The Truth About Trouble

By Michael Scanlan

Catholic-ometer: 4 of 5

Enjoyability: 3 of 5

I'm going to get the basics of this review over with right away in this first paragraph, before moving on to an explanation of why I think this way.  For theologians, I would steer clear of this book.  It contains no significant theology.  For Catholics who recognize the difference between Catholics and protestants, but are just looking for a means to improve your prayer or devotional life, this may be the book for you.  Everyone else should not read this, in my mind, since it may either mislead them, or sour them to the faith.

I've spent a while reading books about suffering and faith, and understanding the Christian explanation for how the two of them jive, and in order to explain the problems that this book has, I feel I should give some examples of how people could be misled by it.

Say you're a modern teenager, just starting to realize that the part of your life that was dominated by television and games is essentially over, and you begin to hate the world for being so demanding and authoritarian.  Because you have this outlook on life, you suffer for every responsibility that's put on your shoulders; more than most adults would.  You pick this book up, because it promises to tell you the truth about the troubles in your life.

You start reading this book, and inside, you find talk about Christianity, descriptions of different kinds of suffering, and not a few anecdotes by the author, being used as examples.  What you do not find is an up-front explanation of how there can be trouble if God is good.  This is the book's first problem; its unwillingness to rope people in with something interesting or amusing, and encourage them to keep reading.

However, suppose that you come across a very patient reader, who decides to give this fairly recent author the benefit of the doubt, and continues to slog through these pages.  On page 76, they will find the phrase "Reconciling evil and the goodness of God is a pressing personal problem."

This is the sign of problem number 2; a tendency of the author to treat real, theological truths as if they depend on our belief in them.  This thought process is protestant; not Catholic.  Furthermore, any very patient, protestant young person who's also logical will immediately say to themselves, "Well, if it's personal, what do I need this book for?"  Then, out it goes in the garbage.

However, as if that wasn't bad enough, the very next page contains the phrase "He (God) berates Job the creature for daring to question his Creator.  He tells Job that he is not capable of knowing the answer to his questions or of judging God."

Every teenager in the world who hears this will instantly conclude "Well, duh!  That's because Christianity can't be reconciled with logic.  Thanks a lot, Christian book, but I could have figured that out on my own."  Then out into the garbage it goes.

These first three problems; slowness of pace, protestant thought processes, and denial of human logic are the bain of nearly every modern book that tries and fails to reconcile God's love with our suffering, and I'm afraid that this is yet another in a long line of such books.  In fact, I've seen them so often, that whenever I see a book about suffering use the phrase "the book of Job," I immediately brace myself for another disappointment.  This book, and others like it, give Christianity a bad name.  By refusing to reconcile faith and reason, they help contribute to the war between God and science that's been brewing on both sides for at least the last couple of centuries.

God created reason and science, the same way that he created faith and emotion, and he wouldn't have given us these faculties if he intended for them to be useless.  Man's inability to perceive the full truth of God is not like his inability to perceive the shape of the wind.  It's more like his inability to perceive the curviture of the Earth.  However, he can still explain it by comparison ("it's round, like an orange.")

Likewise, even though we can't see God, we CAN understand certain things about him, such as why there is suffering, evil and danger in life.  We can understand why there is Hell and free will, why there are demons and angels, and why he gave man the chance to screw things up.  To claim that this knowledge is impossible to acquire is almost an Islamic viewpoint, to say nothing of completely denying the worth of theology, and on a baser level, all Catholic truth.

Of the three problems I mentioned at the start, this is the one with the greatest potential to destroy our spiritual growth; protestant thought processes.  Several times in the book, the author makes statements that seem to imply that Catholics should be happy, because of the growing number of "Christians" in the world, particularly presbyterians.  What?  Why would we be glad about that?  Catholics and presbyterians are both Christians, sure, but we're still two different religions.

This approach to the Catholic faith is what I like to call fake ecumenism.  Whereas real ecumenism is about approaching protestants in such a way as to lead them back to Catholic truths that they've lost or rejected, fake ecumenism is trying to pretend that there's no difference between Catholics and protestants, and that we can therefore all get along, hold hands, and sing kumbaya.

I've been working in a large company, in a big city recently, and I work on a team with two other people.  At least one of them is protestant.  I'm not shy about discussing my faith with her, and she's not shy about discussing hers, so we've gotten into some fairly colorful conversations, as you might imagine.  We've talked about all kinds of Catholic and protestant subjects; the rapture (p), the priesthood (C), morality, etc, but I think the discussion that disappointed me the most was when she brought up the hypothetical situation of a woman with three kids, who has an abortion to save her own life.  Her perspective on abortion was "well, it's not very nice.  I certainly wouldn't do it.  It makes you feel all dirty and stuff even talking about it, but if there's an emergency, we ought to have it available."

So there you go.  She's pro-abortion, and she still goes around thinking she's in good standing with God, and there's a lot of other people just like her out there, who live their lives by the mentality of "Well, that teaching doesn't make me feel very good, and might not be practical, so... I'll decide not to believe that."  Nope.  You can't do that.  Some things are always bad and evil, no matter what the situation.  Abortion is one of them, by the way.  This is the LIFE issue.  THE big issue of our lives; our right to live in the first place, and two people; one Catholic, and the other protestant, can't agree on whether human beings have the inherent right to not be murdered.

