Chateau Lloyd

Posting has been light because I was busy finishing off Graham Greene's The Power and the Glory.  It is an absorbing story set during the period of Catholic persecution in Mexico, which led to the Cristero War.

Greene is vague on the details, giving only the most cursory references to time, geography and even characters.  Indeed, the primary character is a troubled Catholic priest with no name - he refers to himself as 'a whiskey priest,' a reference to his alcoholism.  He has also fathered a daughter, and in ordinary times, he would be a figure of ridicule and scorn, but against his will, he is seen as a heroic figure by the faithful who gratefully accept the sacraments from him.

I have to admit that I would have gotten more out of it if I simply read it as any other book, but instead, I found myself analyzing Greene's writing style, dialog, description, plot points and such.  I was therefore unsurprised by some of the plot twists, but Greene's ending was both surprising and satisfying.

Modern writing seems sterile, most juvenile genres, perhaps because people didn't have the wide experiences of travel, war, revolution and of course faith, as Greene did.  The West has been aggressively secularized, and a classic example is how The Force, which was mysterious and spiritual was redefined as a function of biology in the Star Wars prequels (another reason why I hate them).

Greene, like Evelyn Waugh, puts religion squarely in his stories, yet at the same time is not afraid to mock the hypocrisies  of its practitioners.  I picked up a handful of cheap paperbacks by Greene, and will continue to read through them.  They are only a couple of hundred pages, which is refreshing given all the door stoppers I've been reading over the past couple of years.

The restoration of Notre Dame Cathedral is a marvelous thing.  How encouraging to see world leaders visiting a sacred Christian space and treating it with such respect?

This goes beyond political pleasantries or diplomatic protocols - the cathedral is itself beautiful.  I have never seen it, but I recall being moved to tears by the beauty of the Dom in Trier.

When I was younger, I partly bought into the Protestant argument that golden chalices and detailed artwork were a form of idolatry, and that money spent on architecture was better used to feed the poor.  

Then I grew up.  I realized that faith is a not a zero-sum game, and that money spent on religious art actually can increase giving the poor because it touches the heart, and moves people to acts of charity.

These thoughts returned to me some months ago, when I attended a friend's funeral at a rural Baptist church. The building was purely utilitarian, the fit and finish were right in line with any other institution.  Other than the cross on the far wall, the main space could have been confused for a hotel conference room, which even had a projection screen.  The entire laying was sterile, reminiscent of a public school auditorium.  There was nothing to elevate, or inspire.  The service itself was something of a variety show, with the pastor sitting like Johnny Carson off to one side as the acts performed.

Returning to my parish, I gratefully took in the various images and icons, the Stations of the Cross carvings, chapel and various grottos for private devotions.  I should add that as far as Catholic church buildings go, my parish is actually pretty modern, having been built in 1957 in a college town, so it has many mid-century flourishes and the seating forms a semi-circle, rather than the traditional cruciform aisles.

Still, when the there are slow moments, I am comforted by those images, which help keep my mind on task.  I also think of the artisans responsible for the work, and the satisfaction they no doubt derive from glorifying God.

That's the larger point - if we view religious art as decadent and wasteful, we will have only secular art, which is far more vulgar and typically points to sin.  Is it not better to have talented painters evoke salvation history or should they go for the make their money in pornography?

One of the greatest negative outcomes of Vatican II was the destruction of so much religious art.  Our cathedral is currently undertaking a massive restoration project to undo the damage wrought on it by the reformers.  Vivid murals were simply painted over and the building was given a white, sterile appearance.  Nothing to elevate or inspire.  It looked Protestant.  I can understand why people would have left the Church upon seeing that - and I can also see how people might consider conversion when beholding the meticulous devotion and financial investment in sacred beauty.

This power was celebrated by G.K. Chesterton and Evelyn Waugh, who already seeing the destructive hand a modernism calling for new "efficiencies."

I'm sure they would loathe what passes for Protestant religious art, which is either abstract or kitchy and saccharine and self-indulgent.  I'm thinking specifically of soft-focus portraits of Christ, making him look more like a 1970s hippie musician than the Savior.  I suppose it's an outgrowth of the "personal savior" motif and as such He's more of a boyfriend or pal than the Son of Man.

