Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica. In part 1, I wrote of Aristotle’s understanding of happiness as explained by classicist Edith Hall of King’s College, London. In doing so, I hinted at the enduring efforts of Thomas Aquinas in using Aristotelian philosophy as a framework for Christian theology. Whereas Aristotle believed happiness as being human action directed towards good ends, Aquinas taught…
Edith Hall, Aristotle’s Way. I’ve always had a lot of interests. Life is fascinating, and learning from humanity’s greatest minds, all the more. So, in a way, I am always searching —God’s Truth is infinite. Although I am careful in my quest to test what I read, like the Church fathers, however, I delight in finding “seeds of the Word” in…
A Benedictine Monk, In Sinu Jesu. Written by an anonymous Benedictine Monk, In Sinu Jesu, When Heart Speaks to Heart: The Journal of A Priest at Prayer, is a supernatural book. In the future it will have a rightful place alongside The Dialogue of Catherine of Siena and The Imitation of Christ as a devotional work of unique power and beauty, coming providentially to…
Teresa of Ávila, The Book of Her Life. In 1921, the brilliant Edith Stein, herself a student and assistant of famed philosopher Edmund Husserl, while on summer holiday picked a book at random from her hosts’ library to pass a quite afternoon. Engrossed, she read it through without break, stating simply, “This is the truth.” The next day Edith purchased a…
Francois Jamart OCD, St. Thérèse of Lisieux. The French Carmelite Saint Thérèse of Lisieux is affectionately known as the Little Flower. Named a Doctor of the Universal Church by Saint Pope John Paul II in 1997, she joined the formidable ranks of Hildegard of Bingen, Catherine of Siena, and Teresa of Ávila as an authentic teacher of the faith. Her little way of…
Bonaventure, The Life of St. Francis. “In beautiful things he saw Beauty itself, and through his vestiges imprinted on creation he followed his Beloved everywhere, making from all things a ladder by which he could climb up and embrace him who is utterly desirable.” Saint Francis (1182-1226) is one of the most iconic Catholic saints. Although a wealthy merchant’s son, he…
Roland Barthes, Camera Lucida. Roland Barthes’ classic, Camera Lucida, Reflections on Photography, is an exquisite book, deeply thought-provoking. Had he and I been contemporaries, we would have had much to talk about. Photography is unlike other arts, it captures certainty. To look at a photograph is to be confronted evidentially with existence, the fact of having been there or having been thus.…
Donald Keene, So Lovely A Country Will Never Perish. I have been interested for many years in the Pacific War, especially in stories told by those who lived through it. Diaries from this period written vividly in real time are for me precious artifacts preserving not only the folly and complexity of human conflict, but the bewildering range of emotion…
Flannery O’Connor, Letters. Mary Flannery O’Connor (1925 – 1964) was not only one of America’s greatest fiction writers, but also a hero. Both for her courageous act of living in the face of tragedy as well as her nobility of character which shined through her suffering. Although she was merely 39 at the time of her passing, having battled lupus for…
Julian of Norwich, Showings. A first attempt at reading the medieval Christian mystics can be off-putting for many reasons. As contemporary men and women we are far removed from the spiritual milieu of the religious communities which formed these writers’ lives. Therefore, understanding their thoughts require a basic knowledge of the times, including the use of language and the imagination in…