Book Review: Thomas Merton Selected Essays

For those who enjoy the writings of Thomas Merton the new anthology edited by Patrick F. O' Connell is a must read. Recently published by Orbis Books, Thomas Merton: Selected Essays is a sampling of the numerous essays which Merton wrote. Patrick F. O'Connell is a professor of English and theology at Gannon University in Erie, PA as well as the founding member and former president of the International Thomas Merton Society. 

I first encountered Thomas Merton in college. While browsing the theology shelves in a used bookstore I came across a small blue book called Contemplative Prayer. I read it so much the pages became well worn. After reading that book I read some of his other books and then his biography. Merton was certainly prolific writing not only monographs but also many book reviews and essays as well. This new collection is a sampling of thirty three of his essays which range from topics such as the theology of paradise to a loving tribute to Gandhi as well as the role of contemplation in the modern world and the relationship between Christianity and Zen. 

The word "essay" comes from the French word "essayer" which means to try or to attempt, particularly to attempt at exploring some topic or issue. These essays reveal Merton's attempt at exploring the many important issues of his day. Each of the essays includes a short introduction, explaining where the essay was first published and if it was previously anthologized and where it appeared. 

What is nice about this book is that you can read one or two of the essays and then take some time to reflect upon them and then move on. In that way they are like Zen koans, a statement is read and then you go away thinking about it for a while. Merton had that unique gift of getting right at the topic at hand without including too much minutae, he wanted to get at the hear of the matter. It's amazing that while these essays were written over forty years ago they are still very appropos to our day and age. 

Thomas Merton: Selected Essays also includes a short introduction by Brother Patrick Hart, Merton's former secretary as well as an appendix of his essays in chronological order for those who wish to explore more of Merton's writings. 

For more information about this book click here 

Book Review: God's Other Children

As a priest in the Southeast United States I meet all sorts of people from a variety of backgrounds, especially religious backgrounds. However most of my contact has been with a variety of Christian backgrounds, i.e Methodist, Baptist, Disciples of Christ, and so forth. Occasionally I'll meet an agnostic but that's pretty much it. My contact with Hindu's, Jews, Muslim's, Buddhists, Sikh's, and persons from other Eastern religions is limited to non-existent. However it was not always this way. When I lived in New Jersey I met many people from a variety of religious backgrounds; most of my friends were Jews and my parents worked with a few people who were Muslims.

For those people who know little about non Christian religions, and especially Eastern religions then this book is for you. God's Other Children: Personal Encounters with Faith, Love, and Holiness (NY: Harper One, 2013) is not a textbook nor a survey but a book regarding Bradley Malkovsky's experience with faith, love, and holiness in India. Malkovsky, a practicing Roman Catholic, actually married an Indian woman who was Muslim who eventually converted to Catholicism. This book is an intriguing exploration of how people from different faiths work, live, and exist together in a very big and multi-ethnic country. Malkovsky also is an expert in Eastern religions and teaches in the Theology Department at The University of Notre Dame.

Divided into twenty chapters, God's Other Children, takes the reader away from our comfort zones in the Western world and plops us down in India. I have never been to India but I have met several people who were from there and they all tell me if you want to learn about religions then go to India! You will find almost everything there! Indeed, from what I gather from God's Other Children, India seems like a religious mall for seekers. In one city you may find a Catholic Church down the street from a Sikh Temple or Buddhist shrine. You may come across a religious procession or other type of religious activity.

What makes God's Other Children intriguing and interesting is the personal touch that Malkovsky provides his readers. This book could have easily been an academic or theological exploration of India but it is not. Rather Malkovsky weaves personal vignettes from his own stay in India, studying at various ashrams, learning Sanskrit, living on his own, and also eventually dating and marrying a local girl from a village. God's Other Children is Huston Smith meets Elizabeth Gilbert I guess! I also found Malkovsky's writing very down to earth, he often would pepper the narrative with words and terms in their original language but then translate them for the lay reader. Most of the time we live in a religious bubble. If we are regular Churchgoers we may know very little about our Hindu or Muslim neighbors down the street and vice versa. I think the more we get to know one another the better we will be.

If you are interested in religion in general and the various religions of India in particular then take and read God's Other Children.

For more information about the book click here 

Book Review: You Are the Messiah

When I heard that Justin Lewis-Anthony had a new book coming out this Spring I new I had to read it right away! I read his previous book If You Meet George Herbert on the Road, Kill Him: Radically Re-thinking Priestly Ministry (London: Mowbray, 2009). There are few theological books that make one laugh and this one did. Serving as an ordained priest in the Anglican Church has provided Lewis-Anthony with plenty of material to work with, especially when it pertains to the parish, clergy, and the Church at large. After reading If You Meet George Herbert I told all my clergy friends about it.

Lewis-Anthony's new book, You Are the Messiah is an exploration of the concept of leadership as it pertains to the Church. Anyone who has spent enough time in parish life has encountered the word leadership, or leadership development, or leadership skills. It seems like every year diocesan administrations want to help train clergy for "better leadership skills." My hunch is that Lewis-Anthony, like myself, was tired of hearing so much about leadership that he wanted to write a book about it.

