Jean-Pierre de Caussade (1675-1751) was a French Jesuit priest, writer, theologian, and spiritual director. He is best known for his belief that the present moment is a sacrament from God and that self-abandonment to it and its needs is a holy state. Father Dennis Billy, CSsR, is a teacher, writer, and poet. Ordained a Redemptorist priest in 1980, he taught the history of moral theology and Christian spirituality at the Alphonsian Academy of Rome's Pontifical Lateran University for more than twenty years, reaching the rank of Ordinary Professor. In 2008 he was installed as the John Cardinal Krol Chair of Moral Theology as a scholar-in-residence at St. Charles Borromeo Seminary in Wynnewood, Pennsylvania. He also serves as the Karl Rahner Professor of Catholic Theology at the Graduate Theological Foundation in Mishawaka, Indiana. Raised in Staten Island, New York, and educated there through high school in local Catholic schools, he graduated from Dartmouth College and went on to receive four master's degrees, as well as doctorates from Harvard University, the Pontifical University of St. Thomas, and the Graduate Theological Foundation. Billy is the author of numerous books and articles, both popular and scholarly.