Now, I'm well aware that many protestants are not like this.  There are some very decent and saintly protestants out there, who really believe that their religion is absolutely God's truth.  I'm aware of that, but moral relativism is one of the most anti-Catholic beliefs there is, and it comes straight out of the protestant revolt; the belief that human beings have a right to protest against truths revealed by God if they don't like them, or don't feel right about them.

If you're Catholic, be Catholic.  Learn the church's teaching, and why the church teaches it, then live it.  If you're not going to be Catholic, then go off and become an atheist, or join another religion.  There are plenty to choose from.  However, you can't lead people to God by acting like all Christian religions are true to the same degree.  We need to know the truth; the whole truth.  If you know the truth, it sets you free.  If you don't know the truth, you become confused, and maybe even pro-abortion like my coworker.

Some may ask what kind of arbitrary standard I use to rate Catholic books, movies, etc.  Well, this is it.  Will it come right out and just tell us the truth, like it should, or will it try to tell us that we could never understand, and act like we're all the same?  Does it contain the full truth, or does it not?

I'm sure that Michael Scanlan is a decent and holy man, who only wrote this book to try to lead people into a better devotional and prayer life.  In that respect, you could do worse.  However, I've never enjoyed any book that put God and logic at each other's throats, and that's one of the things that this book does.  What more can I really say?

The Christian Imagination

By Thomas C. Peters

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 5 of 5

The secondary title; "G.K. Chesterton on the Arts" describes this small book a bit better than the main one.  It's really a book all about G.K. Chesterton; that giant of Christian evangelism, who I've so recently had the pleasure of reading some of the work of, and I really can't say anything against this work.  It's about Chesterton's views, art, Christianity, and it's done without any of the "spin" that so many modern authors and essay-writers are fond of using.

I honestly can't think of anything worth complaining about here.  That about half of it is quotes by Chesterton?  Well, yes, but I've given five points to actual quote books before, and this one explains the context sufficiently to make the quotes, if anything, even more meaningful.  Should I complain about the somewhat ostentatious title?  With few exceptions, I don't like to do that, unless the title is truly misleading, since most authors don't get to decide the title of their book.  Should I complain about the essay-like way it was written in?  The almost hero-worship-like way that Chesterton's views are enshrined herein?  No, I can't do that.  In Mister Peters' place, I'd do it the same way.  Should I complain that it's not original enough?  I'd never do that, for one of the reasons listed in chapter 3.

The fact of the matter is, this is a great book for Catholics, all about imagination, wonder and fun, and their place in the life of a Catholic, and all taken from quotes by one of the finest defenders of the faith in the last 200 years.  Chesterton is a delight, as always, and made no secret of his defense of imagination and fun.

This book goes over Chesterton's views on fiction, on critics and proper reviews, on songs, poems and art, and on good humor, then gives a brief biography of Chesterton, containing some information, which I was unaware of, like the name of his wife.  In this entire book, there's only one thing that I disagree with (the notion that people don't want to hear the bad points of an artistic work before they buy it,) which is pretty darn impressive.

I find that Chesterton's best points here are his insistence on the importance of childlike joy and wonder in appreciating the arts, and his strong defense of fun, imaginative expression, regardless of the critical reaction it might receive.  Of course, like all defenses of fun and wonder, it's simultaneously an attack on scientism, which is two birds with one stone, as far as I'm concerned.  However, if you wanted me to tell you the best quotes in the novel, I'd be here all day.  Believe me when I say that you're better off just picking this book up and reading it yourself; especially if you've been fooled by the media's lies about the Catholic Church being the enemy of free expression.  This little book puts all that into perspective, and could serve as a nice, little Chesterton introduction as well.  I just hope you have as much fun with it as I did.

Why Be Catholic?

Not Rated

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 5 of 5

First, the facts.  This is a DVD; about an hour and a half long, by a Catholic evangelist named Tim Staples.  He's one of my personal favorite evangelists, and here, he demonstrates why.  Step by step, he goes over every single major belief that leads to belief in the Catholic Church, and establishes why we believe each one from a very logical and sound perspective, using scripture, historical fact, and ordinary reason.  However, when I describe the talk in this way, I'm afraid that I'm doing him a bit of a disservice, because his strong, likable personality, and vast enthusiasm for the subject at hand do a huge amount to add to the presentation, and really draw you in, keeping it entertaining and interesting.

He covers, first, why atheism makes so little sense, and how we can prove that there's a God, using simple logic.  He talks about how science leads us closer to establishing God's existence with mere data, how only Christianity fits all the facts that pure logic can teach us about God, and how we know the sacred scriptures were divinely-inspired, and Jesus was God in the flesh.

Lastly, he caps it off with an explanation of many proofs from sacred scripture (some of the best, in my mind; especially Matthew 18;15-17.  I love those verses,) and how they prove that Jesus personally established ONE church; only one, and that he founded it on Saint Peter and the apostles, giving them special authority that no one else has.  That authority eventually came to be the Catholic Church that we know today, and Saint Peter (the Pope,) still has the same authority he enjoyed back then, within the Catholic Church.

