Mark Oakley

Whether you love poetry or haven't read it since school, The Splash of Words will help you rediscover poetry’s power to startle, challenge and reframe your vision. Like throwing a pebble into water, a poem causes a ‘splash of words’ whose ripples can transform the way we see the world, ourselves and God. Through thirty selected poems, from the fourteenth century to the present day, Mark Oakley explores poetry’s power to stir our settled ways of viewing the world and faith, shift our perceptions and even transform who we are.

Believing in poetry

The Splash of Words

Mark Oakley is one of the church’s most outstanding communicators. In this series of fifty beautifully crafted reflections, with characteristic wit, he traverses the landscape of the Christian year. His writing is shaped by a sense that language is sacramental, with a poet’s gift of opening up new worlds and new possibilities simply through words.

The Seasons of Faith

By Way of the Heart

Mark Oakley reveals George Herbert as a fine companion with whom to examine the journey of the soul. His poems are 'heart-work and heaven-work', embracing love and closeness, anger and despair, reconciliation and hope. There is too an appealing and audacious playfulness about Herbert: he seems to take God on, knowing God will win, confident God will not abandon him. This sense of relationship with God as primarily friendship is one of many intriguing and healing aspects we are invited to consider.

George Herbert and the Journey of the Soul

My Sour-Sweet Days

Introduces the young thief, Rubel, making his way amidst the powerful events changing his world: soldiers and pirates, kings and princess, and a Shadow Lady of the Sleeping Wood.

Thieves & Kings

How can we enter fruitfully into the seasons of the Church’s year? Why have the seasons become shaped as they have and what can we do to make them good? As Mark Oakley explains in the hugely enjoyable, earthy and wide-ranging introduction to this exceptional volume, we can experience them in stimulating company! Here are reflections by the most senior pastors and teachers in the Church today: SARAH MULLALLY, Bishop of Crediton, on A Good Advent, a season ‘pregnant with hope’, when our waiting is anything but inactive. ROWAN WILLIAMS, Master of Magdalene College, Cambridge, on A Good Christmas, and the overwhelming surprise of ‘a God who values our humanity beyond all imagining’. LIBBY LANE, Bishop of Stockport, on A Good Epiphany, when through discomfort ‘we begin to discover at first hand the hospitality of God’. JUSTIN WELBY, Archbishop of Canterbury, on A Good Lent, ‘which takes hold of human sinfulness and, in an extraordinary way, makes space for the hope of Christ’. STEPHEN COTTRELL, Bishop of Chelmsford, on A Good Holy Week, when we ‘revel in the sensuous and very hands-on re-enactment of liturgical drama’. STEPHEN CONWAY, Bishop of Ely, on A Good Easter, which is ‘life lived shot through with grace and glory’. KAREN GORHAM, Bishop of Sherborne, on A Good Pentecost, when our life’s journey ‘brings us encounters, challenges and opportunities we can rise to, equipped by the Spirit of God’.

A Good Year

Jane Williams

Mary Gregory

Ben Quash

Rosalind Brown

Steven Croft

Jan McFarlane

Paula Gooder

Andrew Davison

Malcolm Guite

Peter Graystone

Barbara Mosse

Martyn Percy

Gillian Cooper

Emma Ineson

Maggi Dawn

Martyn Snow

Reflections for Daily Prayer is a highly valued daily Bible companion based on the Common Worship Lectionary. Each day, Monday to Saturday, some of the very best writers from across the Anglican tradition offer insightful, informed and inspiring reflections on one of the day’s readings for Morning Prayer. Their reflections will appeal to anyone who values both the companionship of daily Bible notes and the structure of the Lectionary. For every day (excluding Sundays) of the 2015/16 church year, there are full references and a quotation from the day’s set of Scripture readings, a concise but challenging commentary on the readings and a collect. In addition, the book includes a simple order for morning and night prayer, an introduction to the practice of daily prayer by Bishop John Pritchard and a guide to reading the Bible reflectively by Bishop Stephen Cottrell.

Reflections for Daily Prayer: Advent 2015 to Christ the King 2016

Thieves and Kings is a thrilling Fantasy, told through an innovative mix of prose and artwork. After returning from an apprenticeship across the sea, Rubel returns to the city of Highborn and declares himself a thief. He soon finds himself caught up in a life or death adventure across Oceansend, battling knights, sorcerers, and the mysterious Shadow Lady. Everyone has an agenda, and the truth is hard to come by in this high-fantasy adventure for all ages.

Volume One

A place to hang my spacesuit

Star Drop

Sue Pickering

John Pritchard

Reflections for Daily Prayer has nourished thousands of Christians for a decade with its inspiring and informed weekday Bible reflections. Now, in response to demand, Reflections for Sundays combines material from over the years with new writing to provide high-quality reflections on the Principal Readings for Sundays and major Holy Days. Contributors include some of the very best writers from across the Anglican tradition who have helped to establish it as one of the leading daily devotional volumes today. For each Sunday and major Holy Day in Year A, Reflections for Sundays offers: �e� full lectionary details for the Principle Service �e� a reflection on the Old Testament reading �e� a reflection on the Epistle �e� a reflection on the Gospel It also contains a substantial introduction to the Gospel of Matthew, written by renowned Bible teacher Paula Gooder.

Reflections for Sundays, Year A

Joanna Collicutt

Ian Adams

Helen-Ann Hartley

John Sentamu

Angela Tilby

Lucy Winkett

Jeremy Worthen

Christopher Cocksworth

Reflections on the Psalms provides insightful commentary on each of the Psalms from the same experienced team of writers that have made Reflections for Daily Prayer so successful. It offers inspiring and undated reflections on all 150 psalms, with longer psalms split into parts in accordance with the Lectionary. Each reflection is accompanied by its corresponding Psalm refrain and prayer from the Common Worship Psalter, making this a valuable resource for personal or devotional use. Specially written introductions by Paula Gooder and Steven Croft explore the Psalms and the Bible and the Psalms in the life of the Church.

Reflections on the Psalms

Mark Oakley

Books

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