devotion, my Philothea, destroy anything at all. On the contrary, it perfects and fulfils all things. In fact if it ever works against, or is inimical to, anyone’s legitimate station and calling, then it is very definitely false devotion.”

–from Introduction to the Devout Life by St. Francis de Sales (excerpted from the second reading from today’s Office of Readings)
The person who possesses Christian meekness is affectionate and tender towards everyone: he is disposed to forgive and excuse the frailties of others; the goodness of his heart appears in a sweet affability that influences his words and actions, presents every object to his view in the most charitable and pleasing light.  
 
–St. Francis de Sales (quote from Franciscan Media’s “Saint of the Day.”)
Today is the feast of St. Francis de Sales, patron of this blog, and one of my favorite saints.  He’s the patron of journalists.
Usually during Lent I bring out my well-worn copy of Introduction to the Devout Life, and this year will be no different.
This is not my edition, but a handsome recently released one. There are many available.

Today I’ll be celebrating in style, as this day is also the baptism anniversary of our oldest.  She requested that I make chocolate fudge and peanut butter fudge (both adapted from my mom’s recipe), so I did so yesterday.  Since  I didn’t make these sweet treats over the Christmas season, we are really enjoying how good they taste.

Update for 2014: I am not making fudge today, but we are still celebrating today and enjoying the feast.  Do you celebrate today?

New Year, New You: Be Mindful, Be Inspired

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Here is my January column that appears in this weekend’s edition of The Catholic Post.  I invite your feedback here or elsewhere online.

A new calendar year offers many a chance to start fresh with eating right or maybe a new exercise plan.  Bookstores shelves are full of how-to books this time of year to help kick-start that process.

That’s all well and good, but many times a shift in thinking is what’s really needed.  A new book offers just that.

 

Running With God Across America is decidedly not a “how-to” book about getting in shape, but many readers will find it inspiring and compelling.

Running is University of Notre Dame grad Jeff Grabosky’s account of his decision to embark, after a rough post-college time, on a cross-country run, praying for others’ intentions the entire way.

Each short chapter is titled by “day” (day 1, etc.) and covers one day of his  3,700-mile, months-long journey.  Most days he ran more than 30 miles, and he relates with openness his spiritual, physical and emotional state through many ups and downs.

“I set out on my journey to help bring our world closer to God,” writes Grabosky at the end of Running with God Across America, but it’s his own spiritual journey that takes center stage, with a endearing narrative and flow.

This book is hard to put down–I would resolve to set it aside for dishes or some other responsibility, but kept reading and telling myself, “just one more day.”

As a busy middle-aged mom (and runner), I found myself envious of two aspects of Grabosky’s trek, one serious and one kind of funny.

First, Grabosky had tons of time and personal space for prayer, while running, of course. That’s why the book reads like a retreat journal or spiritual memoir in many ways.  His spiritual highs and lows are recounted in vivid and emotional detail.

Second, food lovers will marvel as Grabosky relates the sheer amount of food he needed to eat to keep up his weight on this long run. I know how good food tastes after a long run or lots of exertion, and so his descriptions of memorable and delicious meals stuck with me.  Talk about mindful eating.

Most people aren’t going to embark upon a solo cross-country run, though some might want to join in Grabosky’s latest effort, as he organizes the LIFE Runner’s cross-country Relay for Life that begins next month.

Still, most readers will glean from Running With God Across America spiritual fruit from his journey, and be inspired to consider their own spiritual and physical life more like the real journey that it is.  Just one more day ….

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Cultivating Prayer, The Dominican Way

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Here is my November column from this weekend’s print edition of The Catholic Post.  I invite your feedback.

“Without prayer, there is no chance for success in this world.”

Kind of grabs you, doesn’t it?  That was my reaction when I began to read the beautifully produced and spiritually rich new book from Paraclete Press, How to Pray the Dominican Way:  Ten Postures, Prayers and Practices that Lead Us to God by Angelo Stagnaro.

Stagnaro refreshes, without changing the essence of, St. Dominic’s “Nine Ways of Prayer,” a classic spiritual work, adding  on a 10th way of contemplative prayer.  (He describes the 10th way as an outflow of the other nine). Stagnaro wishes to convey in the book that our bodies can dispose our souls to great strides in prayer and closeness to the Lord, if we take the time to learn and practice these ancient postures and gestures.

I was actually unaware of “The Nine Ways of Prayer,” a short volume written by St. Dominic as a description of his ways to pray before the Lord, but what a treasure!  The nine ways are deceptively simple (for example, praying by prostrating, or  praying with hands raised), but rich in wisdom for growth in the spiritual life.

Stagnaro’s book updates St. Dominic’s ideas with a fresh eye and a mature spirituality born of his longtime work as a catechist.  In this volume, Stagnaro wants to fulfill the Dominican motto, “to hand the fruits of contemplation on to others.”  It offers a step-by-step guide as well as takes readers on a spiritual journey.

What I think makes How to Pray the Dominican Way especially worthwhile is that the high quality of printing paper; the just-right size of the lovely font (along with plenty of white space on each page), as well as the size of the book itself, makes it a joy to read.  It feels great in your hand, it’s  handsome to read, and therefore creates an atmosphere conducive to spiritual reading and growth.

Sometimes books have great content but can lack a certain polish. E-books can be convenient, and in general I’m no snob for “only” real books.  But while I recommend all sorts of books, it’s a real pleasure to recommend one so beautifully produced (and real) as How to Pray the Dominican Way.

First, What Are You Reading? Volume 27, The All Saints/Marathon Edition

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Happy Feast of All Saints!   Be sure to celebrate in style this great feast of the Church.

I’m interrupting my marathon story (here are Part 1 and Part 2) to post my monthly “what are you reading?” questions, with a focus on a book about someone who probably is a saint, as well as one book about running by a prayerful young man.

The questions, as always, are:

first, what are you reading?
what do you like best about it?
what do you like least?
what’s next on your list to read?

As always, I hope you’ll consider your current reads on your blog and/or sharing here in the comments or on Facebook or Twitter.  Happy reading!

First, what are you reading?

I actually read Jeff Grabosky’s book Running With God Across America back in the summer, but I want to feature it now, because Jeff is a fellow LIFE Runner.  I also plan to do a Q&A with him in the future since he’s agreed to do one.

 I’m also in the midst of Leonie Martin:  A Difficult Life by  Marie Baudouin-Croix.

What do you like best about them?

I most enjoy Jeff Grabosky’s voice and honesty in talking about his spiritual journey in Running With God Across America. 

Leonie Martin: A Difficult Life is quite moving.  I had read before in an article about Leonie that some believe that she, almost more than Therese, deserves formal recognition as a saint.  I’m not sure about that, but reading about her mental health issues and how she worked to overcome them and persist in seeking to fulfill her vocation has brought me to tears on several occasions.

What do you like least?

I am surprised at how much I enjoyed all of Running With God Across America.  I receive a lot of review copies of self-published books, and the vast majority have major issues, whether style, content or grammar/typo issues.  Jeff’s book, while self-published, genuinely reads like a memoir from any major publisher.  I’m not sure if he had a great helpful editors or friends read through it, or just has a gift, or both.  He’s a great writer and the story flows.

Leonie Martin was written in the French, and sometimes the translation  feels a little awkward.  It’s easy to overcome, and certainly worthwhile to know more about this member of the Martin family.

What’s next on your list to read?

I have a huge stack of books that are possibilities for my December column featuring good gift books.  So many great choices, but I’m on the lookout for more.  If you know of any great newer books that would also make great Christmas presents, please comment here or send me a tweet.