It's a great talk.  I watched the whole thing, and there isn't a single thing he says that's false, which accounts for the Catholic-ometer grade I gave it.  He also speaks with force, enthusiasm and charisma, and even says a few things that I didn't know about Islam, which accounts for the enjoyability grade I gave it.

However, there's also a minefield waiting over the horizon, which I feel I should clarify.  He doesn't say anything specifically false, but it deserves clarification.

Near the end of the talk, he says something like "there are folks who asked 'who is that guy in Rome to tell us we have to have mass in english?'"  That's true.  There were folks like that (sedevecantists and others,) and they were wrong.  Not just in refusing Papal Authority, however.  They were also wrong, because the Pope never said that.

The Tridentine Mass (the traditional latin mass that was nearly universal in the Catholic Church in the last several centuries prior to Vatican II) was not abrogated by the documents of Vatican II, OR by the decree of the pope.  Furthermore, the Vatican II documents said nothing about excising latin from the mass, or about a host of other changes that have sprung up since then (about the mid to late 60s.)

I'm not suggesting that Tim Staples doesn't realize this, and he's right to go after the sedevecantists and their ilk for abandoning the Holy Father and Rome, but there are also countless groups that broke off and became protestants at around that time, and many more who stayed in the church, and used their influence to cover up or support liturgical abuses.  Those people are betraying the faith just as much as the sedevecantists; they just don't get the spotlight shined on them as often.

Still, don't take this clarification on a point as anything more than that; a clarification.  This is a fantastic talk, and Tim Staples remains one of my favorite Catholic evangelists.  This DVD probably won't penetrate the stubbornness of your anti-Catholic, protestant relatives, but it will give you some of the knowledge that you need to defend yourself when they start badmouthing the Church, and who knows?  If they keep hearing it from you, maybe they'll listen some day.

Making Sense Out of Suffering

By Peter Kreeft

Catholic-ometer: 3 of 5

Enjoyability: 2.5 of 5

Let me get something out of the way first, here.  I do not hate Peter Kreeft.  I apologize if it's come across that way in some of my past reviews.  However, I am at odds with him in a couple of things.  Before I outline those things, however, let me give you my general impression of this book.  After that, you can read on if you'd like, or just stop there.

This book is not faithfully-Catholic.  At least not entirely.  The thought processes that go into it are humanistic, inclusive, accomidating and arrive at a generally-Christian outcome, but they are not Catholic.  As such, I believe that many of his conclusions are erroneous, and the processes that he uses to arrive at those conclusions are, unfortunately, flawed.  I do not hate him because of this.  Not by any means.  I appreciate his efforts to produce something which might win certain kinds of people over to a belief in Christ, which is the real point of all these writings anyway.  Supposing that all he really cares about is serving God, and not man, then I applaud his efforts, and support them.  I reccomend this book to atheists, non-Christians, protestants and anyone else who doesn't like to think too heavily about philosophy and the mysteries of life's truth.

However, if you are Catholic, or if you are firmly-entrenched in logical theology, you might want to give this book a pass, because a well-formed conscience will make several problems within this book quite obvious.  Furthermore, on page 17, Kreeft explains that the book is not targeted strictly at Catholics, but at everyone, and isn't meant to be a book of facts, but a personal diary of sorts.  That's all well and good, so long as no one takes the contents of this book as anything more than that; a personal diary, that someone decided to sell.  We should not, under any circumstances, take these scribblings as some sort of dogma or doctrine.  They really have more to do with subjectivity and emotions than Christian truth, and this alone accounts for the poor score I gave it on the Catholic-ometer.

However, it doesn't account for the even harder time I had enjoying it.  That stems from my differences with Mister Kreeft in writing ethics.  I don't believe in putting pen to paper on a nonfiction work unless everything I have to say is well-researched and true.  I also don't believe in being disingenuous with my readers, or pretending to know more than I really do.

Virtually every time he speaks on a subject; philosophical, theological, biblical or cultural, one finds slip-ups and lack of research scattered across the pages.  This is a poor reflection on his effort as a writer, but ultimately harmless.

The only time when it's not ultimately harmless is when he specifically says things about Jesus, the faith, and the church which are not true, and while pointing out every occurrence of this would take much too long, I wish to draw your attention to a few of the more glaring ones before moving on to the next problem.

On page 14, he claims that "the church" has committed big crimes, like the crusades, the spanish inquisition, witch hunts, etc...  Nonsense.  The crusades consisted of six separate campaigns, resulting from a muslim invasion of the Bizantine Empire, and a kidnapping on the part of a mercenary, which provoked revenge on the part of the muslim commander Saladin.  They were not a "big crime."  The inquisition was an ecclesial court, and ecclesial courts didn't have the power to bring in non-Catholics, or to execute anyone.  Only the state could do that.  Those few who were executed as a result of inquisitional trials were killed by the government of Spain.  This is a crime of the Spanish government; not the church.  Finally, witch hunts were NEVER endorsed by the church.  They were bands of superstitious folks, all getting together without the permission or knowledge of Rome, and doing whatever the heck they felt like, against church teaching.  Calling them "crimes of the church," is, to put it very lightly, untrue.

