STEUBENVILLE, OH—Franciscan University Press—in collaboration with The Catholic University of America Press—has recently published two thought-provoking books from very different perspectives: One examines societal issues through the lens of Christianity, while one offers poetry from a disciple’s heart.

Challenging the Secular Culture: A Call to Christians is a compilation of essays on topics ranging from the homosexual movement to the effect language has had on public perception of morality. Written by a variety of Christian intellectuals and edited by Dr. Stephen M. Krason, political science professor at Franciscan University of Steubenville and co-founder and president of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists, Challenging the Secular Culture is the first title in the Franciscan University Press Religion and Society Series. The book’s contributors are James Kalb, Dr. Benjamin Wiker, Anthony Esolen, Robert R. Reilly, Allan C. Carlson, Sheila Liaugminas, Dr. Duncan Stroik, Lawrence M. Stratton, and Krason, with a foreword by Dr. Anne Hendershott.

A Cut-and-Paste Country, by Kathleen Hart, is a book of poetry that explores characters and artists who “cut and paste” in an effort to create personal refuges of beauty and peace that ultimately reflect praise of God. Due to what series editor Dr. David Craig calls a “marvelously Catholic” voice, a “disciple’s heart,” and the deep sense of humility permeating Hart’s poetry, the book won the Jacopone da Todi Poetry Book Prize, established by Franciscan University Press to provide an alternative publishing opportunity to poets writing in a secular world that is generally unreceptive to overtly Christian themes.

Manuscripts are currently being selected for a third series of books from Franciscan University Press. Ex Corde Ecclesiae Mediaevalis will include scholarly works that came from the medieval Church yet have the power to speak to the intellectual issues of our time.

Books from Franciscan University Press can be purchased by calling Franciscan University’s bookstore at (888) 333-0381, or by visiting Franciscan’s bookstore or Catholic University of America Press.