”What a delight, to find so extraordinary a collection meant for use in "ordinary time." Any book that includes passages from The Wind in the Willows and Moby Dick, as well as poems by George Herbert and Christina Rossetti, is all right with me. Especially because each of the works chosen is meant to awaken me to the movement of the spirit in daily life.

”For the avid or eclectic reader, Sarah Arthur’s At the Still Point is a pungent bouquet of words sequestered in poetry and prose. Her selections and compositions make the heart sing and give the mind pause; cause my soul to pray and my body increasing time for Sabbath.”

Spend the summer weeks of “Ordinary Time” praying with novelists and poets.

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless;
Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is…
— T. S. Eliot, from “Burnt Norton” in Four Quartets

With a title inspired by T. S. Eliot, this “literary” prayer book will delight any Christian who is inspired to discover the truths of faith in the pages of great literature.

The liturgical season of Ordinary Time runs for roughly twenty-nine weeks, from Pentecost Sunday (May 27, 2012) in the spring until the first Sunday of Advent in late fall. It’s the longest season of the church year, with few significant events along the way, which gives it a kind of ordinariness that the other seasons lack. There are no narrative high points, no showy colors or costumes, not even a signature hymn or two. At the Still Point expands the genre of spiritual writing to include classic and contemporary fiction and poetry, aimed at inviting you to experience God through your imagination during Ordinary Time. In these pages there are worlds to be explored, characters to meet, images to gaze upon, phrases to savor. You will encounter passages from novelists from Austen and Tolstoy to Dostoevsky and Garrison Keillor and poets from George Herbert and St. John of the Cross to Scott Cairns and Kathleen Norris.