David Zahl

May 28

There's no subtle way to put it: Dementia and the Church should be assigned reading for seminarians, clergy persons, pastoral care professionals, and counselors the world over. In it, Dr. Mary McDaniel Cail sheds desperately needed light on the crucible of cognitive decline and how best to care pastorally for those who live with it--which my decades in Christian ministry have shown me is many more people than we realize. This beautifully written, impressively well-researched, and deeply compassionate book is a gift to the church and all those who seek to embody the grace of God to sufferers.

David Zahl, Director ofMockingbird Ministries and author of LowAnthropology

Mary Cail

Mary Cail earned her PhD and two additional graduate degrees from the University of Virginia. She is the author of Alzheimer's: A Crash Course for Friends and Relatives and Dementia and the Church: Memory, Care, and Inclusion. Mary taught in the graduate school of psychology at James Madison University, where she chaired a national accreditation task force; she has served as a faculty consultant for the University of Virginia’s Department of Academic Affairs. Her op-eds, articles, and blogs on dementia have been published by the Los Angeles Times, the Miami Herald, the Chicago Tribune, Maria Shriver’s Architects of Change series, and the University of Virginia alumni magazine, Virginia, among others. Alzheimer's: A Crash Course for Friends and Relatives was chosen for inclusion in the 2015 Virginia Festival of the Book, and her work to create social opportunities for dementia patients and caregivers in her community was featured on the Charlottesville Newsplex series, Stephanie's Heroes. Mary is the founder of the All-Weather Friend.

David Zahl

C. Travic Jackson