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Thank you so much for posting! I've been pondering similar questions, from a different angle, but coming to similar conclusions. Lately, there seems to be a movement towards relying on politicians and laws to bring about God's Will, and this seems like a very confused approach.
I don't think God intended Christians to wield power like a sword to the head, visibly strong and ascendant, but rather like a persistent whisper to the heart: Easily dismissed at first, until the truth of it inundates the listener and they begin to listen to the other holy whispers - the whispers brought to them by the Holy Spirit, the quiet voice of God.
Thank you for the reading suggestion. I found a link to it on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1586170295/
Also highly recommend Kreeft’s book: https://www.amazon.com/Catholic-Christianity-Complete-Catechism-Beliefs/dp/0898707986
It is essentially a more accessible edit of the Catechism. Kreeft was a Protestant convert and I found it helpful as a convert myself.
Frank Sheed has an excellent explanation in his book Theology and Sanity. It really helped me wrap my head around what we're talking about.
https://www.amazon.com/Catholic-Christianity-Complete-Catechism-Beliefs
This is a really good book by Professor Peter Kreeft. It is a commentary that follows the Catechism because that is the best resource for studying catholicism itself. He expands on the articles, offers more substance and backing for the teachings and provides a wonderful picture of the church.
I purchased a bible from Amazon called Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible NIV. It puts the NWT to shame!!! I love this bible. It gives a verse by verse break down and correlates the beliefs to the contemporary cultural beliefs of that time. It even gives you Hebrew and Aramaic literal translations like the word for Satan which was not an actual name, in fact the Hebrews had no concept of The Devil. It has maps and lots of references. I highly recommend it!
NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible: Bringing to Life the Ancient World of Scripture https://www.amazon.com/dp/0310431581/ref=cm_sw_r_other_apa_HLDkAbHEHE5
As a lay person who is married, I wanted to chime in here with a recommendation for this book: https://www.amazon.com/Theology-Body-Beginners-Rediscovering-Meaning/dp/1635820073/ref=sr_1_4?dchild=1&keywords=theology+of+the+body&qid=1627664847&sr=8-4 because I also had the question about lust and spouses.
Yes, you find your spouse attractive (hopefully), but there is a difference between simple attraction and lust. This book does a great job of explaining. It would also show why sending nude pictures would be inappropriate.
Explore Cultural Backgrounds Of Bible Times
I haven't actually read this plan, so take it with a grain of salt. You've been warned
I know you want a youverion plan, but I think you'd really like this
https://www.amazon.com/NIV-Cultural-Backgrounds-Study-Bible/dp/0310431581
I think most people with a high school education can handle reading straight from St. Thomas. I highly recommend Peter Kreeft's abridged and well-annotated version Summa of the Summa. He has a gift for making the more difficult ideas of Aquinas easier to understand.
A podcast geared towards Aquinas without being too technical is Pints with Aquinas by Matt Fradd.
Theology and Sanity by Frank Sheed. Makes theology easy to understand.
Bible Basics for Catholics by Dr. John Bergsma. While you may not be Catholic, this book is about the Old Testament and points out the covenants, what a covenant is, and other things that we all need to know about the OT. It's easily understood and a good read.
This slogan is the name of a book - did the author speak at the conference ? https://www.amazon.com/Awake-Not-Woke-Christian-Progressive/dp/1505118425/ref=nodl_?dplnkId=a5d86223-8b51-4cfc-954d-ca9f2d2ba0b2
You talking about the MAGA Christian nationalist that was rocking a face tat of "AWAKE" which was specifically coined by a book written by 'Christian' right-wingers as a counter slogan to "woke"-ness and modern culture?
Awake the Rapper
"Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give you light." --Ephesians 5:14
https://www.amazon.com/Awake-Not-Woke-Christian-Progressive/dp/1505118425
Pretty sure he referenced that given his rapper name and rapping about being a sleepwalker. Definitely a lot of lunacy.
Highly recommend you check the right wing subs about this, they're saying stuff like:
>"He has a tattoo that says 'Awake' on his face, everyone knows lefties are "woke", she he's obviously a lefty.
They completely ignore "Awake, not Woke"
(the right wing christo-fascist response to "Woke-ism", He's not a "woke lefty", he's an "awake christian")
>Ffs just a read a book or two
The "Oxford Study Bible" is a standard for mainstream Christianity but I don't think it's in the NIV.
The challenge is that the NIV is super popular among conservative Evangelicals.
I am currently reading through the "Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible" and it's conservative but I would not say fundamentalist. It's pretty great, so far. And it comes in NIV
Rather than focusing on exegesis -- it gives the historical context. For example, it might explain how a "covenant" was done back then. It's pretty different than our current "contract" or "treaty" so it's helpful to know.
I'm sorry that this was your experience.
If you want clarity on the topic, consider reading Christopher West's book, Theology of the Body for Beginners, which helps to clarify the Church's stance on sexuality.
The problem is that bibles, especially the better ones with notes etc., are expensive. I'm not as familiar as many others with English translations, but I think any translation that is not KJV is a good start.
I started to look, and Amazon has the NIV cultural background bible for a pretty good price. Afaik the translation is decent enough (and, very important, readable). And I now want the ESV archaeological bible. You sent me down a rabbit hole, thanks xD
I really like the notes in this one, and it’s available in multiple translations:
NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible: Bringing to Life the Ancient World of Scripture https://www.amazon.com/dp/0310431581/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_9DTWQP9RDVKHQ0EKPEZG
Hey there, sorry for the delayed reply: I couldn't see your response until now for some reason. Bishop Barron is great, but the best introduction to Catholicism would be Ratzinger's Introduction to Christianity: https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Christianity-2nd-Communio-Books/dp/1586170295. Ratzinger is a genius and I can't think of a better introduction than his.