Of course, a recurring Protestant criticism of religious art is that its somehow idolatry, which is patently absurd.  No one is offering sacrifice to the images, or attempting to trap a deity within a sacred statue.  Icons are what they appear to be - images that help center our thought on God.   What better way to contemplate the sacred mysteries than by gazing on an image of Our Lady of Guadalupe?

That's another element - much of the art has historic value, and when we look at it, we see how our forefathers perceived God and salvation history.  This in turn points us to seeking the wisdom of the Church Fathers and the writings and acts of the saints.  Archeology confirms that sacred art has always been used in both Judaism and Christianity.  That modern variants of the two have turned their backs on it only underlines how out of the orthodox traditions they have become.

For the last few weeks Billy Joel's "Honesty" has been running through my mind.  The scope and quantity of lies in public discourse is simply overwhelming.

As the title of the post says - everyone is so untrue.

It is no accident that Man's from grace began with a lie.  Lying comes natural to evil people and often reaches the extent that they lie about everything, no matter how trivial or self-defeating.

We're to the point where once-respected organizations are now rejecting their own reportage in order to toe the Party line.  It's completely self-defeating, but so is evil.

As the song says:

I can always find someone who says they sympathize if I wear my heart out on my sleeve, but I don't want some pretty face to tell me pretty lies.  All I want is someone to believe.

Apparently, pretty lies are in great demand these days.

There is a strain of thought - popularized by Hollywood and contemporary culture - that lies indicate intelligence, and clever lies are the sign of a superior kind of person.  This has obvious appeal to prideful people lost in their vanity, and is of a piece with the elevation of cowardice to a virtue as well.

None of this is new, Chesterton and Belloc wrote about it more than a century ago, and Waugh's writings also address the issue.  A key plot point in his Sword of Honour trilogy is how an otherwise admirable British officer convinces himself that the smart thing to do is abandon his men on Crete and save himself, only to realize that while lip-service is paid to such cleverness, in practice society finds it despicable.  

The scandal is so great that punishment is out of the question, and he is hustled off to the Pacific theater, where he finds redemption through conventional acts of bravery and courage.

Of course modern society also rejects the notion of redemption or forgiveness.  There are only the Yard Sign Calvinists and everyone else.    As I noted a couple of weeks ago, one of the most consequential shifts in American culture was when progressive Christians decided that their mission was to condemn rather than convert.

If one isn't trying to draw people to eternal truth, duping them with lies seems a reasonable thing to do, especially if you merely want to keep them in line.

It's a self-limiting tactic, but siding with evil has always been a sucker's bet.  That's because the biggest lie of all is that one can somehow escape divine judgement.

Yeah, it's a meme, but it's also true.  I recently started re-reading Evelyn Waugh's Helena, a small book about the saintly mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great (who is revered as a saint in the Eastern Orthodox Church).

It's a short book, easy to read, and Waugh's central conceit is to treat it as his "smart set" books and have people use the current vernacular. 

Waugh considered it his best book and was hurt by its poor reception and low sales.  It's not uncommon for others to favor their less successful books.  I suppose I'm somewhat of an exception because Long Live Death is both my biggest seller and my favorite work.

I'll do a full review when I finish, but until then I will note that the book has me once more reaching into my Roman reference library and contemplating that long-vanished world that nevertheless left all manner of monuments and important works.

Put simply, if you aren't thinking  of the Roman Empire, you aren't thinking at all.

The other day I was driving around and upon noticing the tendency of Protestant churches to fully embrace rainbow flags (or even the new "trans" variants), I had to wonder: why even bother with different denominations?

The Lutherans had one, as did a United Methodist church as well as the Presbyterians down the street.

Luther's "reform" was supposedly about recreating the "early Church" of his imagination.  I don't think he meant that to include pagan sexual practices.  Similarly, the Wesleyan movement was a reaction against High Church Anglicanism and built upon achieving "personal holiness."  Apparently this now involves intersex threesomes or something.  As for the Calvinists, I suppose they at least can claim that sodomites were predestined, though why a loving, just God would create perverts to damn them defies logic.

All of which is to say, if the big things like sexual morality and the meaning of marriage are up to revision, who cares about the exact meaning of the Eucharist or the form of the worship service?  The core message is the same: God loves everyone, including sinners, and there's no need to repent.  It's really an extreme form of the Baptist approach that being a believer is enough, and its strange that far older denominations should have gone in that direction.

I suppose if that is the centerpiece of your current thought, that would get the most emphasis, and the rest would just be details.

