The Best Spiritual Books of 2023

Every year from all the books we review on SpiritualityandPractice.com, we choose the Best Spiritual Books. In addition to 50 adult books, we include 20 Best Spiritual Children's Books.

These are the titles that have most impressed and inspired us during the year. Since we only review books that we want to recommend to you for your spiritual journey, this selection actually represents the best of the best. Through diverse approaches, drawing upon the wisdom and practices of the world's religions and spiritual paths, these books explore the quest for meaning and purpose, wholeness and healing, commitment and community, contemplation and activism.

We congratulate the authors and publishers of these exceptional contributions to today's spiritual renaissance. Click on the title links on the entire list page to read the full reviews.

Spiritual Literacy and Transformative Practices Certificates Program

This weekend, January 27 - 28, the third cohort for our Certificates Program will gather on Zoom with program directors Habib Todd Boerger and Mary Ann Brussat for their opening intensive. We invite your prayers and best wishes as they embark on this year-long exploration of the Alphabet of Spiritual Literacy as it can be applied to their professional and personal lives.

They follow the just completed work of the second cohort, many of whom are continuing to do capstone projects to become Spiritual Literacy Facilitators. Facilitators from the first cohort will soon be profiled on the website with their own program offerings.

It's not too late to join this outstanding company of spiritually literate teachers. If you apply this week, we will send you the recordings of the opening weekend. Next week is a settling-in week as the small groups organize; the first email with assignments will not go out until February 5. Please check out the Certificates description page and join us!

Discover More!

• Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie. This is an extraordinarily intimate portrait of the actor who used a diagnosis of Parkinson's to discover who he really was and what he could do for the world.
• Grandma's Window. This children's book is a heartwarming story about how something as simple as waving can build intergenerational community.
• The Mysterion. Shaikh Kabir Helminski has written a masterwork on the Sufi worldview as taught by Rumi and the practice of everyday spirituality.
• How to Practice Democracy in Response to the News. During this election year, we will be reminding you of the practices we identified for our special project on Practicing Democracy.
• Earth Mama. This film, now streaming, is the touching story of a single Black mother who is trying to reshape her life to regain custody of her small children.
• Remembering a Spiritual Master. The Rev. Alan Jones, Episcopal priest and Dean Emeritus of Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, died on January 14. We remember his reverent appreciation of God's mystery and grace and his call for churches to be vessels of love and transformation.
• Support Spirituality & Practice. Help us continue the variety of programs in our School of Spiritual Life and our 65,000+ pages of free multifaith content.

Wisdom from the Short & Sweet Spirituality Blog for Your Spiritual Journey

Jewish Wisdom

This spirituality business is not about answers, but about ways of asking about the meaning of life and creation. A "bad" question slams the door but a "good" question just gets you to wondering and the wondering is wonderful.

— Lawrence Kushner in The Book of Miracles

Movie Lines

There are only four questions of value in life: What is sacred? Of what is the spirit made? What is worth living for, and what is worth dying for? The answer to each is the same: only love.

— Don Juan De Marco (1995)

Protestant Wisdom

Life's most urgent question is, what are you doing for others?

— Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., American civil rights leader