On page 15, he claims that Job's three friends, who criticized him for his suffering, had correct theology.  This is also a falsehood.  Theology is the application of science, philosophy and logic to understand God and the way he works.  It is never correctly used for finding fault in particular cases of suffering.

On page 62, he claims that the soul is his real identity, independant of the body.  Another falsehood, and a very old heresy called Manichaeism (an early Gnostic heresy.)  Man is defined by the church as both body AND soul, not one or the other.

On page 90, he claims that joy in Eden was all about self-sacrifice, and that Adam had to learn.  Both of these are false.  Adam possessed full knowledge of the consequences of his actions, which is why his sin carried such a grave punishment, and the whole point of Eden was that it was a gift from God.  It was not a place of eternal, blissful self-sacrifice.  He's read that wrong.

On page 150, he makes the ridiculous claim that we're already in Heaven.  This one is so obviously false, that I don't even need to say another word about it.

On page 178, he claims that the inhabitants of Heaven are what make it Heaven.  No.  God is what makes it Heaven.

As I said, these are only a few of the obvious doctrinal mistakes, but then, he doesn't seem bothered by any kind of pressure to conform to the church's doctrine, because on page 59, he basically says that you don't want to listen to "religious people," because they're not "humble" enough to recognize that they can't understand God's answer.  This is in defiance of church teaching that the Holy Spirit leads his church to "all truth."  He also basically says, on page 48, almost straight-out, that anyone who claims to have a definitive answer to the problem of evil and suffering is not being humble, and therefore, must be wrong.  Then he spends the rest of the book flitting from one non-explanation to another, frequently saying (I'm paraphrasing here,) "well, we won't get these answers until we're in Heaven, and you should really be more humble anyway."

Hello!  You won't get the answers because you just rejected everyone who claims to have the answers!  Aah!  This kind of anti-logic gives me a headache.

However, it's not the only major logical problem in this book.  For one thing, in his study of philosophical truths, Mister Kreeft gives equal space to both philosophers and poets.  If you don't see a problem with this already, I'll break it down.

Suppose your best friend fell into the pool and can't swim.  Now, you can't swim either, but you know your next door neighbors are a lifeguard and a locksmith.  Using Mister Kreeft's approach, he would go for the lifeguard first, then run and get the locksmith as well, and give him an equal chance to save his friend.

I don't mean to use such an insulting comparison, but you don't go to a poet to teach you philosophy, any more than you go to a locksmith to save your drowning friend.  Poets are experts in the arranging of words and the telling of fantastic stories, but that does not make them philosophers.  Why shouldn't we check to see what the world's carpenters had to say on the subject?  What about the politicians?  Surely, all the blacksmiths and computer programmers throughout history have some insight to give us on this matter!

No.  We don't go to them for advice on this, because it's not their field of expertise.  Likewise, philosophy is not the field of expertise of poets, so I feel quite jusified in treating chapter 5 (Clues from the Arts) as simple filler.  For the moment, let's turn aside from the philosophical views of architects and dental hygenists, and get back to the business of figuring out the truth about suffering, shall we?

The other logical problem in this book is a failure to treat any of these discoveries as "true," or to build on them with logic.  For example, on page 91, he says that God is so good, that he can even bring good out of evil.  On page 180, he says that God cannot contradict his nature.  Both of these statements are absolutely correct, but he seems to reject the simple logic that follows from combining them; namely, that because God cannot contradict his nature, his absolute power is over our nature; not his, and that therefore, there are rules which even he must follow; rules established by his nature.  This is why even God cannot eradicate pain and suffering until the proper time; when the infinite justice contained in his nature will allow for it.  This is the real reason why suffering exists, and he has all the facts that lead up to it, but just doesn't draw his conclusions properly, nor does he take those who HAVE drawn such conclusions (Saint Thomas Aquinas) on their word; either demonstrating or pretending to demonstrate a lack of both faith and reason.

This lack of making proper connections, and overall failure to head off the obvious objections to his claims riddles the book with smaller holes.  On page 66, he claims that bad fortune is better than good, because good fortune deceives us, but fails to define "bad" and "good" fortune, or explain why this change takes place.  On page 71, he claims that suffering is good because it makes us good (which is something like saying that premarital sex is good because it makes us parents.)  On page 84, he claims that suffering is good because it gives us good stories to tell.  I can tell good stories, even without suffering, so this logic is balogne.  On page 143, he claims that we should stop looking for an out to suffering, which is neither true, nor is it what you want to tell a person who's in pain, and on page 146, he makes the claim that joy comes from following God's will, even when he wants us to suffer.  Problem 1 is that God doesn't want us to suffer; he wants us to improve through suffering.  Problem 2 is that when we suffer, we are in pain, regardless of how much we may want to follow God's will.

