Speaker 0 00:00:00 Chenu was the first person to bring to me the whole idea of the insoluble union, the marriage of fetus, vaio of faith, and reason. These things are inseparable. In fact, you know, the, the reason without faith becomes irrational and faith without reason becomes heretical. When I saw this, I thought, wow, I don't have to make that choice. I can be rational and can believe in God.
Speaker 2 00:00:29 Welcome to the Catholic Theology Show presented by Ave Maria University. I'm your host, Dr. Michael Dnet, and today I am joined by a friend and author, publisher, speaker, Mr. Joseph Pierce. So, welcome to the show. It's
Speaker 0 00:00:47 A joy to be here. Thanks
Speaker 2 00:00:47 For having me. Great. Thanks so much for being on our show. And, uh, uh, Joseph Pierce was a, one of the early faculty members at Ave Maria College and Ave Maria University, uh, served as a writer in residence for I think 11 years. So it's great to have you back, uh, at the university. So I wanna begin today looking at this great figure. Um, GK Chesterton. Uh, I think GK Chesterton is someone that many, you know, many of our listeners may be familiar with. They may know the name, uh, but, but kind of like a, a little bit of a deeper penetration of his, uh, really kind of his presence. And I think he's especially unique in his con that his conversion kind of like spawned so many other conversions. So many of the great figures that we know, uh, CS Lewis, Ronald Knox, and countless others were their own conversion to the faith was shaped by Chesterton's conversion. So maybe just in a, a, a brief answer, and then we'll talk about it more for the rest of our show. What do you think was so unique about Chesterton's life and his writings, uh, that helped so many people be able to kind of encounter Christianity anew?
Speaker 0 00:02:15 Yeah. Well, I suppose the way I liked to answer that is that, you know, Chesterton under Grace was the single most important, um, influence on my own conversion. And wow. During my path to Christ, I came across this book, not by Chesterton. I'd been reading Chester for some time, but I wasn't a Christian. And sort of, I loved Chesterton in spite of his Christianity. Certainly not because of it. Yes. And then I came across a book on the shelf in London, uh, secondhand book shop in London, and it's by someone called CS Lewis. Now, I'd heard of CS Lewis Uhhuh <affirmative>, but I knew nothing about him except he'd written a children's book with the Lion of witch wardrobe. And I had no idea that that was a Christian work. I had no idea he was Christian. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So, something prompted me and have to think it's, you know, the Holy Spirit prompted me to just pluck this book from the shelf and take a look.
Speaker 0 00:03:00 And what I used to do in those days is if it's an unknown author, go to the index, uh, for the name Chesterton. And if it's Chester was in there, I'd take a look. And if, if that interests me, I then I'd buy the book. And I thought, that's what I did this time, until someone pointed out to me years later that that book by Lewis does not have an index, which makes it even more providential. Cause I must have opened the book at random and I fell upon the magic word Chesterton. And it was Lewis's first description of reading. Ch his, his his, uh, first experience of reading Chesterton when he was in the trenches of World War I. So in, in the British Army. And what Lewis said about Chesterton's impact on him exactly. Paralleled chesterton's, I impact upon me. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, and I parti was particularly taken by the fact that Lewis said, well, I, you know, I was an atheist and you'd have thought that Chester would been the least conducive authors for, for someone sort of a hardened atheist like me.
Speaker 0 00:03:55 So I'm now looking at him, this is excellent. You know, this not a Christian, but he likes Chesterton. This is my kind of fellow, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So now he's got me grip and he says, you know, I couldn't help liking in Chesterton's sense of humor, uh, the way that, that he employed humor. Um, and, and basically he said, I, it's like falling in love. Now, I found in Chesterton, the friend, even though I didn't agree with him, and then he said, Chesterton had more common sense than all the moderns put together, except of course is Christianity. Right? So I thought, this is brilliant. The whoever the CS Lewis person is is even better than Chesterton. Cause he gets Chester own, but he's not a Christian. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So I buy the book right by Lewis. It's my first ever book by CS Lewis. And it was CS Lewis's book, surprised by Joy, which is of course Lewis's conversion story. So as I'm looking at the book, reading the book, I think he's gonna, he's gonna convert, isn't he? And so he does, but I couldn't, whereas I couldn't help liking in Chesterton, I also couldn't help liking Lewis. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So then thanks to Chesterton, I was introduced to Lewis and I started reading with Lewis's books. And that was, put those two together as a dynamic duo mm-hmm. <affirmative>, and you're certainly on the path to Rome and that. So I have both of them to thank, but I have chess to thank ultimately for Lewis as well.
Speaker 2 00:05:02 Yeah. So maybe when you were an atheist, what was it about Chesterton's writings that drew you to like, want to keep reading him to, as, as you put it, to right, to, uh, to love him in spite of his Christianity?
Speaker 0 00:05:18 Well, there's something about Chesterton's personality. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So when Lewis says it's like, it's like falling in love. You, you know, you've discovered a friend, you just want to be with him. There's something about Chesterton's writing style where you feel he's present with you on a personal and personable mm-hmm. <affirmative> level. And I loved the combination of humor and humility, which, which is, which is a very sort, disarming combination. But the other thing I probably, the most important thing of all that I learned from Chesterton that led me to Christianity was I was raised like most people of our, our generation, you have to choose between faith or reason, right? Mm-hmm. Yes. You can have religion, in which case you got the comforts of, you know, sentimentality and vision. Uh, or you can have reason, which means that you don't have those comforts, but at least you're not living the lie.
