J. Philip Newell

The beginning of this book was EXCELLENT. Fresh perspective that brings us forward. Newell reminds me of CS Lewis and Dallas Willard, although some of his thoughts push a little further, and I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not.

Nicely written by Newell. The unique part of this prayer book: It was written intentionally to be used by a family with children, so the language is more approachable than many other prayer books, and other Celtic prayer books.

That said... it doesn't quite sparkle for me (much like most of Newell's stuff, it's good, but doesn't grab me by the shoulders and demand my attention as does, say, John O'Donohue).

I love so much of Newell's writing (or at least his thinking) that I was sure I would love this book. I just had to put it down about half-way through because it was incredibly repetitive. He said the same thing about 57 different ways. Maybe I just didn't get to the good part. I might finish it someday.

This was and still is a great introduction to Celtic spirituality. The hearbeat of Celtic spirituality is the Apostle John while the heartbeat of other Western Christianity is the Apostle Peter. This may be an historically inaccurate paradigm, but from a spiritual standpoint it makes for a good framework.