Alasdair MacIntyre (1929-2025)

Tributes

• I Learned Virtue from Alasdair MacIntyre (1929–2025), by Wyatt Graham. The Gospel Coalition 05/26/25.
• Alasdair MacIntyre obituary The Guardian 05/25/25.
• Recognizing the Importance of MacIntyre, by John Haldane. First Things 05/23/25.
• In Memoriam: Alasdair MacIntyre, by Joseph R. Wood. The Catholic Thing 05/24/25.
• Alasdair MacIntyre’s Work of Mercy by Christopher Justin Brophy. The Lamp 05/23/25.
• Postliberalism’s Reluctant Godfather, by Nathan Pinkoski. Compact 05/23/25.
• Alasdair MacIntyre (1929-2025), by Russell Arben Fox. Front Porch Republic 05/23/25.
• Alasdair MacIntyre, renowned Catholic moral philosopher, dies at 96, by Kimberly Heatherington. National Catholic Reporter 05/23/25.
• Remembering Alasdair MacIntyre (1929-2025), by Christopher Kaczor. Word on Fire 05/22/25.
• Alasdair MacIntyre: de Nicola Center for Ethics and Culture. Collected conference / lecture videos.

MacIntyre Online

• The Perils of Revolutionary Aristotelianism, by John F. Doherty. The Public Discourse 05/05/25. "The fundamentally Marxist philosophy of Alasdair MacIntyre has less to teach conservatives than some have claimed."
• What Can the Right Learn from Karl Marx?, by Daniel Addison. The Public Discourse 12/15/24.
• The Left Should Take Alasdair MacIntyre Seriously, by Matt McManus. Jacobin 09/24. "Alasdair MacIntyre’s original critique of liberal modernity has won followers on the Left and the Right. His account of how capitalism has undermined the conditions of human flourishing deserves the serious attention of socialists."
• Alasdair MacIntyre's Adventures in Philosophy at Notre Dame, by Kenneth Sayre. Churchlife Journal 09/10/24.
• The Limits of Liberalism: A biography of Alasdair MacIntyre fails to illuminate, by Benjamin J.B. Lipscomb. Commonweal 02/12/23.
• Alasdair MacIntyre's Service to Theology, by Joshua Hothschild. Churchlife Journal 09/25/23.
• On Having Survived the Academic Moral Philosophy of the 20th Century, by Alisdair MacIntyre. Churchlife Journal 07/18/23.
• Liberalism's Two Sides: Alasdair MacIntyre and Richard Rorty’s lifelong argument, by George Scialabba. The Nation 05/23.
• The Oddity of God: A Preliminary Reflection on Alasdair MacIntyre’s Recent Comments, by John O'Callaghan. Churchlife Journal 12/08/22.
  • The Oddity of God, Part II: A Concluding Reflection on Alasdair MacIntyre’s Recent Comments, by John O'Callaghan. Churchlife Journal 12/13/22.
• This Christmas, Radical Christianity and Marxism Can Inspire Us to Build a Better World, by Matt McManus. Jacobin 12/25/22. "The conventional understanding of Marxism as doggedly anti-religious is wrong. In fact, as the philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre argued, Christianity and Marxism have at times inspired in humanity a radical sense of hope to build a more just world."
• The Anti-Modern Marxism of Alasdair MacIntyre, by Samuel McIlhagga. Jacobin 11/09/22. "Over seven decades, the philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre has advanced one of the most radical critiques of capitalist modernity. But in opposing modernity, he has denied a key insight of Marxism: socialism must develop, not reject, capitalism’s dynamism."
• MacIntyre's Flight from Politics, by Pierre Manent. Compact 11/02/22.
• Speaking with the Barbarians: Maritain, MacIntyre, and Christendom, by Anthony Barr. The Public Discourse 02/19/22.
• Alasdair MacIntyre on human dignity: Summary, analysis, and comments, by Edward Feser. Catholic World Report 11/26/21. "I strongly sympathize with MacIntyre’s general theme that the notion of human dignity is more problematic and less interesting than many contemporary Catholics suppose, but I’m not convinced by some of the specific points MacIntyre makes."
• ‘Dignity’ as Dangerous? Alasdair MacIntyre and ‘the Power of the Catholic Intellectual Ecosystem’, by Jonathan Liedl. National Catholic Register 11/19/21.
• The Fractured Metaphysics of Protests, by Alasdair Macintyre. Churchlife Journal 01/10/21.
• Revisiting Alasdair MacIntyre on Liberal Toleration, by Nathan Pinkoski. The Public Discourse 06/21/20.
• Alasdair MacIntyre: True friendships are rare, but possible, by Mary Farrow. Catholic News Agency 11/17/19.
• Christianity's Contribution to the History of Ethics, by Alasdair MacIntyre. Churchlife Journal 11/08/19.
• Marxism and Religion, by Alasdair Macintyre. Churchlife Journal 01/25/19.
• The Anti-Integralist Alasdair MacIntyre, by Caleb Bernacchio. Churchlife Journal 05/08/18.
• MacIntyre's Philosophy of Mercy's Clandestine Work in a Secular World, by Caleb Bernacchio. Churchlife Journal 02/13/18.
• Alasdair MacIntyre's Marxist Sweet Spot, by Timothy Fuller. Law & Liberty 09/11/17. Review of Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity: An Essay on Desire, Practical Reasoning, and Narrative.
• MacIntyre Against Morality, by John Haldane. First Things 05/01/17. Review of Ethics in the Conflicts of Modernity: An Essay on Desire, Practical Reasoning, and Narrative.
• Defending Alasdair MacIntyre’s Economics, by David Andreas. The Public Discourse 03/14/11. "Alasdair MacIntyre may be wrong about the details of finance, but he is right on the largest questions of political economy."
• MacIntyre on Money by John Cornwell. Prospect 10/20/10. "The influential moral philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre has long stood outside the mainstream. Has the financial crisis finally vindicated his critique of global capitalism?"
• The End of Education: The Fragmentation of the American University, by Alasdair MacIntyre. Commonweal 10/16/06.
• The Achievement of Alasdair Macintyre, by Edward T. Oakes. First Things 08/01/96.
• Review: Whose Justice? Which Rationality?, by Alasdair MacIntyre, by Richard J. Neuhaus. Commentary June 1988.
• Dr Küng’s Fiasco, by Alasdair MacIntyre. London Review of Books Vol. 3 No. 2 · 5 February 1981.
• Alasdair MacIntyre on the claims of philosophy, by Alasdair MacIntyre. London Review of Books Vol. 2 No. 11 · 5 June 1980.