Speaker 0 00:06:04 Right? So, uh, I thought you had to choose. And then Chenu was the first person to bring to me that the whole idea of the indissoluble union, the marriage of fetus, vaio of faith, and reason, these things are inseparable. In fact, you know, the, the reason without faith becomes irrational and faith without reason becomes heretical. So, you know, when I saw this, I thought, wow, I don't have to make that choice. I can be rational and can believe in God. So that, that was very, the most important thing for me, which chest in the photo Aristotelian istic approach to the faith that I didn't know was Aristotelian optimistic at the time. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>.
Speaker 2 00:06:41 Yes. And one of the things that strikes me, uh, cuz you, you wrote a whole book, wisdom and Innocence Life of, uh, GK Chesterton, uh, published by, uh, Ignatius Press, I believe, right? Yes. And so I think it was one of, was this one of your first major?
Speaker 0 00:06:53 It was my, it was my first book. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:06:55 Your first book. And you know, it, it's interesting in there you discuss a lot about how Chesterton was a very well-known essayist, right. He, he wrote for newspapers, uh, he was a controversialist. He became well-known even before I think he became a Christian. And then when he became a Christian, he was very well-known. Uh, it's kind of, by the way, I think it's, it's almost hard for us to imagine how famous Chesterton was during his lifetime, right. When he visited Europe. Sometimes the sitting heads of states would welcome him in Spain and Poland. And even when he came to the United States, it was a huge deal. I think when he got an honorary doctorate at the University of Notre Dame, maybe like in the thirties, uh, it made national news. Yes. Right.
Speaker 0 00:07:42 And, and huge audiences wherever he went, uh, he was a, he was a celebrity, no doubt
Speaker 2 00:07:48 About it. Yeah. And, and, and a celebrity who really eventually defends Christian orthodoxy and eventually even converts to Right. The Church of Rome. And yet you, you emphasize how much he had these, he he maintained friendships with, with very prominent, you know, atheists, uh, of his day. I think probably Shaw might be a part, you know, George Bernard Shaw was a particular one, or, and, and many others. Could you, what do you think it was about his particular, in, in many ways, a very kind of muscular, argumentative defense of Christianity that went hand in hand with this friendship, with those with whom he disagreed with atheists?
Speaker 0 00:08:36 Yeah. I think he's an absolute inspiration in that respect. And, and actually this, it's this, there's a motto I tried to follow, which was from Chesterton's autobiography. Mm. And in this autobiography, Chesterton says, of his relationship with his brother Cecil, who tragically was killed in World War I, he said, we were always arguing, but we never quarreled. Mm-hmm. So this sort dis distinction between an argument and a quarrel, but I mean, again, it's another one of these defining moments in my own conversion path of a Oh oh, okay. There's a big difference. Cuz if you're arguing, you know, it's an act, it's an act of love with someone else to try to get the truth. And the worst case scenario at the end of it is, you know, the other person better, even if you don't agree. Right. So it's a win-win one way or the other.
Speaker 0 00:09:17 Yes. You're both closer to an understanding of important things at the end. Yes. Whereas a qual basically is you're falling out with people, you lack charity because you disagree. Right. And then the, the difference between the two are you, it, it's, I think it's the difference between heaven and hell, quite frankly. That is the, the, the, the, the distance is abysmal. It's an abyss. So, you know, I try to practice that. Um, I also, you know, I, I, a lot of my writing is apologetic for the faith, but, you know, try to do it with a, with with the spirit of charity, so clarity and charity. Right. That try, try to keep those two things had in hand. And Chesterton did that to an exemplary degree.
Speaker 2 00:09:50 Yeah. I think that Chesterton's writings often, you know, he really tries to enter into the mindset of both how kind of a an how the atheistic perspective sees the world, how the Christian perspective sees the world. And then also this kind of like almost third thing, which is something like what he calls, you know, maybe common sense, right. That if we just reflect upon how human beings, uh, right. He calls tradition, the democracy of the dead. We give the strangest people votes all the preceding generations. So this kind of common wisdom of humanity. And, uh, so maybe could you just say a little bit more about how he, how you see his writing as able to kind of, um, you know, I don't know, imaginatively enter into these various, like, ways of looking at the world.
Speaker 0 00:10:47 Yeah. Well, first, first of all, if you, we talk about clarity and charity being combined, but you know, love is disarming. So my own conversion story for my, my, I've wrote a book on my own conversion that one of the key ingredients were moments when my enemies, instead of showing me the hatred and animosity I expected, because that was the feelings I had towards them. Uh, they showed me love in response, which is very disarming. Yes. Yes. And so Chesterton shows this clarity always with charity, which means that, you know, so finish HG Wells, uh, you know, the Chesterton engaged with HG Wells. Uh, and whereas Ock also engaged with HG Wells and HG Wells, his understanding of history from a say deterministic perspective, Ock and, and HG Wells became enemies. Right. They, they snubbed each other in public when they, when they met. And, and they, they, they basically became enemies. Ock Beco versus Char's Chesterton's Charity. Chesterton wrote a booking response, the Everlasting man. Um, and you know, that he, he begins by praising wells. He ends by praising wells. Uh, and although they obviously disagreed and there, there's no doubt about that. HG Wells said, who basically died a sort of, uh, disgruntled, uh, cynical, disillusioned atheist. Uh, he said, if I get to heaven, it will be because of the prayers of my friend GK Chesterton. I mean, you know, it speaks of itself.