That being said, as the military taught me, attention to detail in little things is important.  There's a clear progression from dressing like a slob to becoming a slob, and the same is true in matters of faith.  If one section of scripture is now irrelevant, why adhere to the other parts?  If, as their digital message boards proclaim: "I am good enough," then why not sleep in?  Why bother to provide financial support?

I suppose it is no accident that the collapse of mainline Protestantism has corresponded with the explosion of trendy non-profits who offer vague promises of virtue in exchange for a cash contribution.

Indeed, this is a huge contributor to Yard Sign Calvinism.  A half-century ago, those denominations were filled with active volunteers who combined faith and works.  Now lip service to the right cause is considered enough.

I have read a fair number of pop-psychology and self-help books, always under duress.  I've found my archetype, identified my color and learned my language.

None of has mattered in the least because it's just the same warmed-over feelgood nonsense.

That being said, Richard Schwartz's No Bad Parts really does stand apart from the crowd.  I don't think I've ever read a book that combines such monumental arrogance with laughable ignorance while purporting to give expert advice.

In only 14 pages, the author declares that he has more wisdom than the Church Fathers and more insight than Buddha.  This is like the scene from The Princess Bride where Vizzini asks the Man in Black if he's heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates.

"Yes."

"Morons," Vizzini replies.

That's Schwartz's view of the world.  He's figured out the key to mental health, and he's also divined how to bring about world peace and solve all our other problems.  As the book progresses, he takes a less dismissive tone towards religion, modestly informing us that his methods are actually true manifestations of Buddhist thought as well as an interpretation of Christian philosophy that Jesus Christ would be happy to endorse.

It's the kind of book that both Evelyn Waugh and G.K. Chesterton have mocked, so the genre is actually quite old.  It's funny how these miracle methods keep popping up and yet people are ever more depressed.  Maybe, just maybe, there are limited to what secular analysis and treatment can do, and a vaguely spiritual worldview isn't enough to deal with the existential issues of life.

Of course, Schwartz isn't nearly as smart as he thinks he is, especially when it comes to religion.  His summaries of Christianity is a comedy of misunderstandings, but combined with his air of absolute certainty, one must either hurl the book through a window or burst out laughing.

Then there are the transcribed therapy sessions, which remind me of the role-playing examples given in Dungeons and Dragon books from 40 years ago.  It's unclear if their purpose is to show off the doctor's amazing therapeutic manner or just pad the page count, but I found them insufferable.

Aside from humor value, the book does contain about 14 pages of insight, chiefly near the beginning when it discusses the terminology used for various conditions.  That was genuinely helpful, but I could have gotten it from a pamphlet or web site. 

That was a long book.  There are big books that feel big, and books that don't.  This felt big, and the problem was that Saunders not only went into excruciating detail about his subject's movements, incidental friendships and even meals, he also broke up his narrative with extensive discussions of Ford's literary works.

I tallied 83 pages on on the Parade's End series, which is fine in terms of criticism, but if you want to find out more about the author, it's a heck of a digression.

I'm also going to call Saunders out for being a truly impressive fanboy.  I like Ford's work, admire his turn of phrase, but I'm sorry, Last Post was a clunker of a book, and there's a reason why Graham Greene did not want it included in his reprint.  As he points out, the book was not part of the original scheme of the work and was added on later to explore what happened to Tietjens and Miss Wannop.

Having read the biography, it's pretty clear that Ford is creating an idealized version of his postwar life, one starkly at odds with what eventually happened.  Ford should have updated it ten years later, including Wannop's bastard child and the fact that Tietjens has abandoned her for another young woman and regularly keeps his eye open for new talent.

Saunders desperately tries to excuse Ford, emphasizing his art over his morally abhorrent behavior (well, this was written in the 1990s), but there is no inherent contradiction between moral uprightness and literary worth.  G.K. Chesterton was a brilliant writer as was J.R.R. Tolkien and Evelyn Waugh.  Waugh had a wild youth, and was by no means the model father, but he didn't abandon his wife and children and let himself constantly be led astray.  There was quite literally no woman he had a relationship with on whom he did not seriously consider cheating.  The only reason he remained true to his final mistress, Janice Biala, was that he was too ill to consummate any more adulteries.

To his credit, he never truly abandoned his Catholic faith and tried to raise his children in the Church. 

Though the work is quite long enough, I would have liked to see less literary analysis and more about his extended family, including his illegitimate daughter and his brother Oliver, who pops into and out of the narrative without much explanation.  An epilogue on his descendants would also have interested me.

