Customer Reviews

Brightest and Best: A Companion to the Lesser Feasts and Fasts

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book works best when used as exactly what it says it is-a companion to Lesser Feasts and Fasts, an Episcopal Church liturgy book which gives all the background information which Brightest and Best lacks. This book has interesting and thought-provoking meditations on how the lives of each of the Episcopal saints (many of whom are also Catholic saints) relate to life in the modern world. Some of them seem somewhat far-fetched, and the author's politics come through occassionally, but for the most part, this is a wonderful book.

Sam Portaro consistently offers a new take on old themes, making the lives of the saints - ancient and modern - alive with relevance for today. Some of the commentaries border on the whimsical and others (sometimes the same ones) are deep and profound. Having celebrated most of the Lesser Feasts and Fast days several times now as a parish priest, I find this book helping me to be excited about even some of the saints I had almost written off. Very good devotional material here for clergy and laity alike.

I keep this book by my bedside and read it often. It's best when you can also read Lesser Feasts and Fasts along with it. By itself, it's thought-provoking and stimulating.

Sam presents some different ways of looking at the 'saints' whose biographies we may have read in other books. He brings up new ideas for consideration and meditation.Recommended to enliven your daily quiet time.

Portaro's book is a prime example of projecting pop psychology and poorly thought out theology onto a subject where it couldn't have less relevance. The biographies of these people are largely unknown and filled with fiction; loading these biographies with more fiction in order to illustrate tenuous and trite points is simply not worth the time or the effort.