Goodreads’ “Year In Books” — 9,501 pages; 28 books finished (with many still partially read). Not one audible book.

As to my 280% reading challenge score I admit to copying my friend Jeff Miller’s practice of setting the bar low (10 books), thereby ensuring a consistent record of success and personal gratification.

(I probably would have read more, but 2024 was likewise a record year for creativity with the most art I’ve ever drawn).

Planned reading for 2025, Lord-willing:

• Definitely more Herbert McCabe (Dominican priest / philosopher who I happily discovered this year) and revisiting Jacques Maritain;
• Short stories by Leon Bloy; A Canticle for Leibowitz (my reading of which is long-overdue), and Frank Herbert’s Dune Messiah (hopefully in time for the release of the film); Arthur C Clarke (Rendezvous with Rama, also with film in development by Denis Villeneuve); Ian McDonald (Chaga); a novel by Annie Proulx (Barkskins); finishing Pekka Hämäläinen’s North American history Indigenous Continent; putting a hopeful dent into more history by Jacques Barzun and Paul Johnson; and recently picked up Walter Isaacson’s biography of Albert Einstein.

So that's on my "to do" list for next year ... if anything, I'm ambitious. =)

From Enemy to Brother: The Revolution in Catholic Teaching on the Jews, 1933-1965

Among scholars of modern Jewish-Catholic relations, John Connelly's book From Enemy to Brother: The Revolution in Catholic Teaching on the Jews, 1933-1965 has rightly gained wide attention. Connelly, professor of History at the University of California Berkeley, drew on bulletins, journals, and books issued from the thirties to the sixties and sources stored in ar-chives at Seton Hall University (John Oesterreicher’s papers) and in Munich (Karl Thieme’s papers), Vienna, and Washing-ton. The book explores, through a chronological approach, the shift that occurred in Catholic attitudes toward the Jews and the move away from a long tradition of Catholic anti-Judaism and antisemitism toward new, more positive views. Connelly reconstructs this fundamental change, tracing an in-ternational network of protagonists who contributed, before and during the Second Vatican Council, to ideas that shaped the Council’s declaration Nostra Aetate on non-Christian religions (particularly chapter 4, on the Jews). He mainly focused on groups of Catholics who, since the thirties and in opposition to Nazism, had developed new reflections on Christian-Jewish relations in Europe and the United States. Among them, Connelly devoted his attention particularly to converts to Catholicism from Judaism and Protestantism (primarily Johannes M. [John] Oesterreicher, but also Gregory Baum, Leo Rudloff, and Paul Démann).

