4 Fantastic Books to Read on Christian Spirituality
The world of Christian spirituality is rich and filled with different practices and disciplines that span the centuries of the church’s existence. Trying to decide which to incorporate can feel a bit like being a kid in a candy store. There are just SO many options.
If you are new to exploring Christian spirituality, the books listed below can be a fantastic starting point. Each offers straightforward advice for how to dive deeper into your faith.
Likewise, if you’re an avid practitioner of different Christian spiritual disciplines, the books can serve as a helpful refresher and give further theological material to reflect on.
So without further ado, here are four highly recommended books on Christian spirituality:
1. Liturgy of the Ordinary: Sacred Practices in Everyday Life by Tish Harrison Warren
Often we operate on the assumption that spiritual practices must be profound, complex, or life-altering every time in order to deepen our faith with God. Harrison Warren flips that idea on its head in her book.
Rather than offering explanations on the more mystical or eye-catching spiritual practices found within the Christian tradition, she illuminates how it’s the mundane, every day actions we take that truly transform our lives.
From finding your lost keys to eating leftovers, Harrison Warren links the commonplace to the sacred. Her humor and personal examples make the book an enjoyable read, but it’s her passionate explanation of how becoming more like Christ happens over daily tasks like laundry that makes her book a must read.
Liturgy of the Ordinary is a reminder for all of us that each moment of our day is an opportunity to practice our faith in some small way.
2. The Soul’s Slow Ripening: 12 Celtic Practices for Seeking the Sacred by Christine Valters Paintner
When I was in college, I had the opportunity to take a course on Celtic Christianity. That semester I fell in love with the Celtic way of interacting with creation, different life stages, prayer, and time with God.
It’s the connectedness to creation and the rhythms of daily life found in Celtic spirituality that I adore because it forces me to slow down. I’ve found that learning to think and approach life in this manner adds a sense of peace and well being to my days.
The Celtic Christian tradition is heavily inspired by the desert monastic tradition of early Christianity, but Valters Paintner shows how these practices can be woven into your life as it is now. She teaches you how to view your spiritual journey as a slow unfolding or ripening rather than a checklist of things to do each week.
Throughout the book, the reader learns not only about different spiritual disciplines, but also the history behind each of these practices. You are introduced to important Irish saints and the writings of different Celtic theologians and authors. So while the book is incredibly practical, it also introduces you to a new way of reading through and relating to scripture and theology.
3. The Celtic Way of Prayer by Esther DeWaal
I wasn’t kidding when I said I seriously love Celtic Christianity. The previous book is a wonderful overview of different themes and practices that come from this tradition. DeWaal’s book introduces you to how the Celtic tradition approaches the idea of praying without ceasing.
The book is broken up into different chapters based around one particular theme from the Celtic world (for instance the idea of journeys). In that section, you learn about the different written prayers relating to that theme. But the reader also learns how those themes and styles of prayer were woven into each day.
Like the first book which speaks about finding God in the mundane, Celtic prayer shows how each of these daily chores—the cooking of a meal, starting of a fire (or perhaps turning up the thermostat), or working outside in the garden—are accompanied by a stream of prayer.
The book enables you to see how each of these moments can relate back to faith and God. It’s a beautiful way of viewing life. And it teaches you how to begin to do this in your own life.
Suddenly going to the grocery store or dropping the kids off at school can become a regular event that triggers a prayer in your mind. All of these little prayers breathed throughout the day transform your life into one of praying about all things, big and small.
4. Mudhouse Sabbath by Lauren Winner
This last book has a bit of a different approach from the previous three. Rather than being rooted strictly in a Christian context, Winner draws upon her background growing up in Orthodox Judaism and the spiritual practices that formed and continue to form her life now as a Christian.
Throughout the book, the reader is invited into a dialogue between two rich faith traditions. She explains Jewish spiritual practices and uses them to explore Christian traditions like liturgy or seasons of life that we all will enter like aging.
Winner’s book offers the reader ideas on how even something like deciding what food to put on your table for dinner can be a spiritual practice, a moment to ask the divine to enter into. She clearly illustrates how the aim of each of these practices is the transformation of our lives into one that revolves around our faith, even in the most unlikely of places.
Mudhouse Sabbath teaches the reader about a way of interacting with God that many may not be familiar with. They are taken on a journey of exploration that is profound and eye opening. In the end, the picture of Christian life that we are left with is one filled with meaning and encounters with God.
While I recommend reading each of the books on the list, I would suggest starting with one. Read through it and try incorporating some of the practices and mindsets the book mentions. Let the slow process of becoming more like Christ shape the rhythms of your day. Then go back and read the next on your list.