I cannot devote the time needed for a longer review, hopefully a theological journal will do that. However, I do want to provide at least a summary of the book for you to at least consider reading it yourself.

The book is divided into three parts: Leadership is a Myth, the Myths, and Domination and discipleship. This book is not a page turner and nor is it merely just a theological exposition on leadership. Lewis-Anthony also includes plenty of examples from both the silver screen as well as popular culture as to show how leadership, especially heroic type leadership (aka General Patton, John Wayne, etc..) has provided a false image of leadership for those of us in the pews and in the parish. While I found his main thesis very strong I did get lost in the longer second section which really deals with film and film history as well as an excursus into main leadership issues. However I really enjoyed the first and last section when he shows how Jesus provides a very different image of leadership; one of humility, meekness, lowliness, and sacrifice, skills that are certainly not encouraged, taught, or discussed in MBA programs or in the business world.

Basically Lewis-Anthony shows that the Church has really adopted a very bad and even heretical notion of leadership from our culture at large. Bishops and priests cannot be leaders like George Patton and John Wayne, although unfortunately some do, and it often backfires on them! The image of Jesus and also Paul is that of counter-leadership really. When reading You Are the Messiah I really wish Lewis-Anthony explored this more in the last section. He has some really cogent and important things to say about this subject yet he sort of cut it short. He pulls no punches either. What makes Lewis-Anthony's writings and ideas so fresh is that he is radically honest and truthful. Too often our bishops and clergy leaders, even seminary professors, tiptoe through the tulips ignoring or downplaying the real problems and issues in ecclesial life, focusing the annual clergy gathering on "bucks and butts" (i.e. bette income and people in the pew), or clergy development (whatever that means!!), and better administration (again, huh?). It's almost always easier to have ones head in the sand rather than to hit head on the cares and concerns of the day. Perhaps he will be working on a future volume dealing with the image of Jesus and Paul as leaders, teasing out the gospel and epistle lessons which really are great examples for clergy; here I think of John 10 and 12, Romans 10, Matthew 25, and so forth.

For more information about You Are the Messiah click here 

Book Review: Believing

Just have faith. Yea right. Easier said than done. The word faith means trust as in if you trust someone very deeply. Faith is like walking in the dark putting one foot in front of the other hoping that you will keep going forward. Faith is the story of the Israelites wandering around in the desert for forty years not knowing whether or not they'll get the promised land, but they kept going anyway. Faith is tricky. It is also a life-long process too.

In his new book called Believing (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2013), Eugene Kennedy takes up the mantle of faith and creates an extended essay of sorts on this notion of faith and belief. Kennedy is a professor emeritus from Loyola University in Chicago and the author of over fifty books in psychology and religion and has won many awards as well.

Believing is organized around nine chapters, each taking up a different aspect of faith such as incarnational faith, doubting, creative faith, and faith and life.

After reading this book one is left with more questions than answers, something which Kennedy notes is not a bad thing. A healthy dose of doubt is actually good for us! He warns us about people who think that they have all the answers, they are filled with hubris! Unfortunately the institutional Church, which also comes up from time to time in this book, often does seem to have all the answers to our questions and leaves little room for doubt. Doubt says Kennedy, allows humans to grow and expand and keep asking questions which propels us forward. Doubt is not bad, it just is what it is. He mentions that one of the major problems with the institutional Church is that it has not left enough room for doubters, people like theologians, artists, writers, poets who keep pushing the limits of knowledge. Very often these people are pushed aside and their voices are not heard. Kennedy calls for a new and vigorous support of these people since it is this creativity that is needed now more than ever.

Believing is a book which is short enough to read in a few hours but a book which will make you think for several weeks! It seems when we read the gospels for examples Jesus more often than not does not answer every question but he actually answers by asking a question himself, passing the ball into the inquirers court. If Jesus himself does not answer all questions why should be think different.

If you are interested in faith and the many aspects of it than read Kennedy's new book, you might leave scratching your head in the end and that's okay too, it just shows that you are a thinking person.

For more information about this book click here 

Book Review: Stations of the Heart

As a pastor I have ministered to people who have lost their fathers, mothers, siblings, and yes, children too. Death no matter how it comes, whether through cancer, stroke, heart attack, or just plain old age is not easy. Saying goodbye hurts, especially for those near and dear. It is not easy for me either. As a pastor and spiritual guide I have walked alongside parishioners through chemo and radiation, from testing to testing, and held their hands at the end of their life journey. I have prayed that God's hand comes quickly and watched people linger around probably longer than most. Death is tough for both the dying and the living. Death is tough on pastors too.

Richard Lischer, professor at Duke Divinity School, and former pastor in the Lutheran Church,  has recently written a very moving and inspirational memoir  Stations of the Heart: Parting With a Son (NY: Knopf, 2013). He writes with candor and honesty revealing the many details of both the life and tragic loss of his son Adam.