Connelly's thesis is precisely that without the contribution of these converts, the Church could not have arrived at a reconsideration of its position in relation to the Jewish world.Although the phenomenon of conversions is being considered with growing interest by scholars (not only those studying the modern age), many focus on biographies, and the historical narrative of networks connecting the converts, clergy, and intellectuals is still limited. One of the most convincing parts of the book is the analysis of the major role some converts played in pushing to change Catholic teachings about Jews and Judaism. Following this process, Connelly compellingly illustrates their contributions. He defines them as “border-crossers”: “The great majority of Catholics who wrote on the race question [about whether Jews were a race and not able to become Catholics] were Jewish converts, and virtually every figure of note in the Catholic battle against antisemitism was a convert....the irony of conversion, of crossing a border supposedly with no return, is that one never entirely leaves the point of origin. And the scandal of racism was that those expecting security in the new Catholic homes were told that they remained alien, ‘in fact’ ra Jewish” (pp. 63-64). This connotation of the converts as people living along cultural and religious borders between communities is thoroughly examined in the book.

The book begins with a stunning survey of the racist views of prominent early twentieth-century Catholics, among them leading theologians, many denying that even baptism could fully make Jews into Catholics. The author then analyzes some Christian voicesagainst first racism and then against Nazi persecution of the Jews. In particular, Connelly describes a memorandum prepared by Thieme, Oesterreicher, and Waldemar Gurian in 1937, in an effort to obtain an official pronouncement by the Holy See against antisemitism and in favor of the Jews.Approaching the decade before the Second Vatican Council, Connelly highlights the personal "journey" accomplished by some of these converts in a process of rediscovery of the Jewish origins of the Church (p. 189). Thisspirit inspired the foundation by Oesterreicher of the Institute for Judeo-Christian studies at Seton Hall University in 1953, and especially the influential Apeldoorn initiative beginning in 1958 to rethink Christian theologies of Judaism (and Christian read-ings of Scripture) before the Council. In the last chapter of the book, Connelly sums up some of the main revisions of the conversionist attitude that for centuries had marked the behavior of Catholic institutions and congregations toward Jews. Starting from a mission intended to get Jews to convert to Catholicism, Oesterreicher, Thieme, and others moved the Church toward a mission of self-redefinition and ressourcement, with new attitudes toward the Jews and to the Church’s own Jewish roots.

-- Maria Chiara Rioli Studies in Christian-Jewish Relations.

~ *** ~

While not academically trained, I've read my fair share of books on Jewish-Christian relations and Catholic-Jewish dialogue over the decade. None of them come close to the achievement of Connelly's, which I imagine will be a resource for years to come. Though published in , I'm happy to have discovered and to have read it.

When discussing Catholic resistance to National Socialism and protection of the Jews, it is my impression that Catholics tend to get particularly defensive, focusing their attention on notable figures who distinguished themselves by speaking out in defense of, or actively protecting, the Jewish people. The antagonists in their scenario tend to be the Nazis, depicted as chiefly secular, atheist, pagan or anti-Christian (which they were to a large extent). Lost in this perspective, however, is a clear and deserved recognition of just how deeply entrenched antisemitism -- both of a racial and religious variety -- was among parishioners and clergy within the Catholic Church itself (to be clear, the Catholic Church in Europe is the focus here). Under such circumstances, it is not at all suprising that those few who struggled to come to arrive at better relations with the Jewish people were often met with ecclesiastical roadblocks and outright opposition from the clergy on multiple levels within the Church. Connelly's intensive historical research into this era of the Church under National Socialism is worth the price of the volume alone as a reference resource.

Connelly makes a notable observation that

“From the 1840s until 1965, virtually every activist and thinker who worked for Catholic-Jewish reconciliation was not originally Catholic. Most were born Jewish. Without converts, the Catholic Church would not have found a new language to speak to the Jews after the Holocaust.”

Catholics are probably acquainted to some degree (even nominally) with Jacques Maritain and Deitrich von Hildebrand (both recognized as early opponents to anti-semitism, howbeit moving on to other matters post-war). This book does an IMMENSE service in featuring the intellectual biographies of Johannes (later John) Oesterreicher, a Jewish convert and priest, and Karl Thieme, a convert from Luthernism, and the instrumental roles both played in countering antisemitism within the Church during National Socialism and later, in laying the theological groundwork for the drafting of Vatican II's Nostra Aetate.

Expectedly, Connelly arrives at the hope and conclusion that the Catholic Church -- in embracing its "elder brothers and sisters" -- ought to categorically forsake its mission to convert the Jews as a people. This was the ultimate conclusion of Karl Thieme, and to a degree Osterreicher as well in the last years of his life (who while never turning away individual requests for baptism, admittedly did not have any great success in his early efforts to convert Jews in the United States). One can't help but observe the irony in that if Jews like Osterreicher had never been permitted to convert in the first place, it would be questionable whether the Church would have arrived at the place it occupies now in its relations with the Jewish people.

