Books by Mary E. McGann, RSCJ, and Maria Cimperman, RSCJ, received first place awards from the Catholic Media Association's 2021 Book Awards. Sister McGann's book, The Meal That Reconnects: Eucharistic Eating and the Global Food Crisis, and Sister Cimperman's book, Religious Life For Our World: Creating Communities of Hope, earned first place recognition in the categories of Catholic Social Teaching and Future Church, respectively.
The Catholic Media Association website writes of the awards, "This program recognizes the outstanding work of publishers, authors, and book editors. These books promote exceptional Catholic material to the general public, and their writing support readers in their journey to live a faith-filled life."
Sister McGann's book, The Meal That Reconnects: Eucharistic Eating and the Global Food Crisis, was released in 2020. In The Meal That Reconnects, Sister McGann invites readers to a more profound appreciation of the sacredness of eating, the planetary interdependence that food and the sharing of food entails, and the destructiveness of the industrial food system that is supplying food to tables globally. She presents the food crisis as a spiritual crisis — a call to rediscover the theological, ecological, and spiritual significance of eating and to probe its challenge to Christian eucharistic practice. Drawing on the origins of Eucharist in Jesus's meal fellowship and the worship of early Christians, Sister McGann invites communities to reclaim the foundational meal character of eucharistic celebration while offering pertinent strategies for this renewal.
Sister Cimperman's book, Religious Life For Our World: Creating Communities of Hope, also released in 2020, brings together God's call, the world's needs and charisms in consecrated life in a way that dynamically engages the vows, prayer, community and ministry for the particular time and contexts in which we live. The book is a valuable theological and pastoral resource for the conversion, transformation and revitalization needed in consecrated life today.