Speaker 2 00:12:04 Yes. Wow. That's really, that's, that's really, uh, amazing. And boy, that's I think a great, I mean, how, how important for our age today, right. Uh, to be able to, uh, you know, engage in thoughtful, rigorous debate and conversation, uh, without falling into, I don't, you know, kind of like, you know, uh, camps. Yeah. Uh, you know, or, or, or this, this kind of like, uh, you know, I don't know, almost like tribalism, like, Hey, this is my team and you're not on my team, so I don't like you. No. This idea that, uh, Chester was able to, I don't know how somehow he's, he's able to like, describe the errors that he sees in other people. And it's almost partly cuz I think he himself was there. Oh, yes. Uh, and maybe you could say a little bit about that, because I'm, you know, one of the things that he really tended to see and describe in his youth, uh, and in his own, you know, coming of age, uh, in his own studies, his own writing, and, uh, you know, reading, uh, was like this strong really despair, uh, that life was ultimately meaningless.
Speaker 2 00:13:13 It was without God, without purpose, it was, you know, should we even be, it's kind of like he goes back to act three of Hamlet when Hamlet says Right. To be or not to be. That is the question. And I think, you know, maybe you could talk a little bit about this, but, you know, Chester was not always the one who thought life was a gift. Well, you know, and he, he really struggled with the sense of despair, anxiety, pessimism of his agent. That was a personal struggle for him.
Speaker 0 00:13:44 Yes. Which is why, for instance, you know, he, he, he became famous in 1900 as a very popular journalist. He, he, his Christianity's implicit really from the beginning, but implicit, it becomes explicit with his book Orthodoxy in 1,908, which is defense for Orthodox Christian Orthodoxy. Um, some people were surprised, but they shouldn't have been because it was there in his otherwise is implicitly. But what the orthodoxy is, it is a defense for the, for the Catholic faith from the perspective of reason, but it's also very personal. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, it's actually his own con conversion journey. His own conversion story. And there's a lot in it about the fact that when he was in his, uh, late teens or the early twenties when he was studying at the University of London, the Slade School of Art, an art school, um, that he fell under the influence, first of all, sort of, uh, artistically aesthetically of the athletes of the decadence of Oscar Wilden and those people, he, he says in his autobiography, and we have no reason to disbelieve him that he, he never indulged in the vices of, of, of Oscar Wild and the decadence. But he certainly,
Speaker 2 00:14:45 He
Speaker 0 00:14:46 Imbibed the atmosphere, uh, of the aesthetic. And in fact, his early novel, which wasn't published until fairly recently, uh, posthumously, was is, is just like a sort of a pastiche of the picture Dorian Gray. So we can see that aesthetic influence. And then philosophically, he, he imbibed people such as Nche and, and more particularly Shopha with this primal pessimism that is ultimately nothing but mind, you know, even matter. We, we don't know that even matter exists. We only know that mind exists in, in our mind, and we don't even know what that is. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So there's this pri primal negation of reality. And so Chester attorney reached that to be or not to be Moment you talk about. Yeah. Um, and, uh, he just decided, uh, you know, that, well, if even existence is good, even if it's meaningless, it's good. And he says, that I held on to sanity with, with one thin thread of thanks. So this sense of gratitude for the fact that he existed and then fa gratitude for everything he saw in existence, even if they were fantastic magor. Right. Even though they were fantasm. Right. That they, they were beautiful fantasm. Right. And I, it's just a fantasy. It's a beautiful fantasy. So he began that. And then of course, eventually he discovers the vaio as well, the reason that that led him away from, from that subjectivism.
Speaker 2 00:16:07 Yeah. And that's also why I find, you know, in many ways, he's a strangely contemporary figure, you know, born almost what, 150 years ago. And yet the period in England at his, uh, when he was studying was, uh, kind of a collapsing Christian culture and civilization in which it had been a hundred years or so more ear earlier. It had been a more kind of profoundly, uh, or at least more broadly Christian assumptions that were, uh, you know, informing things. And, uh, but by the time he is, it's like that has all been kind of wiped away at the university level, at the level of, we would call him the elites, that that control kind of guide culture in these sorts of things. And so, in many ways, I find we're in a kind of similar situation today. People, you know, we're, it, it's a post-Christian society.
Speaker 2 00:17:00 It's a society that's bent on rejecting its faith, and therefore many of the young people like Chesterton and his age grow up. And I think I had this even, you know, as, as a young person with a deep sense that I'm not clear that it's good to be, uh, almost with this tendency that we're, we're almost mad at God for creating the world. You know, we're mad at God for creating us. We don't really think that the world is worth going on. Uh, this seems to be somehow kind of percolating into, I don't know, in, into the air we breathe, the water we drink. And I think it's partly why you have, I mean this, I don't, I don't think it's unrelated to, of course, the skyrocketing rates of right. Of, you know, depression, anxiety, uh, hopelessness, anger, resentments, all these different things that seem to be kind of flourishing, you know, in our culture today.
Speaker 2 00:17:57 So, so the way you describe it, it seems that there, there was a time when before and a way Chesterton came to say, faith in Jesus Christ. He first came to faith in existence, and he said, right, it's good that I am right. I think in, in one in Orthodox, he says, right. It's something like, um, you know, it's not so much that we need to have a, a human being or, you know, man developing wings. This mere fact that he has legs is awesome, and we ought to be excited about reality. So can you just say a little, I I feel like that point is really, and maybe I feel like that's partly why he's so effective as a whisperer, almost, of like, to con people that are not even at the moment open to conversion. They're not really thinking about Jesus Christ. They're not thinking about, they're really thinking about is, is life worth living at all? Right?