Reviews and Discussion

• Review: From Enemy to Brother. The revolution in Catholic teaching on the Jews 1933-1965 by John S. Conway. Contemporary Church History Quarterly 19:4 (December 2013).
• Catholics and Jews: The Great Change, by Garry Wills. The New York Review
• Jacob and Esau, by Nicholas J. Healy, Jr. First Things January 2013. I concur with Healy's observation:

  Connelly argues that Oesterreicher “abandoned his missionary approach . . . for ecumenism,” that "his goal at the beginning was the opposite of what became the end point." The end point is "not one of Jews becoming Christians, or anything but Jews."

  The irony of Connelly’s narrative is that it is only because of the gifts of converts that the Catholic Church has renounced (he believes) the missionary hope that others will enter the Church. But the final irony is more paradoxical. Connelly is writing as a historian and, for the most part, he seeks to avoid direct engagement with theological debates. It is, however, impossible to reflect on the histori>cal setting and the significance of Nostra Aetate without touching on one of the thorniest questions confronting the Church. How can we hold together the universality of Christ’s saving work and God’s perduring election of the Jewish people?" [read the rest]

• Building on "Nostra Aetate" - 50 Years of Christian-Jewish Dialogue, by Cardinal Kurt Koch. Address delivered by Cardinal Koch at the Angelicum University in Rome under the auspices of the John Paul II Center for Interreligious Dialogue. (05/06/12).
• ‘What Our Church Has Inflicted on Judaism’: An Exchange on Catholic-Jewish Dialogue, Stephen Englund. (Part of Getting Past Supersessionism: An Exchange on Catholic-Jewish Dialogue).Commonweal 02/10/14.
• Selected Works of John M. Oesterreicher Seton Hall University. [Archive] / see also co-authored theological articles.
• To Evangelize, or Not to Evangelize? Against The Grain 03/21/05.

Goodreads 2020 - Highlights of Another Year in Reading

Surprised I met my GoodReads challenge this year, since up to this point my most efficient reading time is the 1.5 hours to/from work on the subway -- I slacked off a bit March-May as the pandemic hit but as I adjusted to the present circumstances I turned to late-night reading.

Perhaps as a means of escape from the pandemic I picked up more fiction than usual, and discovered some intriguing new authors along the way.

If anybody reading this uses GoodReads feel free to look me up and friend me -- I'm always curious what others in my audience are reading!

Personal highlights:

• Eric Foner, The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and American Slavery - comprehensive and definitive examination of the subject. I found him to be very fair: critical where criticism is certainly warranted, likewise credit where credit's due (Lincoln's position on slavery evolved over the course of his presidency).
• Thomas Merton, The Living Bread - meditations on the Eucharist.
• Emery de Gall, O Lord, I Seek Your Countenance: Explorations and Discoveries in Pope Benedict XVI -- very substantial work of Ratzinger scholarship, especially his chapter discussing Ratzinger's contributions as peritus to Vatican II.
• Edward T. Oakes, SJ A Theology of Grace in Six Controversies -- an exploration of theological dilemmas such as nature and grace, free will and predestination, experience and divinization; sin and justification; original sin and evolution. I like Oakes' for the breadth of his own reading (Catholic, Orthodox, Protestant) which he makes ample use of.
• Fr. Garrigou Lagrange, The Essence & Topicality of Thomism -- a treasure ... the bad rap he gets among the Ressourcement theologians is, at least in my mind, undeserved.
• Stuart Walton, The Devil's Dinner - an informative "biological, gastronomical, and cultural history" of the chili pepper. The first two chapters alone on the origins of the chile pepper in South/Central America and its subsequent introduction -- by way of Portuguese trading -- to the entire world (India, Thailand, China, et al., each continent or country giving its own culinary spin to its use) is worth the read alone. Very informative.
• William Faulkner, Light in August. I went on a Hemingway binge a few years ago. Lately I've been on a Faulkner binge, intending to read his works along with a biography on my list for 2021). Faulkner can be very dense at times, with odd syntax and a "stream-of-consciousness" style (ex. The Sound and the Fury), but I found this one more readily accessible.

