Join us for a very special author talk and book signing with Diana Butler Bass, best-selling author of the new book A Beautiful Year: 52 Meditations on Faith, Wisdom, and Perseverance.
Hosted by St. John’s Episcopal Church in their Parish Hall building, 339 S. Main St., Marion, NC 28752.
FREE EVENT BUT RSVP IS REQUESTED (please fill out the form below):
ABOUT A BEAUTIFUL YEAR
One of America’s most trusted theologians offers spiritual inspiration for every week of the year.
A Beautiful Year: 52 Meditations on Faith, Wisdom, and Perseverance offers an essay for every week in the seasons of the Christian year: From Advent and Christmas to Lent and Easter through the entire calendar.
Other than its major holidays, many people are not familiar with the rhythms of the church year, an ancient spiritual cycle of time. Yet all religions have such calendars — and they shape our understanding of faith. In the West, we live in tension with the secular calendar (mostly an inheritance from the Roman Empire) and the Christian liturgical calendar, a cycle of sacred stories that compose a larger narrative of love, hospitality, mercy, justice, and gratitude.
Bass reclaims and presents fresh perspectives for every biblical text in the church year; from musing on A Wrinkle in Time in Advent, to remembering her father’s old-fashioned blue Christmas decorations, and offering a revolutionary reading of the Last Supper.
With fresh insights on familiar stories, these essays surprise and inspire, challenge and comfort, and will be savored year after year. Beautifully designed, the book is also a perfect gift.
ABOUT DIANA BUTLER BASS
Diana Butler Bass, Ph.D., is an award-winning author, popular speaker, inspiring preacher, and one of America’s most trusted commentators on religion and contemporary spirituality.
Diana’s passion is sharing great ideas to change lives and the world—a passion that ranges from informing the public about spiritual trends, challenging conventional narratives about religious practice, entering the fray of social media with spiritual wisdom, and writing books to help readers see themselves, their place in history, and God differently. She does this thoughtfully, with joy and a good dose of humor, leading John Fugelsang to dub her “iconic,” Anne Lamott to call her “a brilliant scholar and wonderful storyteller,” and Glennon Doyle to praise her “razor-sharp mind” and “mystical heart.”
She holds a doctorate in religious studies from Duke University and is the author of 12 books. Her bylines include The New York Times, the Washington Post, CNN.com, Atlantic.com, USA Today, Huffington Post, Spirituality and Health, Reader’s Digest, Christian Century, and Sojourners. She has commented on religion, politics, and culture in the media widely including on CBS, CNN, PBS, NPR, CBC, FOX, Sirius XM, TIME, Newsweek, Rolling Stone, and in multiple global news outlets. From 1993-2003, she wrote a weekly column on religion and culture for the Santa Barbara News-Press, which was distributed nationally by the New York Times Syndicate.
Diana currently co-hosts the Convocation Unscripted, a podcast on religion and politics, and writes The Cottage, a top-five Substack newsletter in Faith & Spirituality.
Her work has received three Wilbur Awards for best nonfiction book of the year, prizes from Religion News Association for individual commentary and for Book of the Year, Nautilus Awards Silver and Gold medals, the Illumination Book Award Silver medal, Books for a Better Life Award, Book of the Year of the Academy of Parish Clergy, the Frank S. and Elizabeth D. Brewer Prize for Church History, a Substack Fellowship for Independent Writers, and Publishers Weekly’s Best Religion Book of the Year.
Diana and her husband live in Alexandria, Virginia, with their dog, Paddy, and their sometimes-successful backyard garden.