LEGACY ADMISSIONS: A while ago, in a polemical context, I wrote: “Without the authoritative, can’t-ignore-it-can’t-work-around-it teaching of the Church, I doubt that a sizable chunk of the greatest writing about wrongdoing, justice, mercy, personal identity, and the importance of the human body would ever have been conceived.”

Here now is a very, very short list of books exemplifying this statement–and which I think you all should read–which never would have been written were it not for the Catholic Church. I include in this list only those books that present some kind of positive stance (except Lancelot)–which means that I exclude many of the books that have been most relevant to my own faith, since I am most struck by the books that present the alternatives and the “seventh proofs of God.”

Pat Cadigan, Mindplayers–marriage is both sign and source of personal identity

Anselm of Canterbury, Cur Deus Homo (How God Became Man)–the nature of justice, the inevitable need for mercy

T.S. Eliot, “Journey of the Magi”–God need not feel good

ditto, “Preludes“–the physical world is covered with the fingerprints of God

Graham Greene, The Power and the Glory–sufficient grace is offered to all

Pope John Paul II, Fides et Ratio–the nuptial meaning of the mind–the mind is an arrow seeking an as-yet-unknown beloved

ditto, Veritatis Splendor–ditto

ditto, The Theology of the Body–the nuptial meaning of the body

Walter Miller, A Canticle for Leibowitz–love persists through time and despite physical incapacity; God works with what He has

Walker Percy, Lancelot–justice; Ecclesiastes as film noir


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