Austin Hall Library

We Walk to Heaven Backward

The story of life:

We advance to the truth by experience of error; we succeed through failures. We know not how to do right except by having done wrong. . . . We know what is right, not positively, but negatively--we do not see the truth at once and make towards it, but we fall upon and try error, and find it is not the truth. We grope about by touch, not by sight, and so by a miserable experience exhaust the possible modes of acting until nought is left, but truth, remaining. Such is the process by which we succeed; we walk to heaven backward.

--John Henry Cardinal Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons

A Favorite Theologian

Reginald Marie Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. (1877-1964), taught at the Angelicum in Rome for many years, wrote widely, and specialized in spiritual theology. He is generally regarded as the greatest Thomist of the 20th century. Among his students was John Paul II, on whose early thesis draft Garrigou-Lagrange is reported to have written: "Writes much; says little."

This great Dominican's magnum opus in spiritual theology is The Three Ages of the Interior Life. His Providence, written in 1932, and Predestination, written in 1936, are among his most famous works. The latter is a magisterial and scholarly treatment of the classical Catholic (i.e., Augustinian/Thomistic) understanding of the subject, and likely stunning to modern Catholics and Protestants alike. A bit more accessible to moderns than Predestination, Providence is arguably the greatest Catholic treatment of God's sovereignty and care for His creation ever written.

Conquering a Divided Heart: The Hardest of All Struggles

Whether known by the name "asceticism" or "spiritual combat", the struggle to overcome the deep division in our nature and to bring our lives into harmony with the demands of our faith is an essential element of Christianity. As Jonathan Robinson notes, "This effort involves a struggle with ourselves because we are divided creatures; we are pulled toward what is good, and we lean to what is evil."

However imperfectly practiced, the conviction that the Christian faith demands an effort to fight personal sin and to develop virtues such as kindness, patience, truth-telling, and chastity must be developed, acted upon, and sustained. And this does not come about through some vague notion of "spirituality", theoretical discussions of living the Christian life, or even solely the vital discipline of reading Holy Scripture. If one wants to live united with Christ, one must die to all that stands in the way of that unity.

I had occasion last week, in preparation to teach a class in my home, to return to one of the classics in ascetical theology, Spiritual Combat, by Lorenzo Scupoli (1530-1610). It is a short, straightforward, and uncompromising statement of the theory and practice of the ascetical life. It is my favorite book on the subject. The book is not complex, but it is highly condensed, and it presupposes a theological and moral formation that is rare today. Therefore, I always recommend that it be read with Jonathan Robinson's excellent, Spiritual Combat Revisited, which sets forth an analysis of the structure and main arguments of Scupoli's powerful book. Together, these two books provide the foundation to conquer the divided heart.

Don't be misled by the contemptuous way in which the term "asceticism" is sometimes used by moderns. The word asceticism comes from the Greek askesis and means practice, bodily exercise, and more specifically, athletic training. Early Christians adopted the word to signify the practice of spiritual exercises performed for the purpose of overcoming sin and acquiring the habits of virtue. As Robinson makes clear, at the heart of asceticism is the understanding that we are born in sin; we are saved by Christ; we must live in hope; and we can do no good without God's grace.

Integrity: It's Not What it Once Was

Mankind lost not only the supernatural gift of sanctifying grace in the fall. Man lost his preternatural gifts as well. His knowledge was darkened; he was no longer immune to suffering and death, but worst of all, he lost integrity (the subordination of his lower powers to the higher). When Adam rejected subordination of his life to God, he lost the subordination of his desires to his reason. Man was no longer a wholly integrated human being.

While the redemptive work of Christ restores man's supernatural gifts, it does not restore man's preternatural gifts. He still suffers and dies; he still lacks harmony between his reason and his desires. That's what the Apostle Paul refers to in Romans 7:14-25--the internal "civil war" in the redeemed human being.

Little is clearly said these days about this devastating loss of integrity and the profound struggle that goes on in man due to the weakness of his flesh. Failures in integrating reason and desires are most often explained only in terms of cold calculation and diabolical art. No doubt that exists, but what of human weakness?

Oddly enough, I have found this subject best addressed these days in the work of good Catholic fiction--through the pens of Flannery O'Connor, Walker Percy, Graham Greene, Cormac McCarthy, J.F. Powers, and others like them (E.g., here).

"Who knows what goes on in a single human heart?" That's the question voiced by Father Rank in Graham Greene's heartrending novel, The Heart of the Matter. Father Rank's uncertainty notwithstanding, the common plight of man is discernible. It is no further away than the recesses of our uneasy minds. As a consequence of the fall, a certain break opened up between reason and desire. It is painful to watch a human being ground down by the constant assault of the higher powers by the lower. But, it is a poignant reminder of what we have lost this side of heaven, a dramatic warning of consequences that await those who do not mortify the flesh in this life, and a summons to tenderness toward the hopelessly and culpably weak. But, most of all, it is evocative of the grace so desperately needed by any human being who wants to live at peace with himself.