Speaker 0 00:18:54 Yeah, absolutely. And, and, uh, you know, there's some of Chester's most charming lyrics. They're not great poetry, but they're charming lyrics with great aphoristic wisdom. Yeah. Uh, were written, you know, when he was in his youth when he was coming out of this period of pessimism and subjectivism and, and just being grateful, uh, for, for life, for existence. Yeah. And there's a wonderful short atheistic lyric from that time, if I can get it right, give me miraculous eyes to see my eyes, those terrible crystals made alive in me more miraculous than all the things they see.
Speaker 2 00:19:32 Wow.
Speaker 0 00:19:32 That sort of sums it up that, you know, I, I should needly be able to see at a primal level, the, the miracle, first of all, that, that I am
Speaker 2 00:19:40 <laugh>
Speaker 0 00:19:40 And then the fact through this miracle, I can see other miracles.
Speaker 2 00:19:43 Yes. There's a, uh, Catholic physicist who's, uh, Stephen Barr, who's done a lot of writing on kind of showing how faith and science are not only compatible, they, they, they, they, they need one another. Science needs, uh, faith needs a kind of conviction that the world is fundamentally intelligible and that we can come to know it. But he says one time he describes kind of like, uh, a lot of the somewhat atheistic atmosphere among modern scientists, he describes this. He says, we're so good at seeing what is in front of our eyes. Cause we never see what's behind our eyes. Right. And, uh, now maybe I realize that he got that from Chesterton, right? That that can I see the miraculous, the like Right. The miracle of my own, seeing my own eyes, not only my ability to see visually, but my ability to see another person to see a truth.
Speaker 2 00:20:36 Right. The moment we see that, we see something in a way, right, that can't be reduced to materialism, it can't be reduced to mere kind of accidental, um, evolutionary kind of determinism. There's a, there's an act of seeing, an act of knowing, an act of loving, uh, that I think is just, it's just, anyway, it's really powerful to see. Uh, I want to take a break and then I want to come back and I wanna go through a little bit of some of just maybe, you know, a few highlights, uh, from some of, uh, chesterton's great books, uh, that I think would be of interest to our, you know, listeners and viewers.
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Speaker 2 00:21:48 So, welcome back and why don't you tell us a little bit about which books or writings maybe were most impactful for you from Chesterton, and maybe at the same time, which ones do you find kind of most helpful when you teach? Uh, which ones might you, you know, would be maybe, you know, that listeners might want to pick up and, and try to read?
Speaker 0 00:22:14 Okay. Uh, plenty to answer there. So I'll probably let you interject
Speaker 2 00:22:17 At some point. Sure. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:22:19 Um, but with, for me, actually, the first book of Chesterton's I've read was not a book that most people know about, uh, but it's a wonderful book, a late book of his. So, you know, I wasn't interested in religion mm-hmm. <affirmative> as i, as you've said already. And nothing would've enticed me to read a, a Christian book and still less a Catholic book. I was raised to be very anti-Catholic. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I was actually a member of an anti-Catholic secret society, so mm-hmm. <affirmative>, I would never read a Catholic book, but I was interested in politics and economics. Okay. Yeah. And some said, well, you need to check out Chester's Political and Economic Ideas. Right. Okay. So, and they said there was one essay in a particular book I should read. Um, and, uh, I said, well, sure. And what, what's the book called? The Well and the Shallows, what's the name of the book?
Speaker 0 00:22:57 And the essay, which was called Reflections on a, what? Apple was about two-thirds of the way through the book. So I thought, with this fellow Chesterton's Worth reading, I'll start from page one. Okay. And the rest of that book is a collection of essays by Chesterton in Defense of the Catholic Faith. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> the Well and the Shallows. So the well is the Catholic Church has profundity life giving water, and the shallows is everything else. Right. That was the approach of the book. Oh. And of course, I didn't agree with everything, but as with CS Lewis, I had the same with, uh, impact upon me that, that Chesterton had on Lewis. I couldn't help liking him, wanted to read more. So that was a big in my past. So I have a, that was published in 1935, only a year before Chesterton's death. So it was a late book.
Speaker 0 00:23:38 Ah. Uh, and, uh, so that I have a soft spot for that particular book mm-hmm. <affirmative>. But, uh, as regards chesterton's greatest books, uh, you know, people would normally say, uh, orthodoxy and The Everlasting Man, and perhaps his book on Thomas Aquinas. Uh, perhaps his book on some Far Sisi, uh, you know, I'm a literature person, so I, I like his novels. I think his poetry's uneven, there are some good ones. Le Panto is a to of force. Yeah. And, and several oth other Chesterton's poems are wonderful. But for me, the Man Who Was Thursday, uh, is, is a perennially brilliant novel that every time I go back and reread it, and every time I reteach it, I, he's just hitting me as being friends.
Speaker 2 00:24:19 Could you, could you say more about the Man who was Thursday? Because I, I, I've heard from a number of, uh, people that have tried to pick it up and, and I think, I don't know, but maybe 20 years ago I picked it up and I remember for the first time, just, I don't know, I think I got 50 pages in and just stopped reading. It was just like, it because it just say a little bit more. What, what should people know before trying to read, you know, the Man Who Was Thursday.
Speaker 0 00:24:45 Well, I'm glad you said that actually, cuz there are certain works of literature that are really profound that are difficult to get if you read them unassisted by yourself. Yes. So what, what I'll call recreational reading rather than guided reading. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, so Finn, other examples would be The Wasteland by TS Elliott, or, or the record of the Deutschland by Java Mani Hopkins. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Now, these are difficult poems that if you try to read The Man Assist the first time, you're probably gonna be perplexed or even a perplexed
Speaker 2 00:25:11 <laugh>,
Speaker 0 00:25:12 Uh, annoyed. So check the Man Research is the same. And the first time I read it, I thought, wow, that I enjoyed that, but I'm not sure why. And I have no idea what it was about <laugh>
Speaker 2 00:25:20 <laugh>.
