ABOUT this version...
While we recognize it is not possible to reproduce the iBook version of Preparation for Death on an iPhone and do it justice, we wanted to extend the Retreat offering in this format for personal and private reading...
waiting for the start of Mass...
waiting for the Bus...
Eucharistic Adoration etc.
This iPhone / iPod Touch version provides some graphics, but most importantly the text from St Alphonsus! As the angel said to St Augustine “tolle et lege” we pray that it will change your life.
Two years ago we were introduced to Preparation for Death by Saint Alphonsus Liguori, and it has had a profound effect on our spiritual lives. We immediately began looking for additional copies of the 1926 unabridged Grimm Edition to distribute to friends and family – but could only track down a few old reprints in second-hand bookstores. We discovered several copies of an abridged version, but found the omissions to be wanting. So after much prayer, and several phone calls to the Redemptorist Fathers, we began creating both an iBook (iBooks Author) using the complete 1926 translation, and finally we developed a version as an iPad App with the abridged Retreat and now this brand new iPhone & iPod Touch edition!
We are hoping that in reproducing this spiritual classic in electronic form a new generation of readers will come to discover the importance of this work, as we have come to know it.
The Grimm Edition was translated from the Italian in the 1920’s by the Rev. Eugene Grimm, who was a priest of the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, Baltimore Province (Redemptorists). At the time, it was the first and only complete edition in English of the ascetical and dogmatical works of Saint Alphonsus. The original spelling of common words in the Grimm Edition favors British orthography. However, for the benefit of modern readers these spellings have not been maintained. There are also many names and events that St. Alphonsus refers to that may be unfamiliar to the modern reader. In the iBook version, we have included a Glossary with nearly all the names mentioned by St. Alphonsus. This was not possible to do in mobile app format and has not been introduced here.
We would like to thank the Rev. Carl Hoegerl, C.SS.R. both for his encouragement in our pursuing the iBook publication, and for writing the Foreword to the Electronic iBook Edition... Read it! It is a spiritual exhortation unto itself.
We dedicate both the iBook and iPad app and now this iPhone & iPod Touch edition to the memories of family and friends, who have all passed while we have been working on the book. Please pray for their souls – and for our own sanctification as well.
St. Alphonsus Liguori, pray for us.
+JMJ
– St. Clement ePress