Best this month
By Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat
Barbie Izquierdo, a Phila- delphia single mom, struggles to make ends meet for her two children. She swore that she would never feed her kids canned spaghetti three times a day like she had growing up, but sometimes it is the best she can do.
A Place at the Table
Forty-nine million people in America don’t know where their next meal is coming from. One in four American children is food insecure. This documentary, directed by Kristi Jacobson and Lori Silverbush, puts faces on those facts and also profiles citizens and activist groups who are working to end hunger in America. These include “Top Chef’s” Tom Colicchio, who has lobbied in Washington for an increase in funds for child nutrition programs; David Beckmann, an ELCA pastor and head of Bread for the World, who probes the connections between faith and feeding the hungry; Bill
Hooray for Bread
This picture book by Allan Ahlberg for children 3 to 5 years old is a playful tale about the journey of one loaf of bread as it provides nourishment to people and animals.
The baker uses his talent to
The Brussats pub- lish the website www. SpiritualityandPractice. com where you can find more information about the items reviewed in this column.
make it and then delights in sampling it. The bread gives joy to his wife who is eating break- fast in bed. Then she makes a sandwich for her son’s lunch. Meanwhile, the loaf of bread sits on a shelf “dreaming of fields of wheat, perhaps, and humming to itself.” In the park, the baker’s wife feeds bits of the bread to ducks and a few fish. More crumbs are given to birds waiting on the garden wall. Following the trail of this loaf of bread, we find ourselves feeling grateful for this precious food and for all the ways it connects us with others (Candlewick, www.
Candlewick.com).
PHOTO COURTESY OF MAGNOLIA PICTURES
Shore, founder and director of Share Our Strength, who discusses the idea that children lack access to food pro- grams; and pastor Bob Wilson and teacher Leslie Nich- ols, who tell their stories of distributing food to those in need in a small Colorado town. A companion book, A Place at the Table: The Crisis of 49 Million Hungry Americans and How to Solve It by Peter Pringle is also available from Public Affairs and Participant Media (Magnolia Pictures, www.
magpictures.com/aplaceatthetable, PG).
99 Blessings:
An Invitation to Life In ancient times people would regu- larly bless each other, their labors, their homes, their land and their animals. Nowadays this spiritual practice is often limited to religious services and ceremonies, the occa- sional “bless you” when someone sneezes in public, or the response of
a homeless person after receiving a gift of money. Benedictine Brother David Steindl-Rast brings these prayers back where they belong—into the midst of everyday life. He offers blessings for fresh linen, using the Internet, taking leave, listening to music, learning by heart, being taught by spiders, daydreaming in bed, smelling leather and much more.
Here’s a blessing from the book’s preface: “May the patchwork quilt of blessings help to sharpen your taste for the gift of life in its innumerable facets. May you grow ever more blessed, ever more able to bless” (Image Books,
www.imagecatholicbooks.com).
42 The Lutheran •
www.thelutheran.org
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