Speaker 0 00:25:21 Um, and then you go back and you read and reread and, and, and you come to it. So, uh, I would say that it's, it's a dangerous book to read in the sense that you might find yourself wondering what earth is about and put it down. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, the experience you had is not that unusual. Yeah. But I would ask people to persevere, maybe under guidance, maybe find someone that, that's written about it or, or is taught it that you can, you can be guided through I better still in a class situation. Yeah. But in a nutshell, if we can do that, it's, it's, it was written the same year as Orthodoxy. Okay. And that's important cuz it's also really a conversion story. He's really saying, uh, the same sort of thing he's saying in Orthodoxy, but he's doing in the, in the form of a detective story.
Speaker 0 00:26:01 Okay. And sep you know, the, the, the, the question is who is Sunday? So the, you know, the first day is one of this, the secret Amicus Council, where they all have code names, so they don't use their wrong name, they use it day of the week. And Sunday is the president of this Amicus Council. And, and the question is, who is he mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, and it's the, the, the other six detectives are trying to find out who he is, are called the Six Philosophers. There's actually a, a chapter in the, the novel called the Six Philosophers. And they all approach who Sandy is from different philosophical perceptions and angles mm-hmm. <affirmative> and Chesterton's a brilliant as a storyteller, uh, because if he treat it as a detective story, as a mystery, right? Yes. Except you're not looking for a criminal. You're looking perhaps for the criminal for, for Satan himself, the diabolical Sunday as the diabolical.
Speaker 0 00:26:48 And, you know, he does these wonderful things. He gives Sunday throws out clues to each of them mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And you're saying, oh, and the first clue seems to make sense and now he's got your hawks. Right. Yeah. And you look at with his clues, and then the, that the, the penultimate and ultimate clue makes it clear these were all red herrings, all of the, all of the tricks of the, of the storyteller. But in the midst of the story, in the midst of the story, in one page, he gives three specific clues that, um, of who Sunday is. And the three specific clues are omniscient, omnipotence, and omnipresence. And every reader misses it. Mm-hmm. And this is a brilliant detective story cuz he, he's showing you the answer in front of your face mm-hmm. <affirmative> and does it in such a way, like a slide of hand, like a conjuress trick.
Speaker 0 00:27:31 Yeah. You don't actually pick it up mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And then at the end, you know, we discover, I'm I spoiler. So switch off if you don't wanna be spoiled. We discover that Sunday's not the devil, but it's actually the piece of God. He declares himself to be the peace of God. Ah. And then the accuser, the real anarchist. Right. Um, says, I cannot accept the peace of God when there's all this suffering going on, you know? Yes. Um, and then someone said, have you ever suffered, uh, and the final words of Sunday before he sort of disappears as, can you drink of the cup that I drank of?
Speaker 2 00:28:03 Wow.
Speaker 0 00:28:04 So at the end, the end of the novel is basically Sunday is revealed as God. So the whole thing, metaphorically or parabolically is the quest for truth, the quest for God, the quest for meaning. And it all begins with this, this radical pessimism, this shop andhow, you know, everything's meaningless. Right. Everything that's nothing makes any sense. And then the, the whole chase after Sunday, and he does lead them when a world goose chase is, if, you know, God is a loving father who plays hide and seek, right? Mm-hmm. And you have to want to find him in order to do so. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but if you do want to find him, you're given help.
Speaker 2 00:28:38 Yeah. Yeah. Those who seek me will find me. Exactly. Ask Haskin and shall be given, knocking the door, I'll be opened. Uh, that's really it. It's amazing too, because I think Chesterton, again, having this inside experience of modern philosophies and, you know, post-modern philosophies, saw that in many ways it was that fundamental rejection, maybe first of God because there is suffering, there can't be a God. And then secondly, because there is suffering, existence is not worth it. Exactly. No.
Speaker 0 00:29:12 You know, and, and, and if God does exist, which he doesn't, we don't like him.
Speaker 2 00:29:15 <laugh> Yes, yes.
Speaker 0 00:29:16 The hatred of a God, you, you, you say doesn't exist. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 00:29:19 <affirmative>. Um, yeah. And, and I think in part that is, uh, like, I mean, that is the fundamental like rebellious creaturely attitude that's encapsulated in, uh, Satan. It's encapsulated in, uh, we could see it in Kane. Right. Um, I'm not willing to maybe, you know, do the work that Abel did to have my sacrifice accepted, so I'm going to kill Abel. Right. Right. Yeah. Um, and I'm going to, rather than change to become harmonious with God or to recognize that I can't and let God change me, I'm gonna try to kill God. Right. Right. And, and in some ways right. It's that re sta state of rebellion. And so it's, that really is a beautiful way of putting it. So in some ways then the man of Thursday is kind of like taking all those modern post-modern philosophies and then showing in their strange way. Right.