On page 148, he claims that we're unhappy because we think we deserve better.  No.  We're unhappy because we WANT something better, whether we deserve it or not.  Then he turns around on the very next page, and says that infinite joy is our ultimate goal.  Well, if joy really comes from suffering, the way he seems to think it does, then what do we want with that?  The logic just doesn't hold up on its own.

However, I think that this book's failings are most dangerous when it gets into personal approaches to the world.  For example, on page 163, he basically claims that you don't need to hate anyone; that you can cry instead of being furious (since Our Blessed Lord did both, I tend to doubt that,) but then on page 87, he says something truly hazardous; claiming that because the reader hasn't committed suicide yet, he must love his life.

I'm sorry, but this is just a very stupid thing to say; especially in a book about suffering and pain.  People pick this book up because they're in pain, and depressed, and don't know where to turn, but they don't want to kill themselves, mostly, because they're afraid of what will happen to them after death, or are more afraid of death than they are of life, but certainly NOT because they love their lives and are having a jolly old time.  If that were the case, they wouldn't have picked up this book to begin with.  This comment (and indeed; most careless comments about suicide) run the risk of either sounding like a challenge to a near-suicidal person, (a challenge that some of them might just try to respond to,) or else a message of "Well, if you don't love your life, just kill yourself already."  I know this isn't the intent.  I know, but we need to be more careful than this when we speak, and especially when we write and publish our writings.  It's our duty to be responsible for the advice we give to others, whether intentionally or by accident.

He doesn't make any ridiculous claims about liberals being more loving than conservatives in this book, fortunately, though he does remark that conservatives seem to be afraid of questions and liberals of answers.  However, I wasn't as upset by this, not because it's more even-handed, but because, in my experience, it seems to be more true, and gives all of us something to work on.

This book is not terrible; it's not, but it feels careless at many points, and even dangerous.  At the end of it all, my advice is this; know the truth first, then proceed with caution.

The Everlasting Man

By G. K. Chesterton

Catholic-ometer: 5 of 5

Enjoyability: 5 of 5

I haven't read many Chesterton books, but hopefully, I'll get the chance to read more of his work in the future.  He's witty, clever, a brilliant logical thinker, and very faithful to the church.

In this book, Chesterton approaches the topic of comparative religions, and what an enormous load of bunk it is.  From the very beginning, he defines, in very simple, logical and understandable terms, why modern man's view of himself and his history is at best, incomplete.  He gradually goes over every major moment in human history, and what each tells us about the nature of human beings as they were, and as they are now.

The things that Chesterton manages to debunk with this approach are many and varied.  The notion of evolution, in terms of applying it to human beings, the belief in the "cave man," the "missing link" and others, but he doesn't stop there.

Next, Chesterton establishes the mentality natural to human beings; a normal belief in a supreme, invisible being, who judges by standards of plain right and wrong.  This vein, he claims, runs through even the most barbaric of polytheisms, even when its practitioners are trying to avoid considering it.  It's hard, in fact, to argue with a simple, good sense approach like this, since most polytheisms seem to treat their "gods" more as very powerful superheroes/villains than as the sources of any real moral standard.

Furthermore, he establishes that on the world stage today, only Christianity, and those religions that were designed to mimic its success have really been serious religions at all, in both senses of the word.  What are those senses, you ask?

The first is the mythological; the imaginative.  A belief in supernatural things, greater than ourselves.  The second is the philosophical; a logical and well-reasoned view of the world, which covers all the important facts of life.  In ancient times, philosophers and priests didn't get along.  They didn't fight each other, but no one seriously considered combining philosophy and worship.  However, for a religion to be logical and true, and also be fulfilling to human nature, it had to be both.  Christianity, he indirectly says, is that religion; more specifically, the Catholic Church.

Now, this book does contain some words which, in our modern times, would be considered offensive, but it's important to take this book in the spirit of the age it was made in, when these words were commonplace, and not even really considered rude.  For this reason, I will not remove any points from it for this.

I enjoyed this book a lot, and am pleasantly surprised that it managed to get published.  It certainly would never make it through any of our contemporary, mainstream publishers, for the very reason that I even enjoyed it at all; it implies, quite strongly, that Catholicism is absolutely correct, and all other religions are less correct.  For this reason alone, I don't think I can reccomend it enough.

Chesterton also doesn't waste space on any of these pages.  When he isn't telling jokes or making funny comparisons, he's considering modern or ancient religions from an interesting and original perspective; always in a way that will confound people who want all religions to be the same, and make faithful Catholics chuckle a bit.  This is not a comprehensive book of human history from a Catholic perspective, nor is it a serious, scientific document, but it is well-informed logic and philosophy, presented in a very clever and amusing way, and that's all I need to say about it.

There Be Dragons

Rated PG-13

Catholic-ometer: 4.5 of 5

Enjoyability: 4.5 of 5

Indie movies are, of course, a mixed bag, much more so than Hollywood films, because in Hollywood, there's very little quality added to the mixture.  I honestly didn't know much about this film going into it; only that it was a historical fiction, based around the life of Josemaria Escriva; founder of Opus Dei, and another character named Manolo.  Nothing else.  I had no idea how events in the movie would unfold.