Some new discoveries:

• John Le Carre - spurred by the news of the author's passing this year, I had enjoyed various movie adaptations of Le Carre's work (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy; A Most Wanted Man) and decided to read the whole series featuring his character "George Smiley". Knocked out the first two this year, Call for the Dead and A Murder of Quality.
• Vasily Grossman, Everything Flows -- a Russian novelist whose work was introduced as a source to Timothy Snyder's magnificent Bloodlands: Europe Between Hitler and Stalin (2010). This is Vasily Grossman's unfinished and final novel, written after the Soviet police seized his earlier work and left him to write alone. It's about a prisoner returning to Moscow from the Gulag after 30 years and readjusting to the world around him, together with an account of the Ukranian terror-famine of 1932-33. (I now want to read his suppressed masterpiece Life and Fate, an epic account of World War II).
• Ian McGuire, The North Water - oddly enough, I spotted the literary vocalist Neil Fallon (of the American rock band Clutch) reading this in a video tour of the band's bus, figured "why not check it out?" -- a delightful, gritty romp of mystery, murder and arctic survival in 1859. McGuire has a unique and visceral way with words. I'd like to read more of his novels in the new year.

"The Light of Christ: An Introduction to Catholicism", by Thomas J. White

The Light of Christ: An Introduction to Catholicism
by Thomas Joseph White.
The Catholic University of America Press (August 4, 2017). 328 pages.

The Light of Christ provides an accessible presentation of Catholicism that is grounded in traditional theology, but engaged with a host of contemporary questions or objections. Inspired by the theologies of Irenaeus, Thomas Aquinas and John Henry Newman, and rooted in a post-Vatican II context, Fr. Thomas Joseph White presents major doctrines of the Christian religion in a way that is comprehensible for non-specialists: knowledge of God, the mystery of the Trinity, the Incarnation and the atonement, the sacraments and the moral life, eschatology and prayer.

At the same time, The Light of Christ also addresses topics such as evolution, the modern historical study of Jesus and the Bible, and objections to Catholic moral teaching. Touching on the concerns of contemporary readers, Fr. White examines questions such as whether Christianity is compatible with the findings of the modern sciences, do historical Jesus studies disrupt or confirm the teaching of the faith, and does history confirm the antiquity of Catholic claims.

This book serves as an excellent introduction for young professionals with no specialized background in theology who are interested in learning more about Catholicism, or as an introduction to Catholic theology. It will also serve as a helpful text for theology courses in a university context.

As Fr. White states in the book's introduction: "This is a book that offers itself as a companion. I do not presume to argue the reader into the truths of the Catholic faith, though I will make arguments. My goal is to make explicit in a few broad strokes the shape of Catholicism. I hope to outline its inherent intelligibility or form as a mystery that is at once visible and invisible, ancient and contemporary, mystical and reasonable."

Fr. White is the director of the Thomistic Institute at the Dominican House of Studies, Washington, D.C., and author of many books, including Wisdom in the Face of Modernity: A Thomistic Study in Natural Theology, The Incarnate Lord: A Thomistic Study in Christology, and Exodus Theological Commentary. He is co-editor of the academic journal Nova et Vetera and in 2011 was appointed an ordinary member of the Pontifical Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas.

Related

• The Light of Christ: A Conversation with Thomas J. White, OP - Thomas Joseph White, O.P., joins First Things editor R. R. Reno in a conversation about his new book. 10/13/17.
• The Light of Christ is far more than an "Introduction", by James V. Schall. Catholic World Report 10/6/17: "Fr. Thomas Joseph White’s new book is an erudite, rich, and accessible guide to Catholicism that demonstrates in the inner cohesion and profound logic of the Faith."
• A Review of Fr. Thomas Joseph White’s The Light of Christ, by Casey Chalk. Called to Communion 11/20/17.
• [Counterpoint]: A Life, Not a Grammar: The Limits of Theology, by Paul J. Griffiths, Commonweal 03/01/18. "A form of life isn’t the kind of thing that can be introduced by elucidating its grammar."
• A Searcher Discovers Thomas Aquinas The Public Discourse 11/12/18.

Exploring Aquinas with the help of Reinhard Hutter

In Dust Bound for Heaven: Explorations in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas, pp. 20-25, Reinhard Hutter provides an immensely helpful and insightful list of books for those interested in further explorations of St. Thomas Aquinas:

For those readers who come as neophytes to the thought of Thomas, the following invitation to further explorations should serve as a beginner’s guide to his philosophy and theology, a beginner’s guide that gradually progresses to some more substantive and demanding interpretations of Thomas that are most helpful. For those readers already more advanced in their encounter with Thomas’s teaching and for those who would call themselves Thomists, the more demanding among the following list of studies simply indicate among a much larger body of Aquinas scholarship those works to which I am most gratefully indebted.