Speaker 2 00:30:17 Christ actually is the answer Yes. Who says, right. Li life is worth living with suffering. Because one of the things he develops is that we're all in a way suffering. Yes. Which means it's not like we are fundamentally saying that our lives aren't worth living. Right. Right. Which is a and I think it's almost, it's like, again, it's this kind of truism that we almost take for granted now. Um, I was, uh, reading somewhere where they were talking about like the new malthusians who are worried about overpopulation not for overpopulation sake, which has already in some ways been shown to be false because human beings actually don't, you know, like we, we, we have the capacity to sustain enough resources, minus are, uh, fights and wars and everything, but that simply, I don't want to bring people into a world like ours. Right, right. Again, which in some ways is saying, my life is not worth living. And so I think, you know, ch that's, that's beautiful. You, you, uh, you, you describe it that way. The man who was Thursday, who I guess needs to, we need to discover Sunday
Speaker 0 00:31:15 Exactly. Need to discover the Sunday. And also Sunday at one point he turns on these people and some of them represent, you know, uh, istic philosophy. Okay. Some, some bli optimism. But he, he, he Sunday says to them, you are all well-intentioned
Speaker 2 00:31:32 Idiots, <laugh>,
Speaker 0 00:31:34 Uh, so in other words, philosophy. And he says that you will discover the secret of the smallest atom and the furthest stab before you, before you discover me, understand me. In other words, that what he is beyond human reasons, grasping human reason will lead us to, to an existence of him. And it's another wonderful twist in the novel. We can only go so far. Reason only take us so far. At some point, if we want to go further, God has to reveal himself to us. Mm. God has to show himself to us. That's moving towards the end of the novel. Revelation is necessary if you're going to go deeper into reason.
Speaker 2 00:32:06 Yeah. So first that idea that existence, its itself is good. And then secondly, that existence also though is bad. Yeah. Existence is at the same time Right. Wounded and broken. So we need kind of a declaration. And it's so funny Right. What begin in Genesis one, what do we get? God created the heavens and the earth in the beginning and it was good. Yeah. It was good. It was good. It was very good. So right. Thousands of years ago, we needed to be told creation is good and, and today we need to be told it is good. And then we have the new creation in Jesus Christ. Right. That that is, that that son of the peace of God who is not just, um, is not just like a cosmic principle, but is a cosmic person.
Speaker 0 00:32:54 Right.
Speaker 2 00:32:55 Right. Who goes through our suffering and somehow says it is good. Yeah. Right. So it says, we can go through our suffering and our sin and attain, uh, goodness. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:33:09 AB absolutely. And again, the man was Thursday, every, it's, it's so deep mm-hmm. <affirmative>, because the other revelation is that these six detectives are set out to look for the villain, discover who the villain Sunday is. Yes. By this invisible chief of police. Mm-hmm. Where they never see, cause he's always, they always meet in him a dark womb. So they never, never see him. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so the, the, it's revealed that actually he's the same person the Sunday.
Speaker 2 00:33:34 Oh, okay. So
Speaker 0 00:33:35 In other words, the, the God who in the dark, who prompts us to look for him mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, is the same God who's prompting us and to, to find him. Yeah. Um, you know, so it's, it's, it's, uh, so the desire for truth is something God puts in us that the suffering is something which is a red herring ultimately. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And we have to come to God through it, but it's not the meaning of existence, but then obviously at the end with the divine revelation, Kenya drink of the cup that God shows us ultimately Yeah. How we defeat suffering by suffering himself and the victory over it. Right?
Speaker 2 00:34:08 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yes. That's a, that's such a, such powerful story. Uh, hope people will, uh, pick it up and, uh, and, uh, you know, give it, give, give it a chance. Uh, also, so in his other two famous works, say Orthodoxy and Everlasting Man, uh, he, he begins, I think both of them, uh, telling kind of imaginative stories. I think at the beginning of Orthodoxy, he describes, you know, imagine you leave, uh, England and want to go discover an island when you end up missing the island. So you sail around the world and you come back to England. But rather than saying that you, you know, just came back to England, you go ahead and you think you discovered it and you keep discovering it. And then the more you keep discovering this new island, you start realizing it looks a lot like the Old England.
Speaker 2 00:34:56 And in the beginning of the Everlasting man, he often, he tells the story in a way that we are, if you want to think about Christianity, don't think about it as Christianity instead, don't think of the 12 apostles as kind of Middle Eastern or European. Think of them as Asian. Right. If you think of them as this weird near East, like this weird Eastern philosophy or weird eastern religion, you might actually listen to it. Right. And so in both of these images, he says, we're so familiar with Christianity that we don't take it seriously. Yep. And we don't even know what it is. We think we know what it is, so we don't recognize it. And so he, in both of these books, seems to kind of go around the world and he comes back to Christianity as if he's seeing it for the first time and helps his readers kind of see Christianity, uh, in its complexity and in its simplicity. Like anew
Speaker 0 00:35:55 Yeah. Fresh. I mean, again, it's, it's going back to what we said about give me, uh, eyes to see my eyes. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> or, or the other thing with chest, we need to stand on our heads in order to see something for the first time, because we've got so used to seeing it, we are not seeing it at all. Yeah. And I'd like a sunrise, you know, no two sunrises are unique, are are the same. Everyone's in that unique work of art, but do we see it that way? We don't normally see it at all. Right. Yeah. Because we don't bother to look mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, so Chenu sort of shows us that, that, that we need to stand on our heads to see something fresh for the first time. So going around the world, coming back and seeing your home as if it's a strange place.
Speaker 0 00:36:33 Alright. Yeah. Um, but the, then sometimes you stand on your head and you realize to your astonishment that you are actually standing the right way up. And the whole of your life prior to this, you've been standing on your head thinking it was the right way up. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, which is in a very paradoxical way of understanding conversion. Yeah. No, because you've taken all sorts of things for granted in your ignorance that you thought this was the right way. Things are. Um, and then you discover actually why, because you make a point of seeing it from the opposite perspective that, hang on for a second. I've seen it wrong the whole time. There's a wonderful line in evening war about conversion, even in war says conversion is like stepping across the chimney piece from a looking glass world, uh, where everything is an absurd caricature into the real world that God made and then begins the delicious prospect of discovering all a new, so like a very chesterton and understanding of, of conversion from by even in war there mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 00:37:25 <affirmative> mm-hmm. <affirmative> almost. It's, it's not so much putting on glasses that help us to see, it's taking off glasses that have somewhat distorted reality. Yeah. Right. You know, through our own ego and through, in a way Right. The, the egos and the distorted egos of our cultures. Right. And, and surroundings. You think
Speaker 0 00:37:45 The, the lens of prize distorts our vision basically to use cue your
Speaker 2 00:37:49 Metaphor. Yeah, that's right. Could you, so you, you, you call your book Wisdom and Innocence. Why are these two words particularly associated with Ek Chesterton?