Instead, Saunders - like his subject - regarded Ford's death as the end of the line, and wrote no more.

The second volume of Max Saunders' mammoth biography of Ford Madox Ford has arrived and it continues to (mostly) impress.  Saunders does tend to get hung up on literary meaning, symbolism and his interpretation of why Ford's work is so great, but I have to cut the guy some slack.  After all, he wrote more than 1,000 pages on the topic.

He's clearly a fan.

This book picks up where the other ended, with Ford now serving as an officer in the British Army during World War I.  I will have more to say on this later, but one element that stands out is that after an awkward beginning and a severe episode of shell-shock, Ford actually took well to Army life, so much so that he considered remaining in the service after hostilities ended.  Apparently, he proved very gifted in providing lectures and mentoring young officers.  He would certainly have found a home in the training establishment, but he put his writing career first, and so was demobilized.

The rest, as they say, is history.

This is yet another point of comparison between Ford and Evelyn Waugh, who military service did not end on such an optimistic note.  To be fair, Waugh's service was of greater duration and he never seemed to find the ideal billet that Ford did.

But as Saunders notes, Ford was unusual among mobilized writers insofar as he welcomed the structure and rules of Army life, probably because they curbed his tendencies towards chaos.  Waugh, like most writers, found Army routine tedious, particularly after five years (World War II for the British lasted nearly six years; World War I lasted little more than four).

At any rate, this is probably the most painfully obscure topic I've ever explored, so I will endeavor to keep my writing about it as brief as possible.

Over the past week, commenter CN has deftly woven together two of the themes of this site - the corruption of Christianity and the complex personality of Ford Madox Ford.

The discussion of Jewish women indulging in neo-paganism reminded me of a consideration of paganism from a few years ago.

As I said then, paganism offers much that appeals to our contemporary culture.  It's bold, transgressive, and  it eliminates bothersome boundaries. 

The primary weakness is that once one casts aside restraint, why bother with religious ritual at all?  I think for the Boomer generation, there was something of a thrill in going to church in a bathrobe and slippers and the Gen X crowd went even farther by getting all tatt'd up and "blessing" same-sex relationships.

But why bother with all that?  Why not sleep in on Sunday?  The truth is that classical paganism actually had lots of rules and required frequent acts of devotion.  All those marble temples were used; they weren't just empty monuments to be admired.

This is why I think it is no accident that much of paganism is concentrated within the global church rather than rising outside of it.  This would of course fit in with the Enemy's designs of outright blocking the path to salvation by corrupting Christ's message and misleading His servants.

But even that thrill seems to be fading.  In places where Woke Christianity reigns triumphant, church attendance is almost undetectable.  It's interesting that the Anglican population of Wales (which needs six bishops (most of them female, of course), could fit into a mid-sized sporting area. 

Whether "observant" or not, a frequent recourse is to the display of virtue.  The old amulets and shrines have now given way to a bumper sticker or yard sign, hence closing the ring between neo-paganism and Yard Sign Calvinism.

For students of history, there is a dreary familiarity to all of this.  Just as the same worn-out heresies keep cropping up in new wrappings by people who think they've just invented the wheel, so the same old sins get repackaged as virtues.  Waugh, Chesterton and of course Tolkien all saw it, and it's still going on today.

Something to keep in mind as the latest "new neo-pagan" thing emerges.

When I first discovered Evelyn Waugh a few years ago, I could not get enough of his work.  Doing a followup search, I discovered his grandson, Alexander Waugh, had written Fathers and Sons: The Autobiography of a Family.

I really enjoyed this book, which goes through the Waugh family history and traces the development of its authors, who span multiple generations.  Naturally, the book also contains a discussion of the women, but the women of the Waugh family never took much interest in writing.  Laura Herbert (his grandmother) liked raising cows and was indifferent to Evelyn's writing.  There were no literary partnerships in the Waugh line.

It is an interesting contrast with Ford Madox Ford (there I go again), who all but destroyed his literary legacy by abandoning his wife and daughters.  Evelyn was never particularly affectionate, but his many descendants respect his work and defend his legacy.

The Waughs also provide a unique insight into how writers are shaped both by genetics and family tradition.  Most of Evelyn's (many) descendants never took up writing, but the strain of those who did continued the tradition of biting satire and sharp wit.