That's a great question! I think it was CS Lewis who likened sex to fire--it is indeed a good thing and can bring a lot of warmth when used within a house in a chimney, it's a terrific aid for cooking, etc. But when it out of control it can wreak havoc and burn whole villages down.
Chastity is not about "not having sex" (that's called continence), but about living God's plan for our sexuality, and in reverence for the glory of God's image in the other--chastity is the force that frees love from egotism, use, and violence. The marital act, when lived in the spirit of a total gift of self among spouses, is a mutual conferring and participation in Christ's love for his Church (cfr. Eph 5:31-32) and according to Christian mystic Adrienne Von Speyr, it can even bring forth graces of conversion and holiness. However, when sex is lived outside of the marital bond, it becomes a mockery and a negation of the holy image it represents--akin to trying to Baptise someone with motor oil. It can't help but be an egotistical self-seeking activity that negates the spousal meaning of the body.
As a sidenote, I think you'll profit a lot from reading any sort of book expanding on this; my personal favorite being Christopher West's Theology of the Body for Beginners. You'll fall in love with God's plan for sexuality and marriage, and see yourself experiencing a desire to avoid any kind of sin that would disfigure this sign.
Sure, I believe this is the one I use (I have one of the boujie leather bibles so the cover doesn't seem right, but I'm pretty sure this is the one)
https://www.amazon.com/NIV-Cultural-Backgrounds-Study-Bible/dp/0310431581
You should help her see why sex is not only "allowed" and "not a sin" in marriage (as you know), but also an actual, positive good which is part of out sharing in God's free, total, and faithful love (it is as man and woman together that we're his image [cfr. Gen 1:27] and it is in marriage that we participate in Christ's love for his Church). I don't know if you're familiar with the Theology of the Body, but a great reading you can both share is this introduction by Christopher West. The basic theme is that sex is a sign and participation in God's love, and thus also a means of growing in holiness, and even healing from wounds.
Puritanism has unfortunately caused many evils, and this is why some have a lot of trouble understanding why something that was previously "bad", "shameful" and "sinful" before marriage can suddenly turn to its opposite after a marriage ceremony. The answer is that sex is not bad (and never was). It is a beautiful gift from God (He invented it in the first place), but it must be lived in the context of a free, faithful and total gift of self (ie. marriage) to be a true communication of what it is. Seeing the body as 'evil' springs from the gnostic heresy that said that creation was a bad thing (and only the spirit a good one) and thus denied that Christ could have truly incarnated among us (by failing to imagine that God would have anything to do with the material existence that we have).
St. John Henry Newman once wrote that 'false ideas may indeed be refuted by argument, but by truth alone can they be expelled'. Besides the daily Rosary, what killed in me the appetite for watching porn (after 6 years of addictive behavior towards it) was John Paul II's Theology of the Body. I'd recommend you to start with Christopher West's brief introduction to it in Theology of the Body for Beginners. Once you get a hold of God's awesome plan for marriage and the body, you won't want to go back to cheap falsifications of it.
Peter Kreeft has two books that sound like what you’re looking for:
A Summa of the Summa https://www.amazon.com/dp/089870300X/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_XEH1RJPWDDA3CQM9NDGQ
A Shorter Summa: The Essential Philosophical Passages of Saint Thomas Aquinas' Summa Theologica https://www.amazon.com/dp/0898704383/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glt_fabc_VQ1K1DK7ZTD76FN0QT5G
I read Peter Kreeft's Summa of the Summa. It's literally the philosophical part of the Summa, but Dr. Kreeft edited out of it objections, articles, etc. that have little to no relevance today--so it's only about 500 pages long instead of the full length monster that it is. Also, Dr. Kreeft filled it with comments (in the form of footnotes) to the brim, actually quite helpful when getting through the heavy handed stuff.
Also, I just remembered this book my small group is going through. It does a good job of walking through the basics. https://www.amazon.com/Bible-Doctrine-Essential-Teachings-Christian/dp/0310222338/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=bible+doctrine&qid=1628787357&sr=8-1
Check out NT Wright's book Surprised by Hope, it goes into some pretty solid exegesis about heaven. Most Christians have this misconception of heaven being a place in the clouds where we just lounge around and sing for eternity. But that couldn't be further from the truth. Humans were created to be God's imagers on Earth, or in other words, his representatives whose job it is to see to it God's will is accomplished in this physical realm. Just as how angels are God's imagers in the spiritual realm.
Our ultimate destiny is to be reunited with our bodies and to rule in a renewed universe. It will be like the Garden of Eden restored, but even more magnificent than that. We will all likely be given things to do, but it won't be exhausting and draining work like how it currently is.
A little aside, but since you're Catholic you might find Frank Sheed's Theology and Sanity (https://www.amazon.com/Theology-Sanity-Frank-Sheed/dp/0898704707) an interesting introduction to the more "intellectual" side of Catholicism. I'm reading it now and it's a very good and readable introduction to theology. There is also has a shorter version called Theology for Beginners (https://www.amazon.com/Theology-Beginners-Frank-Sheed/dp/1887593926).