Maybe that's for the best, however.  I should say, right off the bat, that the half point down on the Catholic-ometer is solely for historical inaccuracies in depicting the life of Saint Escriva, and even then, those inaccuracies were few and far between.  The half point down in enjoyability comes from another factor, which I'll explain in a moment.

To start with, as indie movies go, this one is very well-written.  Much of the dialogue is truly captivating, and the pacing of the film is refreshingly-methodical.  It's a bit difficult to review it without spoiling anything beyond that.  I noticed several trends in this movie, however, which I feel it might be important to describe.

The first is a mentality of "black and white;" a very Catholic perspective, and one I'd love to see more of in movies.  Josemaria's life and Manolo's life are shown in intervals, with Josemaria starting his religious group, supporting them, protecting them, and keeping them from trying to take revenge for the evils going on around them.  Manolo, on the other hand, is working as a double agent in an army complement; the dirtiest and least honorable work one can have in wartime.

Josemaria's work in supporting his group, and helping them to survive is truly exceptional, and his devotion to holiness shines through magnificently in the performance he gives, while the selfishness and envy of Manolo make him seem like almost more of a devil than a man; even in a place of rampant killing, like the trenches of wartime.

All of this is set against the backdrop of the Spanish civil war that Josemaria survived when he was young, and make no mistake; it is a "war movie."  There are battles, explosions, planes bombing and shooting at people, and people killing innocents, out of nothing but empty hatred.  There's a good reason for the rating it got.  Furthermore, there's a good deal of cursing, though not to the degree seen in Juno, and some implied sex, between some of the people in Manolo's company.  This is not, by any means, a lighthearted movie for the kids.  No war movie is.  Then again, neither war the Passion of the Christ, and it was, I think, the most outstanding movie I've ever seen.

Another theme that runs back and forth through this film is forgiveness; an appropriate theme in a movie that contrasts an extremely holy saint with an extremely vile sinner.  Most of us, by the grace of God, will never sin as often or as deeply as Manolo does, but if we ever did, we'd need to make a choice; either give in to despair, or look for forgiveness.

I said before that this movie is not for kids, and this is the other reason; it's meant to be thought about more deeply than kids can do.  The characters are complicated, and their situations need to be considered carefully, if you want to keep up.  It's a movie that challenges you to think about our human nature, and the situations we find ourselves in, in a whole new light, and depending on the kind of person you are, you may end up thinking of the characters differently.  It's a captivating indie movie, and a thought-provolking ride.

Now for the reason why I gave it a half point down in enjoyability.  It's not because of the bloodshed, ugliness or cursing.  It's because I was really hoping to see more of Saint Escriva.

Manolo is a fictional character, made up for this movie, to contrast with Josemaria, and between his escapades in wartime, and the future version of himself, musing on the whole thing, he gobbles up a good percentage of the movie.  In fact, I don't think it's much of a stretch to say that the movie is more about him than about Saint Escriva, and that's really not what I was hoping for.

I could be the eternal pessimist, and assume that it was done this way on purpose, but honestly, I can't imagine that being the case for a moment.  If they'd only wanted star power, they wouldn't have made an indie film, much less one about a Catholic saint.  My conclusion, therefore, is simply that they wanted to tell a story about black and white morality, and about forgiveness, and that they just didn't spend enough time on the saintly side of it; probably by accident.

In the end, I feel I can reccomend this movie to any adult who's willing to see it and think about it with a little intellectual honesty.  Whether you're closer to the saintly Escriva, or to the Oedipus-like Manolo, watching this movie may help you to realize things about your life and your faith that could help you on your journey towards Heaven.  In fact, I'd watch it with some friends.  You may have a few things to talk about when you're walking out of the theater.

Bakhita; From Slave to Saint

Not Rated

Catholic-ometer: 3 of 5

Enjoyability: 4 of 5

Recently, our current pope, Pope Benedict, saw this movie and said that it was "beautiful."  While you'll never find me disagreeing with his holiness on any matter of Catholic Doctrine, or on the beauty of this movie, I don't feel it would be right of me to reccomend it.

To start with, I feel I should point out the first and most glaring flaw of this movie; it's about as faithful in depicting the events of Bakhita's life as "the Neverending Story; Part 2" was in depicting the events of the second half of the book it was based on.  In fact, I'd say this movie bares much in common with your typical, Hollywood, book-to-movie transition, in that virtually nothing of the original story survives, except the name of the main character.

In this movie, Bakhita is kidnapped by slavers when she's young, raised as a slave by a rich, african slave-trader, and kept until rebels attack.  An italian named Federico Marin saves her from the rebels and takes her to Italy as his own slave, where she becomes the nanny of his daughter; Aurora.

In reality, the slavers who kidnapped Bakhita was arabs; not africans, and they forced her to convert to Islam when they enslaved her.  She had several "masters" in Africa; not one, and the rich italian was her fifth "master;" not her second.  Furthermore, his name was Callisto Legnani, not Marin, and she was given by him as a gift to the wife of another man; named Augusto Michieli.  It was Michieli's daughter Alice; not Aurora, who Bakhita became the nanny of, and they didn't spend all their time in Italy.  They went back to the Sudan together for a while.