The best popular introduction to Thomas’s life and work remains G. K. Chesterton, Saint Thomas Aquinas (2009) and the best recent scholarly introduction is Jean-Pierre Torrell, O.P., Saint Thomas Aquinas, Volume 1: The Person and His Work (2005). For a lovely, accessible, yet still profound paraphrase of the Summa theologiae in pocket size, the reader might turn to Walter Farrell, O.P., and Martin J. Healy, My Way of Life: Pocket Edition of St. Thomas: The Summa Simplified for Everyone (1952).

The most accessible and concise introduction to Thomas’s philosophy is Edward Feser, Aquinas: A Beginner’s Guide (2009), to Thomas’s theology is Michael Dauphinais and Matthew Levering, Knowing the Love of Christ: An Introduction to the Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (2002), to Thomas’s ethics is Paul Wadell, The Primacy of Love: An Introduction to the Ethics of Thomas Aquinas (1992), and to Thomas’s masterwork, the Summa theologiae, is Jean-Pierre Torrell, O.P., Aquinas’s Summa: Background, Structure, and Reception (2005). An exceedingly helpful resource to Thomas’s theology for beginners is Joseph P. Wawrykow, The Westminster Handbook to Thomas Aquinas (2005). Those readers who want to get an exposure to Thomas’s theology under the guidance of leading contemporary Aquinas scholars should turn to The Theology of Thomas Aquinas, edited by Rik Van Nieuwenhove and Joseph Wawrykow (2005). For a brief, concise, and lucid account of the remarkable history of reception, interpretation, defense, and application of Thomas’s thought in the course of the more than seven centuries since his death, students of Thomas should turn to Romanus Cessario, O.P., A Short History of Thomism (2005). For a useful guide into various aspects of Thomas’s philosophical thought that organizes his theology, the beginner might turn to The Cambridge Companion to Aquinas, edited by Norman Kretzmann and Eleonore Stump (1993). For a first introduction into Thomas’s metaphysics that is as accessible as it is lucid, one can hardly do better than to avail oneself of W. Norris Clarke, S.J., The One and the Many: A Contemporary Thomistic Metaphysics (2001).

For a balanced and lucid overview of and solid introduction to all topics treated in the Summa theologiae, the student of Thomas’s thought might first want to consult Brian Davies, O.P., The Thought of Thomas Aquinas (1992). However, the reader who is looking for guides to the most central treatises of Thomas’s masterpiece will find excellent guidance from the following studies, which are not listed alphabetically but along the lines of the order of teaching (ordo disciplinae) the Summa theologiae unfolds.

On the First Part of the Summa:

• The Hackett Aquinas: The Treatise on the Divine Nature. Summa Theologiae I, 1-13 (2006)
• Rudi te Velde, Aquinas on God: The “Divine Science” of the Summa Theologiae (2006)
• Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., The One God: A Commentary on the First Part of St. Thomas’ Theological Summa (1943)
• Matthew Levering, Scripture and Metaphysics: Aquinas and the Renewal of Trinitarian Theology (2004)
• Gilles Emery, O.P., The Trinitarian Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (2010)
• Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., The Trinity and God the Creator: Commentary on St. Thomas’ Theological Summa I, 27-119 (1952)
• Robert E. Brennan, O.P., Thomistic Psychology: A Philosophic Analysis of the Nature of Man (1941)
• Pia Francesca de Solenni, A Hermeneutic of Aquinas’s Mens through a Sexually Differentiated Epistemology: Toward the Understanding of Woman as Imago Dei (2000)
• Bernard Lonergan, S.J., Grace and Freedom: Operative Grace in the Thought of St. Thomas Aquinas (2000)
• Jacques Maritain, God and the Permission of Evil (1966)
• Herbert McCabe, O.P., God and Evil in the Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (2010)

On the First of the Second Part of the Summa:

• Servais Pinckaers, O.P., The Sources of Christian Ethics (1995)
• Denis J. M. Bradley, Aquinas on the Twofold Human Good: Reason and Human Happiness in Aquinas’s Moral Science (1997)
• Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., Beatitude: A Commentary on Thomas’ Theological Summa I-II, 1-54 (1956)
• Ralph McInerny, Ethica Thomistica: The Moral Philosophy of Thomas Aquinas (1982)
• Steven A. Long, The Teleological Grammar of the Moral Act (2007)
• Stephen L. Brock, Action and Conduct: Thomas Aquinas and the Theory of Action (1998)
• Nicholas E. Lombardo, O.P., The Logic of Desire: Aquinas on Emotion (2010)
• George P. Klubertanz, S.J., Habits and Virtues: A Philosophical Analysis (1965)
• Josef Pieper, The Four Cardinal Virtues: Prudence, Justice, Fortitude, Temperance (1965)
• Romanus Cessario, O.P., The Moral Virtues and Theological Ethics (2008)
• Fulvio di Blasi, God and the Natural Law: A Rereading of Thomas Aquinas (2006)
• Jean Porter, Nature as Reason: A Thomistic Theory of the Natural Law (2005)
• Charles Journet, The Meaning of Grace (1960)
• Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., Grace: Commentary on the Summa Theologica of St. Thomas, I-II, 109-114 (2010)
• Joseph P. Wawrykow, God’s Grace and Human Action: “Merit” in the Theology of Thomas Aquinas (1995)

