We have a very full August–September issue of Position Papers, covering themes in theology, politics, anthropology, and literature.
First, on the political front, we lead with Tim O’Sullivan’s review of a biography of King Baudouin of Belgium (1930–93), which is, as yet, available only in French – a pity, since we badly need to hear more about the lives of saintly statesmen. It was King Baudouin who famously and nobly abdicated for a day rather than remain king of a country legislating to permit the killing of its unborn. Let us pray that poor Belgium, and Europe at large, may once again be ruled by saintly men and women.
Our second political offering is James Bradshaw’s timely review of a book recounting the tragic story of Iran’s fall to the fanatical Islamists in 1979, due in large part to the spinelessness of the Shah, combined with American incompetence. As Bradshaw writes: “The tragic legacy of all this is seen today in the suffering of the more than 90 million people who call Iran their home.”
On the theological front, we have Fr Pat Gorevan’s review of the latest work by the outstanding Australian theologian Tracey Rowland. This volume is a collection of Rowland’s essays on Catholic ecclesiology. Much of the theological confusion of our age centres precisely on misunderstandings of the nature of the Church. One theme she addresses will be of particular interest: synods and synodality, given that the Church’s recent foray into “synodality” seems to have generated more confusion than clarity.
The second theological contribution this month is my own review of a deceptively small book – only ninety-six pages – tracing the Church’s changing appreciation of her lay faithful. Put simply, the Church understood the role of the laity in the early centuries, but that understanding was soon overshadowed by other forms of vocation. Only in the last century or so has she begun once more to harness the extraordinary energy of the laity, which lay dormant for so much of her history.
David Gibney reviews what looks to be a fascinating history of the human face. What strikes me most from his review is how our attitude towards our faces has changed over time, as reflected in artistic portrayals. The significance attached to the face, and the ways in which it has been represented, have varied from age to age and from culture to culture. Christianity’s openness to depicting the human face differed markedly from the Jewish and Islamic traditions, with their prohibitions on representing the human form. More recently, the advent first of the mirror and then, more dramatically, of the mobile phone has transformed our relationship with our own faces. Certainly, we can all relate to the feeling that our poor little faces are under strain: one moment serving as an icon, the next as a magical password.
Turning to literature, Michael Kirke, in his “In Passing” column, considers the curious phenomenon that “many American authors seem devoid of any underlying aversion to the Christian faith. They may not all be adherents of that faith, but they have few, if any, hang-ups about it.” On this side of the Atlantic, and perhaps especially here in Ireland, we are so accustomed to the hostility of writers towards the Catholic faith that we are almost surprised to discover great writers who do not share this antipathy – or who, quite to the contrary, celebrate the faith in one way or another.
We also carry George Weigel’s suggested summer reading. Among the nine recent books he recommends are works by Bishop Eric Varden, Pope Benedict XVI, Fr Carter Griffin, and Samantha Kelley on spiritual matters; Carl Trueman’s analysis of the West’s descent into unreason; and Sergei Chapnin’s analysis of the moral corruption of Putin’s Russia.
Finally, we could hardly omit a review of the film The Odyssey, given the enthusiastic reception it has received and the extent to which it appears to be reviving interest in cinema at a time when filmmaking has been overshadowed by streaming services such as Netflix. Furthermore, the film has led to a remarkable resurgence of interest in Homer’s original epic, with print sales of The Odyssey increasing hugely compared with the previous year. That cannot be a bad thing.