Book Reviews2 Mother Angelica’s Little Book of Life Lessons and Everyday Spirituality

Oct 19, 2007

Mother Angelica is one of the most known Catholic religious women in the United States.  Her television network, EWTN (Eternal Word Television Network), is the best known Catholic network in the United States and beyond.  She is very earthy and this comes through in this book which is a collection of sayings and quotes from her many years of ministry to God’s people.

Raymond Arroyo, the author of Mother Angelica’s biography Mother Angelica (2005), edits this collection of quotes.  He provides a brief introduction to Mother Angelica and he also introduces each chapter and its topic which relates to Mother Angelica’s life or experiences.  Some of the sayings are a single line while others are a few are paragraphs long.  In these sayings the reader will find a lot of material for their prayer life and for plain living.

There are many sayings from Mother Angelica that involve the idea of living in the present moment.  Her insights into this come from Brother Lawrence who wrote The Practice of the Presence of God.  She greatly encourages us to live now in this present moment and not to live in the past or to worry about the future.  We only have to be concerned about now.  We cannot do anything about the past or the future.  We can do something about the “now.”

Another topic of hers is regarding Divine Providence - not worrying about money and other things, God will provide.  That is how she built her television network and her other ministries.  If they were meant to be, God would provide for them.  Her network survived from month to month.  God provided or inspired donors to give money or other materials that were needed.  Usually what came into the network was just enough to make ends meet and maybe a little more.  Mother’s faith in God was strong and she continues to rely on this method.  So far it has worked out very well for her, her sisters and the organization.  However, she did not sit around and expected God to provide.  She worked on getting donors and prayed that God would them to give.

She addresses several topics in her sayings on family life, work, prayer, pain and suffering, temptations, the saints and angels, and death.  Those undergoing pain and suffering will find comfort in her advice.  She has suffered pain most of her life and can relate.  

This book is a great companion to Raymond Arroyo’s biography on Mother Angelica.  It is highly recommended to those interested in her, spirituality, prayer, and the religious life.

Br. Benet Exton, O.S.B., St. Gregory's University, Shawnee, Oklahoma.

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