In the movie, Marin lost his wife while she was giving birth to Aurora, and bore an old wound from his loss.  Bakhita eventually ran away from him and sought shelter in a church, where she first learned about Jesus, and was given sanctuary, eventually, by the Canossian sisters.

In reality, Michieli and his wife were both alive, and both together, when Bakhita entered their household.  They bought a hotel at Suakin; the largest port of the Sudan at the time, and left to manage it, leaving Bakhita and Alice in the care of the Canossian sisters.

In the movie, Bakhita spends a long time in Marin's village, caring for sick people during a smallpox epidemic, in a Mother Theresa-like way.  She's eventually offered a free ride to Venice by Marin, and eventually accepts, once the epidemic is over.  Once there, however, she decides to become a Canossian sister, instead of rejoining Marin and his family.  Marin raises a fuss about it in the courts, but they decide in her favor.

In reality, Bakhita spent no time caring for smallpox victims before deciding to become a nun, though there was a legal battle with Michieli, which was eventually decided in her favor.

At this point, the movie pretty much ends.  Marin turns over a new leaf, and makes peace with being forced to leave Bakhita behind, which could well have happened to Michieli as well, though we can't know for certain.  In reality, many more things happened to Bakhita while she was a sister, but that's a story for another time.

I just don't see the point of changing so much about the life story of such a great person.  I mean, she's already canonized.  This movie's lies can be found out by five minutes on wikipedia, and won't do much to prop up her entry in the anals of hagiography, simply because they are, of course, lies.

There's a strong sense that this film made such an effort to reconstruct Bakhita's life out of wholecloth, just so that it could promote the agendas of those who funded its production, though again, I can't prove anything.  I will say, however, that the total removal of the forced Islamic conversion from the movie seems suspiciously like a direct injustice to a very saintly woman, just to "keep muslims happy."  Furthermore, there's a scene at the beginning, dwelled on much too strongly throughout the film, in which a witchdoctor proclaims that she's "lucky," almost as though the film was attempting to encourage non-Catholic superstitions.  Lastly, the whole smallpox subplot seems to have been inserted, as if to remind everyone of the church's role in social wellfare.  The problem is, that's not the church's main role.  It's to lead souls to Heaven; not full stomachs.

Why did they change the names of so many of the other characters?  I'm not really sure.  Maybe they figured they'd already warped so much of the story that it wouldn't hurt.

Now, the question is just this; if it's so unfaithful and disrespectful to the life and history of this great woman, why didn't I hate it?

The truth is, the movie really isn't that bad.  I bemoan the changes made, seemingly out of a secular, accomodationist view, but as a fictional story (which, let's be honest here, is what this movie is,) it's actually very touching and inspiring.  It's moving, beautiful and well-paced.  The settings are well-rendered, the costumes are wonderful, and nearly every actor did their job incredibly.  It's a beautiful story about a woman who touches the hearts and souls of those around her, with her gentleness, compassion and faith.

At the start of this review, I said that it wouldn't be right to reccomend this movie, but thinking it over again, I don't think that's true.  If you can accept that this movie is just fiction, and take it as such, there's no real harm in watching it, and you might even enjoy it.  Just don't let anyone fool you into thinking it's a biography.

In My Own Words

By Mother Theresa

Catholic-ometer: 4.5 of 5

Enjoyability: 4.5 of 5

Reviewing a book of quotes by Mother Theresa puts me under a lot of pressure, because I know that giving it a less than perfect score will earn me some scorn, just because of who the author is.  Defending the score I gave it will require some work, but I am prepared to defend it.

Mother Theresa was still alive when I was young, and I caught some glimpses of the work she did, and have since studied her life through various biographies and such, and I will reccomend this approach to anyone else who wants to learn about her too.  It's certainly one of the best ways to understand this wonderful and saintly woman; studying her life, and what she did out of charity for the poor.

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, which means that a person's life must be worth billions of them, and many, if not most of the holy men and woman throughout history are best learned from by studying the way in which they lived.  In my opinion, Mother Theresa is a prime example of this.  I also saw her as a woman who spoke infrequently, and took action very often, and I think I may understand part of the reason for this as well.  Mother Theresa was good to others, and loving; almost to a fault.  I won't say anything against these qualities that she possessed in such abundance.

However, she was not a theologian, and she never actually wrote any books.  This book is just a compilation of quotes that she allegedly spoke over the course of her life.  Therefore, when she claims that there is no such thing as a just war, simply because all wars involve killing, I'm willing to give her something of a pass for the most part, simply because she may not have known any better.

Now, paragraph 2309 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church outlines the criteria for a just war quite cleanly.  It would be one thing if she'd been responding to a politician's claim or something, but the concept of the "just war" is official church teaching.  The same church whose doctrine is protected infallibly from all falsehood by the Holy Spirit.  Doctrine of the church are not up for review, and I think that Mother Theresa would be the first to admit that the Holy Spirit knows better than she does about such matters.

