Ladydale Diary
Saint Germanus, 2021
Today’s saint was the defender of the Church against the heresy of Pelagianism, which was rampant in the fifth and sixth centuries and seems to have lingered for several centuries afterwards, especially in England, where it remained a concern for both St. Bede and the Beowulf Poet in the early eighth century. For that matter, it is still rampant today in all forms of “self-help” spirituality. Members of the Inner Sanctum can hear me reciting and possibly even singing (if my memory serves me correctly) Belloc’s “Song of the Pelagian Heresy” in the archives of the Poem of the Week podcast.
Perhaps the event that has excited me most this week is the fact that I’ve begun writing my next book. The period before the writing of a new book is always fraught with a degree of anxiety. It’s like being at ground zero at the base of a mountain, looking up. It’s a daunting prospect. As soon as the climb begins, so does the adventure!
My next book, if I haven’t mentioned it, is a history of Christendom. The tentative title that I’ve ascribed to it is “The Good, the Bad and the Beautiful: History in Three Dimensions”. The idea is to have one chapter for each of the twenty centuries since the birth of Christ. This week I’ve written the Prologue, which I’ve entitled the “The Three Dimensions of History”, and the opening chapter, which I’ve entitled “In the Beginning: Life, Death and Resurrection”. I’ve also written a good deal of the next chapter, which is on the first century and which I’ve entitled “This is My Body”. It’s great to be putting one foot in front of the other and beginning the climb of this new and challenging mountain!
Actually, it’s been a very good week for writing. In addition to beginning the book, I’ve also written an essay entitled “Walking with Chesterton and Lewis (and Tolkien)” for the Imaginative Conservative, and “Beowulf in a Nutshell” for Crisis Magazine, the latter of which gave me the opportunity to write a little about Saint Bede on his feast day (Tuesday).
In Monday’s FORMED Book Club we continued our discussion of the best of Chesterton’s essays, which is really great fun, as well as being an opportunity and an excuse to re-read one of the finest essayists in the English language.
Tuesday evening was the monthly online gathering of the Troubadours. This month we discussed books we haven’t read before which we’re planning to read this summer. My selection was Tolkien’s Modern Reading by Holly Ordway and On Stranger Tides by Tim Powers. The reason for my reading the former (apart from a simple desire to read it anyway) is that I’ve been commissioned to write a review of it for the Chesterton Review; the reason for reading the latter (apart from my admiration for Tim Powers as a novelist) is that I want to see how Hollywood distorted the Christian elements in the novel for the 2011 Pirates of the Caribbean film which was based on it.
One of the joys of having a thirteen-year-old daughter is that one gets to go places one would never dream of going otherwise. At present, Evangeline is obsessed with Johnny Depp, having fallen hook, line and sinker, or perhaps that should be hook, skull and crossbones for The Pirates of the Caribbean films. Having watched these, we’ve been watching other films starring Johnny Depp, including Alice in Wonderland and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, both of which were much better than I expected or feared they would be.
With respect to my work as director of book publishing for the Augustine Institute, it’s been a busy week. Edward Sri’s excellent book on the cardinal virtues, The Art of Living, is on the brink of publication, with Susan Treacy’s wonderful book, The Music of Christendom, hot on its heels. In addition, a new book on the true meaning of Christmas by Michael Barber, author of Salvation: What Every Catholic Should Know, is almost ready for copy-editing. It will be a real challenge to have this ready by October so that it can be marketed for Christmas.
This morning (Friday), the focus of my weekly interview on the Son Rise Morning Show on Sacred Heart Radio was Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales and this was also the focus of this morning’s online lecture for my friends in Chile.
I’ve been out supping craft ale with friends for the past two evenings and will be watching my favourite football team, Chelsea FC, playing in the European Champions League Final tomorrow. And, to top it all, I’ve even managed to get to the gym three times this week. It’s been a highly fruitful and highly satisfying week.
Deo gratias!
