Customer Reviews

Saints: A Year in Faith and Art: 2010 Wall Calendar

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

As a Catholic priest for over 30 years, I am a lover of spiritual books and stories of role models of the faith. SAINTS: A YEAR in FAITH and ART is just such a book! In addition to the brief paragraphs about each saint, the art work presented relating to the saint is itself worth moments of reflection. If you want more knowledge of a saint, I suggest ALL SAINTS by Robert Ellsberg. If you want a succint understanding of a saint, this is your book! The cover, the daily portrayals and the art work all are worth this price!
PS: I bought several copies and gave them to my Staff for Christmas gifts. They loved it!

The book offers a daily review of a saint or blessed within the Catholic faith. An overview of their life and who they are patron saints of is included. What I enjoyed most was learning the Saints name origin and what it means. Each review is only 1 large paragraph and a picture is included. What a wonderful way to start or end your daily prayers!

As a Catholic School librarian, I highly recommend this
book. One of the very delightful aspects of this book is
it's beautiful physical appearance. It is small in size,
remanisant of medieval hand printed books. The smooth
paper and gilt cover add to it's appeal. There is a brief
description of each saint with an accompanying picture
on the opposite page. The old masters art work is
lovely. However, some of the pictures are graphic and
may not be for very young children.

The reproductions contained in this calender are lovely. This is my second "saints" calender so I must like the product. Very beautiful for personal use and as a gift.

It's a Small Sized but Lengthy Hardcover book,780 pages, Beautiful Illustrations, Art, Layout and Information. Great History and A Catholic Gem.

I bought this book at an airport near New Years hoping that it would help me keep regular with my spiritual readings. Each entry is fairly short and has excellent artwork, but every now and again the author feels the need to define the following of a saint as a "cult" which was borderline, but I overlooked it as possible a mistranslation. What really peaked my displeasure was that instead of veneration, the word "worship" is used such as on page 244 under the entry for Saint George:

"Worshiped as a Soldier-Saint at his presumed birthplace of Lydda (modern Lod, near Jerusalem), George lived between the 3rd and 4th centuries."

THE CATHOLIC FAITH PROHIBITS THE WORSHIP OF SAINTS!!!

I saw one other review in here by a priest and was shocked that he did not mention this point. Worship is a degree of prayer and praise reserved for God, who alone is worthy. The degree to which we remember the works of the saints and do them honor is best described in Corinthians: "Remember your leaders, those who spoke to you the word of God; consider the outcome of their life, and imitate their faith" (Heb. 13:7).

I suggest if you already bought the book, double check some of what it says with other sources. Even Wikipedia will make a distinction between veneration and worship in their articles. When the wording on Wikipedia is more in line with teachings of the Catholic Church than a published book by a respectable company like Abrams, you know there is a problem!

To Catholics, I caution you to find a better book if you can. I have written the publisher about the concerns I am posting here with no response so far.

To others wishing to learn about the Saints of the Catholic Church, please, do not use this as your main source. Find something instead that has been reviewed and approved by the Church.

A truly beautiful book of Art. Saint biographies are interesting and quick reading. But you'll want to linger over the art.

I see 18 reviews for a book that sounds great, but Amazon seems to have changed up this page, because now it's for ordering a calendar, not a book. I just ordered the calendar and I'm very pleased with it. It's got big, beautiful, classic paintings of various saints, not an ugly or boring picture in the bunch. I uploaded a picture of the previews on the back of the calendar, since Amazon didn't have one already. Normally I'd never buy a calendar without being able to see what twelve pictures it features, but in this case I took a chance because I'd bought this same calendar in a past year and the pictures were all great then too.

The calendar has a classy, high-quality look and feel. Can't beat the price, either. It does NOT give saints' days or any other Catholic feast days except Christmas, Easter, and a few others. Doesn't even have Pentecost, but it does have Cinco de Mayo and Holocaust Remembrance Day. So in other words, this is a completely secular calendar with some awesome Catholic pictures that earn it five stars.

This is an amazing little book of saints. Designed for a "saint a day", it sometimes has two saints per day, but what really stands out is the absolutely beautiful artwork from medieval to modern times. Although the book is small, and hence the pictures also small, they are so sharp and beautiful that their size won't matter. The lives of each saint, being limited to a page or a page and a half, are only overviews, but good for a brief reading on a daily basis. No large time commitment here.

I bought this book for my son as he received First Communion. He has consulted it almost every day since, reporting to the rest of the family on the saint featured. Every page turn has a brief story of the saint of the day on one side and a stunning artwork depicting a scene from the saint's life on the other.

One word of caution: martyrdom is not for the faint of heart. Some of the artistic renditions are quite graphic, even explicit, as in the case of Saint Agatha, who apparently had her breasts ripped out with pincers.