The Pursuit of Happiness - God's Way: Living the Beatitudes

by Servais Pinckaers, Mary T. Noble (Translator)

When we think of happiness, we have to admit that our idea is at times worldly and self-centered. Jesus in His Sermon on the Mount showed us that true happiness will elude us, however, if we follow that kind of thinking. And, in the form of a series of promises and challenges which we have come to know as the Beatitudes, He told us how to find perfect happiness both here and hereafter. In a world that is capable of the best and the worst, we all have reason to be concerned about the very possibility of ever finding happiness in our lifetimes. The good news of the Gospel message is that we can. Even more, it teaches a way based not on rules and obligations so much as one founded on love, a way that depends upon and leads to the blessings of God Himself. These pages have been written in the conviction that every seeker should make the Sermon on the Mount the primary source of what will and will not make them happy. In His approach to the question, Jesus insists from the outset that we face up to the inevitable trials of poverty, tears, hunger and thirst, and shows us how we can find God as the source and object of our joy in the midst of them.

Genres: Theology, Christianity, Catholic, Spirituality

204 pages, Paperback

First published February 18, 1988

Reviews

[☆faithy☆ · Rating 4 out of 5]

actually so good????? threw me off a bit when he defined words using the words he was trying to define, though.

[Sskous · Rating 5 out of 5]

Tr from French by Sr Mary Thomas Noble,O.P., whose renderings are perfectly pitched. Pinckaers reveals the paradoxes contained in the Beatitudes, gently but firmly opens us to our own particular ways of failing the ideal, all the while energizing our longing for holiness. I had to quit underlining; it was pointless to leave 2-3 words per page not underlined.

[Hannah Malinowski · Rating 1 out of 5]

Defining the beatitudes might’ve actually made it easier for me to understand what you mean by living them.
Each beatitude is lived by living the other beatitudes that you need to live * basically * but nothing is ever specified or defined.
Loose explanations with not a lot of commitment…
✨specify✨

[James Millikan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Servais Pinckaers, OP is an incredibly gifted and insightful writer. The Pursuit of Happiness provides captivating commentary on the Beatitudes of Mathew's Gospel that is both deeply profound and perfectly comprehensible.

Each Beatitude is treated individually, offering scholarly exegesis on the theological message from many different perspectives. I found myself learning a great deal about a section of this bible that I thought I already knew almost completely.

The book is concise without being dense, prophetic without being preachy, and spiritually challenging without being condemning. It has been said that the Sermon on the Mount is a summary of the whole Gospel, and the Beatitudes a summary of the Sermon on the Mount. If you care to understand the Gospels in greater depth, I can think of no better place to start than Pinckares text.

[Katrina ✨ · Rating 3 out of 5]

I literally physically could not annotate this book for the life of me but 3 stars for making me smarter

[˚₊‧꒰ა ‪👑 🩹bunny ‪‪🎀 ໒꒱ིྀ༝⁺ · Rating 2 out of 5]

everyone else rated it so i'll just say i didnt get it like at all. i just yapped

[D.J. Lang · Rating 4 out of 5]

My nephew first told me about this book because he was reading, studying, and learning from Jesus' Sermon on the Mount. I joined him in doing the same, and this is one of the books we discussed. It is a short 202 page book, yet I chose to take a longer time reading it because the nephew and I wanted to "live out" the beatitudes and the sermon on the mount, not just learn about them / it.

Even though the book was originally written in 1998, I'm still going to point out how using the word "darkness" for evil (35) did not need to be used. My hope is that authors, editors, and publishers will someday get a clue and stop using this overused, harmful (and, frankly, lazy) metaphor.

Nonetheless, I, like another reader, have tons of underlining, particularly in Pinckaers's discussions on justice and injustice. I also camped out in the chapter "For Those Who Mourn" for personal reasons. I appreciated what Pinckaers wrote on page 78: "The third beatitude invites us first of all to be fully human..."

Would my mom read the book? I thought Pinckaers (and his translator) did a good job of keeping the language readable, but the book still had quite a bit of theological vocabulary. I appreciated the explanations on such words as "peace" and how it is hard to capture the richness of what that word in Hebrew means. My mom isn't quite as interested in etymology (or a word like 'etymology') as I am.

I do recommend the book for anyone who wants to do as the subtitle states: "Living the Beatitudes".

[Tyler Hurst · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some really interesting insights, but some aspects are unhelpful or exegetically questionable. I wish it maintained the thread of happiness better.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

An accessible exposition of the beatitudes.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

An extraordinarily insightful book.