I'm not slamming Mother Theresa in any way by saying this.  I'm merely pointing out that on this subject, in this one instance, she was wrong.  Then again, we've all been there, and it didn't really bug me that much to read such quotes, since she speaks them with such humility.

On this point, I also feel the need to draw one more comparison to a previous book that I read.  I read "The God Who Loves You," gave it a far lower grade, and was considerably angrier when I put it down, despite similar theological missteps.  However, the reason for this is that the writer of that book was Peter Kreeft.  I'm not being harder on him because he's less famous.  I'm being harder on him because he seemed to have such a firm grasp of theology otherwise, and really should have known better.  I can't say the same for Mother Theresa, whose work was in helping the poor, not in theology.

Is this book enjoyable to the right audience?  Naturally.  Did I enjoy it?  Large parts of it; yes.  Would I reccomend it to others?  Well...  Yes, with reservations.  You can read it if you want to, but if you really want to get to know Mother Theresa, your best bet would be to spend time sacrificing and helping the poor instead.  Her real strength was in her actions; not her words, and this book's weakness, I'm afraid, is more a weakness of the written word, than of the incredible person being written about.

The Tripods Attack

By John Mcnichol

Catholic-ometer: 4.5 of 5

Enjoyability: 4 of 5

A novel this time; a sort of restructuring of victorian culture and literature; combining old victorian characters and authors in a sort of new steampunk/gaslamp setting.

Since I enjoyed this book, let me start by getting my complaints out of the way.  This book is not children's fiction.  It's based on, and in, the fictions written for adults in the victorian era, such as Frankenstein, Sherlock Holmes, Father Brown and War of the Worlds.  This might be a strange and difficult world for those unfamiliar with victorian-era stories to venture into, and it really should have provided a literary guide, explaining where it got all its characters and concepts from; if only to be polite to the original authors of those pieces.

This is, in essence, a piece of victorian-style fanfiction, re-imagining both the characters and the authors of classic victorian literature into a different kind of world; one driven by steam and run by secret conspiracies.  I've seen other reviewers say that this method doesn't work unless the portrayals are spot on, regardless of the changes, and...  I agree, sort of.  It would be better to say that the story can no longer use its celebrity elements as a crutch to stand on, since it warps them so unrecognizably into something else.  This means that the question of the actual quality of the story comes up.  Is it a good story, in and of itself?

In this respect, one could do a lot worse.  The main characters are H.G. Wells (pretty much a dead-on portrayal, from what I can tell,) G.K. Chesterton (seeming very similar to his real personality, but very different in shape and appearance,) Father Brown (a character written about by Chesterton, who seems to be basically accurately portrayed,) and "the doctor," who young Chesterton eventually refers to as "a snake."

The plot is as much a conspiracy thriller as an alien invasion story, though it certainly does have elements of both, and I'm afraid that it moves a bit slowly at first.  I would say that the first quarter of the book is gobbled up by Chesterton getting an assignment, meeting Wells, getting on a train, talking on the train, trying to save someone's life on the train, trying to stop the train from crashing, etc, with nary a sign of the tripods.  This section, to its credit, is kept interesting, because the dialogue and events are indeed involving and exciting ones, but through it all, one wonders; when will the tripods attack?

Well, it happens fairly quickly.  One of the martian machines from H.G. Wells' classic "The War of the Worlds" tips over the train and starts abducting people.  In this respect, the book does not take it easy in the slightest.  It's very vivid in its depictions of the war and carnage wreaked by the martians on the poor earthlings (in fact, I would say, it's a bit more gruesomely-delivered than even Wells himself probably dared,) and this won me over at first.  Then the doctor leads the group into a secret passage, and Chesterton gets lost in a cave, and begins to whine and whine, like the biggest weakling who ever lived.

This section is easily the story's weakest point, and it goes on for the better part of a chapter.  After that, there's martian-fighting, and finding out about the doctor's secret organization, and their connection to Chesterton himself, as well as the fate of Chesterton and Father Brown, all of which was, I thought, just a little disrespectful to the characters and people depicted, but at least it was entertaining and even a bit encouraging.

When all is said and done, there are only a few questions left to ask.  Is this book Catholic enough?  Well, it comes at you from a Catholic perspective, so yes; it is.  I only gave it a half point down because the real Chesterton wasn't involved with secret agents, and I honestly think it would have been a more interesting story if there'd been nothing special about him at first.

Is the book entertaining enough?  Well, there are dull or grating spots here or there, and the book's premise, as I said, takes a while to get underway, but I would say yes; it's sufficiently entertaining, and on the whole, is written rather well.

Is the book propaganda?  I wouldn't say so.  It just approaches fiction from a religious perspective (finally) instead of the tired, old, secularist one, which, in my view, has done more than enough damage to the world of fiction already.

Will this book convince people to become Catholic?  Probably not.  Still, it might encourage folks to read more of Chesterton's real work, and few people made the Catholic position seem as logical as it is, quite like G.K. Chesterton.  That was his real shining accomplishment; not fighting martians or secret agents.

I won't harp on any of these points, because none of them really upset or stunned me that much.  It's the elements of fiction stories, shown through the lens of Catholic Church teaching, and that's certainly rare enough that it deserves some support.