Speaker 0 00:37:58 Well, I, I, I took the idea from two volumes of Chesterton's father, brown stories, father Brown, you know, father Brown's probably in terms of pure sales, he's probably his most popular works mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 00:38:09 <affirmative>. Um, and those are a series of detective stories. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:38:12 Basically what he's doing, father Brown is some sense is a response to Sherlock Holmes. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and Sherlock Holmes is very much a sort of, uh, empirically empiricist who looks for the material evidence mm-hmm. <affirmative>, so everything is sold by physical evidence. Whereas, um, father Brown looks at the metaphysical, you know, why did the criminal do it? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, if you, if you understand pride and sin, you understand motive, you understand motive, you can find the, the, the, the culprit. So, uh, so it was a repost, but the first volume of Father Brown story is called the Innocence of Father Brown.
Speaker 2 00:38:45 Oh,
Speaker 0 00:38:46 Okay. And a subsequent volume is called the Wisdom of Father Brown. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I was, uh, enamored of the paradox because in, in our worldly cynical way of seeing things, you have to choose right between innocence and wisdom innocence is, is mm-hmm. <affirmative> synonymous with naivete. Right. Uh, and or you have to get rid of your naivete in all become wise. Whereas an actual fact the innocence is just the absence of guilt. Right. Uh, is actually your being able to see with the childlike simplicity that's necessary to get the heaven so far. So Father Brown actually knows more than the criminals because he's innocent, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, and that that his wisdom is connected inexorably to his innocence. And it certainly is true that if we gain worldly experience, you know, we become addicted to sinful practices, to mm-hmm. <affirmative> sexual activity or to drugs or alcohol, whatever, then we are, we are actually not seeing things clearly any longer. We are a slave to, uh, our own habits. We are slave to our appetites. We're not able to see the world as it is. We're seeing the world as we poisoned it, as we've intoxicated it. So there is a connection between us innocence and wisdom. And what is true of Father Brown is very true of Chester, which is why I chose the title for the book.
Speaker 2 00:39:56 Wow. That's, uh, really amazing. And it, of course, you reminds me of that, uh, that idea from Right. Jesus himself says, right. Go out and be innocent as doves, but is cunning as serpent. So Right. We be, be more innocent so that you can become wiser because you can understand, you know, others. Uh, I think CS Lewis has a, uh, description where he says that goodness can understand evil in a way that evil can't understand goodness because the man who was awake can understand both being awake and being asleep, but the man who was asleep understands neither. Yeah. Uh, so there's a famous line, um, in Chesterton's, uh, autobiography. Right. He has this conversion to Christianity to orthodoxy maybe in 1905 or so. He's, uh, he writes his famous book Orthodoxy in 1908, but he's not received into the Catholic Church until 1922. And I wanna ask you two questions about that.
Speaker 2 00:40:53 Uh, one, we'll, we'll get to it in a minute, but is that it happens after a visit to the Holy Land. I just wanted to see whether or not you had any connections to that. But, but before we get to that, he says this, people ask me, or when people ask me, or indeed anybody else, why did you join the Church of Rome? Right? Remember, this is in Gli, this is in English where the Church of England is the right. I mean, Catholicism is still very suspect, uh, at this time in England. The first essential answer if partly an elliptical answer is to get rid of my sins for there is no other religious system that really does profess to get rid of people's sins. It is confirmed by the logic which teams to many startling by which, which the church deduces that sin confessed and adequately repented is actually abolished.
Speaker 2 00:41:38 The sinner does really begin again as if he had never sinned. Right. He goes on a little bit farther. Uh, he says, when a Catholic comes from confession, he does truly, by definition step out again into that dawn of his own beginning and look with new eyes across the world to a crystal palace that is really of crystal. He believes that in that dim corner, in that brief ritual, God has really remade him in his own image. He is now a new experiment of the creator. He is as much a new experiment as when he was really only five years old. He stands, as I said, in the white light at the worthy beginning of the life of man. The accumulations of time can no longer terrify. He may be gray and gowdy, but he is only five minutes old. Right. So this, uh, why did you join the Church of Rome to get rid of my sins? And again, we,
Speaker 0 00:42:38 To continue for our discussion just then, you know, the wisdom of contrition and confession leads to the innocence of forgiveness,
Speaker 2 00:42:44 Right? Yes. Yeah. So could you just maybe say a little bit more about that? About like his, his final conversion to Rome? Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:42:52 Well, first of all, I to to mention that the trip to the Holy Land that, uh, that obviously read a book called Lu Jerusalem had a profound impact upon him. Yeah. But I don't think that was the defining moment. Chester Tomb was a Catholic, effectively, essentially in 1,908 when he wrote Orthodoxy mm-hmm. <affirmative>, but he loved his wife Francis dearly. Oh. And Francis Chester was a very comfortable Anglican. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> quite happy to stay there, and Chesterton was not willing to do, to make that momentous step without her. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So he waited and waited and waited, and in the end, it was the only thing he did without her. He came into the church without her, and then she came in a couple years later and was a good Catholic thereafter. So the delay was ultimately through his love, love for his wife, you know, this, this momentous thing. We have to do this together Yeah. As one flesh, we can't do it separately. Yeah. But in the end, his conscience wouldn't let him delay any, any longer. Mm-hmm. He had to do it without her. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:43:41 And, and I think you can even see his description there of, to get rid of my sins. Yeah. Um, what is it that in so many ways people are looking for and longing for is a way to get rid of shame and guilt. Right. Uh, and, and here you have something and really perhaps the only thing that claims that your sins can be abolished. Yeah.
