Really? Jane Austen? A woman who died in 1817? What can she tell us about relationships today? Our world is so different from hers. Her characters speak in what almost seems like a foreign language. And the romantic relations between partners back then were so restricted . . . how can their problems be relevant to us?

Yet the men and women in her novels struggle with the same passions we have, and they ask the same questions: Is this person the one? What is love anyway? Do I want to spend my life with him (or her)? How can I nurture a satisfying relationship?

A significant...

We have all been in transit from the time of our birth. Life is one transition after another. We move from one way or form of life to another. There are a number of normal life cycle transitions that all individuals and families go through as they have children and raise them. Churches also go through certain predictable life cycle transitions as they grow and shrink and change. Sometimes, these changes goes smoothly, but at other times they can be very difficult and upsetting for those involved.

I gave the three lectures in this little book on the occasion of a Lutheran Synod...