On the Second of the Second Part of the Summa:

• Stephen J. Pope (ed.), The Ethics of Aquinas (2002)
• Lawrence Dewan, O.P., Wisdom, Law, and Virtue: Essays in Thomistic Ethics (2008)
• Romanus Cessario, O.P., Christian Faith and the Theological Life (1996)
• Romanus Cessario, O.P., The Virtues, Or, the Examined Life (2002)
• Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P., The Theological Virtues, Volume 1: On Faith (1965)
• Michael Sherwin, O.P., By Knowledge and by Love: Charity and Knowledge in the Moral Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (2004)
• Josef Pieper, Faith, Hope, Love (1997)
• Hans Urs von Balthasar, Thomas und die Charismatik: Kommentar zu Thomas von Aquin, Summa Theologica II-II 171-182, besondere Gnadengaben und die zwei Wege menschlichen Lebens (1996).

On the Third Part of the Summa:

• Romanus Cessario, O.P., Christian Satisfaction in Aquinas (1982)
• Paul Gondreau, The Passions of Christ’s Soul in the Theology of St. Thomas Aquinas (2009)
• Matthew Levering, Christ’s Fulfillment of Torah and Temple: Salvation according to Thomas Aquinas (2002)
• Reginald Garrigou Lagrange, O.P., Christ the Saviour: A Commentary on the Third Part of the Theological Summa of St. Thomas
• Coleman E. O’Neill, O.P., Meeting Christ in the Sacraments (2002)
• Abbot Vonier, O.S.B., A Key to the Doctrine of the Eucharist (2003-2004)
• Charles Journet, The Mass: The Presence of the Sacrifice of the Cross (2008)

To assist the reader in grasping Aquinas' philosophy (without which his theology "cannot be adequately understood, let alone appreciated"), Hutter offers the following recommendations:

The most thorough historical-genetic treatment of Thomas’s philosophy is John F. Wippel, The Metaphysical Thought of Thomas Aquinas: From Finite Being to Uncreated Being (2000). The best account to see Thomas’ metaphysics concretely at work in a conceptual reconstruction of its main moves would be Lawrence Dewan, O.P., Form and Being (2006). Eleonore Stump, Aquinas (2003), offers an excellent treatment of Thomas’s thought, primarily his philosophy, but also aspects of his theology, that is directed to a readership influenced by analytic philosophy and the natural sciences. Inspired by an Aristotelian-Thomist integration of natural philosophy and metaphysics, Benedict M. Ashley, O.P., in his opus magnum, The Way toward Wisdom: An Interdisciplinary and Intercultural Introduction to Metaphysics (2006), offers an impressive demonstration of how the pursuit of philosophical wisdom along the lines of Thomas — metaphysics as meta-science — allows a comprehensive vision of all human sciences in a coherent and expansive framework. Jacques Maritain’s earlier and in many ways unsurpassed classic, Distinguish to Unite or The Degrees of Knowledge (1995), offers an even more expansive framework of Thomist epistemology: from the knowledge conveyed by the senses to natural philosophy and natural science, from there to metaphysical knowledge and theological knowledge, and finally to mystical knowledge. And in order to find out why indeed Thomism as a coherent intellectual tradition of philosophical discourse and inquiry proves superior to modern and postmodern modes of such discourse and inquiry, one cannot do better than turn to think through the argument advanced in what has become a classic in a very brief time: Alasdair MacIntyre’s Gifford Lectures, Three Rival Versions of Moral Inquiry: Tradition, Encyclopaedia, Genealogy (1990). Another set of expanded Gifford Lectures offers a brilliant and spirited defense of Thomas’s understanding of philosophical wisdom. No other recent work will help the interested reader better to understand why natural theology was absolutely indispensable to Thomas’s overall theological project than Ralph McInerny, Praeambula Fidei: Thomism and the God of the Philosophers (2006). For a contemporary restatement of Thomas’s natural theology that addresses and rebuts the criticisms against natural theology raised by Kant and Heidegger, one best turns to the lucidly argued book by Thomas Joseph White, O.P., Wisdom in the Face of Modernity: A Study in Thomistic Natural Theology (2009).

