Pause in Wonder: Learning to Delight in God and His World

Do you want more joy in life? Make room for a daily encounter with the Lord.

In Pause in Wonder, Eddie Ensley recounts stories from his own spiritual journey as a Native American and a Catholic deacon to show how you can experience joy even in the most difficult circumstances. Simple, spiritually sound prayer practices—based on scripture and tradition—heighten your sense of wonder and bring you greater joy in everyday life.

“Joy has its tendrils in God,” writes Deacon Eddie Ensley. “It draws on the infinity of his love. Having joy is a matter of being in relationship with the wellspring of joy, not due to our circumstances. God is always available, always ready to touch us. The question becomes: Are we willing to touch him? Do we want to seek deep joy in our lives?”

With compassion and wisdom, Ensley draws from his Native American heritage and spiritual journey to the Church to explore joy’s true meaning and how to find it and experience it in both happy and discouraging seasons of life. Combining prayer exercises with his personal testimony, Ensley and his ministry collaborator Deacon Robert Herrmann will help you appreciate in a new way the life-changing power of the sacraments and other riches of the Church, and to be more mindful of the invisible realities all around you.

Ensley and Hermann offer step-by-step pointers to help you cultivate practical spiritual habits such as engaging in contemplative prayer and journaling to enrich your prayer life. You will also learn how to:

• Choose joy, centering your whole being on God
• Become the custodian, rather than the prisoner, of your thoughts and emotions
• Experience release from stresses and worries by learning to “sing with the angels”
• Pour out your joy upon others through the intentional practice of compassion.

You will discover how to encounter God in deeply personal yet practical ways. Fresh approaches to prayer combined with scripture and the wisdom of the saints will help you rejoice always and appreciate life in all its messy excellence.

Eddie Ensley is a permanent deacon in the Diocese of Savannah. He serves on the clergy staff at St. Anne Catholic Church in Columbus, Georgia. Ensley teaches graduate school at Josephinum Diaconate Institute, Pontifical College Josephinum, where he also serves as a course developer. He is a mission member of Alleluia Community, an ecumenical covenant community.

He and Robert Herrmann operate Deacons in Ministry, through which they have preached to more than 370,000 people in 350 locations since 2001. The two are coauthors of Writing to Be Whole.

Ensley is a licensed clinical pastoral counselor with a master’s degree in pastoral studies (Loyola University) and a doctorate in clinical pastoral counseling (Cornerstone University). The author of fifteen books, he has more than thirty years of experience leading parish missions, retreats, and renewals.

Ensley is an enrolled member of the Echota Cherokee tribe and a member of the Knights of Columbus. He lives in Fortson, Georgia.

Robert Herrmann is a permanent deacon in the Diocese of Savannah. He serves on the clergy staff at St. Anne Catholic Church in Columbus, Georgia. An expert in spiritual journaling and teaching contemplative prayer, Herrmann is the coauthor of Writing to Be Whole.

Herrmann is certified in parish ministry from Loyola University. He has more than thirty years of experience leading parish missions, retreats, and renewals. He also served as campus minister and theology teacher at St. Anne-Pacelli Catholic School in Columbus. Herrmann and Eddie Ensley operate Deacons in Ministry, through which they have preached to more than 370,000 people in 350 locations since 2001.

Herrmann is a member of the Knights of Columbus. He lives in Fortson, Georgia.