Speaker 0 00:44:03 Can you imagine though, right. Yeah. Chesterton knowing that yes, for 14 years, Uhhuh <affirmative>, uh, and knowing that many other people such as Ronald Knox and other mm-hmm. <affirmative>, Maurice sparing and others have been brought to the faith through his writings, and yet he's not taken the step himself. Mm. He must have become increasingly aware of the anomalous nature of his situation, of his standing mm-hmm. <affirmative> and the fact this was probably becoming sinful. Mm. That not only, you know, was he not having a sins forgiven, he was actually, you know, he'd been sinned upon his own head in the fact he was not doing what his conscience was demanding of him. Right. By this stage. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:44:36 And maybe in that way too, you can see even in another way in which Chesterton becomes so relatable, that this towering intellect, this towering imagination towering writer, and still it takes some time. Yeah. It time takes time. Yeah. Uh, you know, we to really summon up Right. All the courage to make that leap. Yep. Uh, you know, wasn't, wasn't, wasn't easy for him. And so for, for those who are interested or growing in their faith, again, time takes time. And Chesterton's a great example of, well, I mean, we
Speaker 0 00:45:09 Are arguably one of the great one, arguably one of the greatest intellects ever was Augustine. And he took a long time
Speaker 2 00:45:14 <laugh>. Absolutely. Yes. And it's also interesting, if you go back to Augustine, uh, he'd become a catechumen earlier, and then even a couple years before his final conversion, he started basically becoming a catechumen again under Ambrose. But it was still like a couple years before he has a scene in the garden. So, uh, well, thank you so much for being on the show today. I wanna close with, uh, three questions and, uh, partly so our listeners can get to know you a little better. Uh, so what's a, what's a book you've been reading lately?
Speaker 0 00:45:44 Book I've been reading lately, I've just finished reading actually. Um, father Elijah by Michael D. O'Brien that I've read about 25 years ago. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And I want, I'm writing a series for Crisis magazine called, uh, great Literature in a nutshell. Oh, yeah. And I wanted to include this, and I thought, well, I haven't read it for so long, I better go back and read it again. So I've read that again, thorough. Enjoyed this. That's the most recent book I've been reading recreationally.
Speaker 2 00:46:06 Yeah. Yeah. And, uh, maybe, uh, uh, just an extra question for you. Uh, what's, what's a book you've been writing lately?
Speaker 0 00:46:12 Well, I've recently finished a, a, a book that's a history of Christendom. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, uh, this can be published by Ignatius Press. And, uh, the title I've given to it is the Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful, uh, uh, history of Christendom in Three Dimensions.
Speaker 2 00:46:23 Okay. Well, that's, uh, wonderful. And when will that be coming
Speaker 0 00:46:26 Out? Well, probably not till the autumn at the earliest,
Speaker 2 00:46:28 I think. Okay. So maybe later this year, but thank you. And what's a practice you do on a daily basis to help you find meaning and purpose in your life?
Speaker 0 00:46:38 Well, I try, I, for, for years, since about amount of time my conversion, I tried to live what I call a healthy trinity. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. So I try to find time every day for spiritual fitness. Yeah. Uh, physical fitness. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> and intellectual fitness. Mm-hmm. So intellectual fitness takes care of itself with just what I'm doing. So it's really a question of finding enough time each day for the spiritual and physical fitness. So for prayer, spiritual reading, uh, and also the gym or some other form of physical exercise.
Speaker 2 00:47:03 That's great. And, uh, last question, what's a falsehood that you believed about God? Um, and, you know, how did it, how did it hurt you, and what was the truth you discovered through theology?
Speaker 0 00:47:17 Wow, that's great. Um, nothing like hitting me with the curve ball to finish with Michael. Uh,
Speaker 2 00:47:23 You know, I,
Speaker 0 00:47:24 I, I, I think that with me, I, I, God was, God was inexplicable. Mm-hmm. Uh, the Christian God was distant and it took reason, uh, a and charity of people like Chesterton to open my eyes to who he was. So, I don't know, I think that once I started to take God seriously mm-hmm. You know, first Chesterton Lewis Aristotle acquired us, you know, it was just like a, an opening out of a flower into the fullness of God's presence. Before that, you know, he wasn't important enough for me to, to care whether he was true or false. Mm-hmm. You know? Mm-hmm. He was this person who didn't matter mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, uh, whether he existed or not to this person who just was revealed to me bit by bit, by bit through reading these great minds that we've been talking
Speaker 2 00:48:08 About. Excellent. Well, thank you very much, uh, for being on the show. And again, for listeners who might be interested, uh, your book on Chesterton is called Wisdom and Innocence, A Life of GK Chesterton, uh, by Joseph Pierce, published by Ignatius Press. Great. And thank you very much. My pleasure.
Speaker 3 00:48:24 Thank you so much for joining us for this podcast. If you like this episode, please rate and review it on your favorite podcast app to help others find the show. And if you want to take the next step, please consider joining our Annunciation Circle so we can continue to bring you more free content. We'll see you next time on the Catholic Theology Show.