We meet Adam in the beginning of the book as he tells his father that his cancer has returned in a simple way by saying, "Hey dad..." and that "Hey dad...." changes everything. It is a "Hey dad..." that no dad wants to hear.

Lischer provides some rich insight into his relationship with Adam as we see vignettes of their relationship from Adam's happy go lucky childhood dealing with a mysterious neurological disorder to his enrolling in law school to his work as a district attorney. The memoir takes the reader back and forth from the  present to the past to the present again. We know Adam is going to die in the beginning of the book, yet Lischer shows his readers that this is not just any person, it's his son. Lischer takes us through is PET and MRI scans, to his regular chemo treatments. He even reveals the very intimate details of dying such as the lack of humanity of the dying, the hair loss, the hospital gowns, and yes, the vomiting. After reading Stations of the Heart I really felt, in a small way perhaps, that I knew Adam a bit.

The title of Lischer's memoir is taken from the Stations of the Cross, a regular spiritual prayer ritual used in the Catholic spiritual tradition. Most Catholic churches have the stations of the cross on the walls alongside the interior of the Church building or sometimes in a garden area next to or behind the Church. Parishioners use the Stations of the Cross as a way to follow Jesus during the final moments of his life, from his betrayal all the way through is crucifixion. As a young adult Adam joins the Catholic Church in order to worship with his wife Jennifer and they together do the stations of the cross especially during his terminal illness. The Stations of the Cross become embedded in Richard as he walks the long walk towards the inevitable with Adam. The pain and suffering of Jesus becomes embedded in both Adam and father as they deal with Adams cancer.

I don't want to give to much away. This memoir is rich with emotion yet not sentimental. We see the tragic loss of a son yet we also see how Adam's death forces his father, a professor of theology, to deal with his own faith. As a pastor I have dealt with much suffering in my parish but also in my personal life. I confess that pain, suffering, and death does indeed call to question ones faith in the Almighty God whom we adore and worship. It also reminds us of the rich grace that he continues to pour out on us, like he did with Adam in his final days.

I congratulate Dr. Lischer for writing such a tender book. Surely it must have been cathartic putting on the page very tender and intimate moments of a father's love for his son. Adam's life and death surely changed his parents and his family and in a vicarious way it has changed mine too. I hope it will change yours as well.

For more information about Stations of the Heart click here 

To learn more about Dr. Richard Lischer click here 

Book Review: Notes From the Underground

Once in a while a book just hits me in my gut. One of those, "wow, I gotta keep reading" types of books. Donald Cozzens' new book, Notes From the Underground: The Spiritual Journal of a Secular Priest (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 2013) is that type of book. I am very familiar with Cozzens' previous books, The Spirituality of the Diocesan Priest and The Changing Face of the Priesthood, both very good books for anyone interested in pastoral ministry.

Cozzens is a writer in residence at John Carroll University and has been a guest on NPR as well as Meet the Press. In many ways he is a "pastors pastor" as he served many years in the priesthood, taught college and seminary classes, and has authored several books.

Notes From the Underground is not so much a theology of ministry or of the Church neither is it a textbook. Rather it is what the subtitle states, a sort of journal or series of personal reflections on what the Church has become over the years, especially in the past thirty years or so. Cozzens has seen deep changes in the Church, first the major liturgical and theological changes at Vatican II and more recently the stronger conservative push coming from the Vatican. While this book is aimed more at Catholic audiences, those of us in the Eastern Church would benefit from this book as well. It is not hard reading, but it is certainly thought provoking to say the least.

Cozzens laments the fact that even after the wonderful documents coming from Vatican II such as Sancrosanctum Concilium as well as Lumen Gentium, the Church is still pretty much clerical, authority and power flows from the top down. Yet when one read the Sacred Scriptures as well as the major writings of the Patristic Fathers and Mothers and the Tradition, one finds that the opposite is true, the Church is the entire people of God, not just the bishops or priests, but everyone all together gathered around the Lord's Table.

Notes From the Underground is a prophetic book. He calls into question the lack of pastoral care of bishops and other clergy regarding the recent sexual abuse scandals as well as not listening to the laity. Our parishes are full of wonderful gifted lay men and women whose voices are never heard. No one asks what they think. At one point Cozzens says that the presbyters are supposed to be a "presbyteral council" to the bishop yet the bishop usually never asks what his priests think! So true. While reading this book I kept underlining sentence after sentence as his writing rang true for this reader.

Notes From the Underground is certainly not a feel good book, but it is a good book. It is short but yet it is packed with plenty of food for thought for later reading.

I highly recommend this book to clergy and lay leaders who want to be challenged and to hear a true "voice in the wilderness" aka Father Donald Cozzens.

For more information about this book click here 

Prayer of St. Ephrem

If you are looking for some Lenten reading then look no further than my book The Prayer of St. Ephrem the Syrian: A Biblical Commentary. 

This ancient prayer will help you through your daily walk of faith as you strive to become more faithful in your life.

For more information about this book and to order a copy click here 

May we all learn to love both God and neighbor each and every day.