How to Read Your Way to Heaven: A Spiritual Reading Program for the Worse of Sinners, the Greatest of Saints and Everyone in Between
I’m so excited to share this resource with you! I hope you’ll check it out and let me know what you think!!!
What people are saying about How to Read Your Way to Heaven:
“Getting to heaven often requires that we rely on the wisdom of those who have gone before us. Vicki Burbach has done us a great service by providing an insightful reading plan and approach that if absorbed and followed will no doubt produce saints!” — Dan Burke, Executive director, National Catholic Register; founder, Catholic Spiritual Direction
“If you want to develop a deep knowledge of our Faith, here is a reliable book that shows you how.” — Fr. C. John McCloskey III, priest of the Prelature of Opus Dei, Research Fellow of the Faith and Reason Institute in Washington DC.
“We can read all day and read forever, and still feel as if we’re not making progress. Vicki Burbach gets us out of the rut and onto a track toward real spiritual — and cultural and intellectual — progress. This is the kind of book that can make life so much richer — by leading to many more books, and all in good order.”— Mike Aquilina, award-winning author of more than forty books on Catholic history, doctrine and devotion
“Whether you’re a lifelong Catholic or a skeptical inquirer, you’ll find How to Read Your Way to Heaven by Vicki Burbach to be an indispensable gift for your intellectual and spiritual life. With this timeless treasure, Vicki has helped solve my ‘so many books and so little time’ problem by providing a masterplan that’s both exciting and accomplishable. By committing a portion of each day to life’s most important pursuit — knowing, loving and serving God — we journey ever closer to heaven. I’m grateful to Vicki for a book that’s sure to become well worn over the next five years. I can’t wait to dive in!” — Lisa M. Hendey, Founder of CatholicMom.com and author of The Grace of Yes
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This program has done wonders for my spiritual life over the past several years, and I firmly believe that if you follow it, you will be amazed at what it can do for you, too!
For years I attempted to include spiritual reading in my schedule. I read books here and there with no real plan in mind. I would pick up the Sacred Scriptures for a while, and then put them down when I got bored – usually around Leviticus. I would pick up the Catechism and get overwhelmed by the profound nature of every. single. paragraph. After a while, I would set that down too and move on to other reading.
I have always loved to read, and for years after converting to Catholicism, I read books on every subject, from the Mass to writings of the saints, prayer, or just living the Christian life. Unfortunately, I never had direction, and my method seemed to be a revolving door – Bible for a month or two, Catechism for a few pages, book; Bible for another month, Catechism for the same few pages, book, maybe another book, and so on.
Then one day, about eleven years ago, I came up with an idea. Instantly. It felt like a long-awaited answer to prayer.
What if I developed a reading program that allowed me to read the Bible, the Catechism and some of the greatest books ever written each day? What if, each year, I could concentrate on one of the Four Pillars of Faith as described in the Catechism:
The Profession of Faith (What we Believe)
The Celebration of the Christian Mystery (Liturgy and the Sacraments)
Life in Christ (Living the Christian Life)
Prayer
By the grace of God, I did just that! I developed a detailed reading program that would allow me to read five days per week, 52 weeks per year, and resulted in my ability to read the entire Bible, the Catechism and about 40 of the greatest Catholic books ever written within five years.
That program is what you will find in this book!
Having used this program for years, I can assure you that you will be able to keep track of your reading, make good use of your prayer time and progress greatly in your spiritual life not matter how slowly you read or how long it takes for you to complete the program.
I am always amazed at how the readings from the Bible and the Catechism – or the Catechism and whatever spiritual book I am reading – build on one another, significantly strengthening any lessons cultivated that day.
Here is an example of a page from the program:
Notice the blank lines at the bottom of each Day. They are there so that you can customize the program to suit your own interests or needs!
I’m so excited about this part:
In addition to the program, We asked Catholics to whom many of us look for wisdom, guidance or support on our spiritual journeys to share their favorite books from each of the four pillars of Faith. Many responded. We have recommendations from Dr. Peter Kreeft, Jennifer Fulwiler, Mike Aquilina, Fr. Mike Schmitz, Fr. Timothy Gallagher, Tim Staples, Trent Horn, Jason Evert and many others. Additionally, we included Fr. C. John McCloskey’s Catholic Lifetime Reading List, which includes over 100 books for your spiritual reading pleasure and enlightenment.
That means that when you finish the program laid out for you, or you’ve already read one or more of the books in the program, you’ll have many other books from which to choose, each of which comes highly recommended by a trusted source!
Here’s the blurb from the back cover of the book:
Wouldn’t it be great if we really could read our way to heaven?
Many of us commit to some form of spiritual reading, but we find that our book choices are sporadic and often based on a whim rather than following a purposeful plan. Designed for individual or group settings, How to Read Your Way to Heaven will guide your quest to delve deeper into a relationship with Christ by meditating on the written word while organizing your reading around the four pillars of the Catholic Faith – the Creed, the sacraments, morality and prayer.
Not merely another book to read, How to Read Your Way to Heaven is designed to be an invaluable tool for guiding and organizing your reading to help you on your journey to become a saint.
Following this plan, you’ll meditate daily on Sacred Scripture and read the entirety of the Catechism over the course of the program. You’ll be introduced to a treasure trove of the greatest Catholic books ever written, and you’ll learn prayerful reading methods such as lectio divina and find time-tested advice on where and when to read.
Some additional notes:
- This book is an integrated 1-,3- or 5-year spiritual reading program, complete with a checklist, specific assignments and a magnificent book list that is fully in line with the Magisterium of the Church.
- Daily assignments include brief readings from Sacred Scripture, the Catechism of the Catholic Church and some of the greatest Catholic books ever written. Readings generally take 15-30 minutes per day, or can be split between two days, if time is limited. The program is completely adaptable to the schedule of each individual reader.
- This book was printed with a lay-flat binding, to allow for years of daily use.
- The four pillars of the Catholic Faith as described in the Catechism of the Catholic Church are the foundation on which this reading program is built: What we believe (Profession of Faith); liturgy and the sacraments (Celebration of the Christian Mystery); life of Christ; prayer.
- Hundreds of quotes by saints and other great and holy minds are sprinkled throughout the text for your meditation and contemplation on each of the four pillars.
- The main text includes the story of my spiritual reading journey as a Catholic convert, including five things I’ve learned about spiritual reading, and why it should play a critical role in our lives as Catholics.
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