Those who want to find out — contrary to recent rumors — why Thomas’s philosophy is far from dead but intensely engaged by contemporary analytic philosophers might want to consult John Haldane (ed.), Mind, Metaphysics, and Value in Thomistic and Analytic Traditions (2002), John P. O’Callaghan, Thomist Realism and the Linguistic Turn: Toward a More Perfect Form of Existence (2003), Craig Paterson and Matthew Pugh, Analytical Thomism (2006), and David S. Oderberg, Real Essentialism (2007). For an instructive and very broad-minded Thomist engagement of philosophy as presently practiced in America, one might turn to Thomas Hibbs, Aquinas, Ethics, and Philosophy of Religion: Metaphysics and Practice (2007), and for learning to appreciate the ongoing relevance of Thomas’s doctrine of natural law for contemporary political and legal theory and for the practice of law-making, the reader will profit immensely from Russell Hittinger, The First Grace: Rediscovering the Natural Law in a PostChristian World (2003) and from J. Budziszewski, The Line Through the Heart: Natural Law as Fact, Theory, and Sign of Contradiction (2009).

For those readers who are interested to find out how Thomas’s theology inspires and informs the work of contemporary theologians, they might want to turn to Ressourcement Thomism: Sacred Doctrine, the Sacraments, and the Moral Life, edited by Reinhard Hütter and Matthew Levering (2010) and to The Analogy of Being: Invention of the Antichrist or the Wisdom of God?, edited by Thomas Joseph White, O.P. (2011).

By the time the reader has reached this point of the introduction it might have dawned upon him or her that this kind of invitation to a deeper exploration of Thomas’s philosophical and theological thought might presuppose a more encompassing intellectual reorientation and reeducation. Such a reader is well advised to take advantage of two rather unique books, one as precious as the other: A. G. Sertillanges, O.P., The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods (1980), and Josef Pieper, Leisure — The Basis of Culture (1998).

By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment, by Edward Feser

By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment
by by Edward Feser and Joseph Bessette.
Ignatius Press (May 29, 2017). 500 pages.

The Catholic Church has in recent decades been associated with political efforts to eliminate the death penalty. It was not always so. This timely work reviews and explains the Catholic Tradition regarding the death penalty, demonstrating that it is not inherently evil and that it can be reserved as a just form of punishment in certain cases.

Drawing upon a wealth of philosophical, scriptural, theological, and social scientific arguments, the authors explain the perennial teaching of the Church that capital punishment can in principle be legitimate—not only to protect society from immediate physical danger, but also to administer retributive justice and to deter capital crimes. The authors also show how some recent statements of Church leaders in opposition to the death penalty are prudential judgments rather than dogma. They reaffirm that Catholics may, in good conscience, disagree about the application of the death penalty.

Some arguments against the death penalty falsely suggest that there has been a rupture in the Church's traditional teaching and thereby inadvertently cast doubt on the reliability of the Magisterium. Yet, as the authors demonstrate, the Church's traditional teaching is a safeguard to society, because the just use of the death penalty can be used to protect the lives of the innocent, inculcate a horror of murder, and affirm the dignity of human beings as free and rational creatures who must be held responsible for their actions.

By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed challenges contemporary Catholics to engage with Scripture, Tradition, natural law, and the actual social scientific evidence in order to undertake a thoughtful analysis of the current debate about the death penalty.

"Based primarily on the natural law, this excellent and much-needed book will be valuable to Catholics and readers of any faith who ask why capital punishment is justified."
--J. Budziszewski, Ph.D., University of Texas

"At long last, we have a serious and intelligent look at all aspects of the death penalty its causes, its justification, its consequences for the victim, the criminal himself, and for civil society." --James V. Schall, S. J., Professor Emeritus, Georgetown University

"An illuminating study of a subject often clouded by emotions. An essential read for anyone who wants to understand this thorny subject."
-- Robert Royal,President, Faith and Reason Institute

"The arguments in this book have clarified many of the contentions of this critical issue in my mind."
--Fr. Robert A. Sirico, President, The Acton Institute

Discussion

• The Wages of Sin: Review of By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment, by Janet Smith. Claremont Review of Books Fall 2017. "[T]he central argument of [the book is] that some crimes deserve death, and that this is now and has always been the teaching of the Catholic Church. Anyone who would claim otherwise must contend with Edward Feser and Joseph Bessette’s unparalleled – and I’m tempted to say, irrefutable – marshalling of evidence and logic in this important new book."
• Against Capital Punishment, by Paul Griffiths. First Things December 2017.
• Christians & the Death Penalty: There Is No Patron Saint of Executioners, by David Bentley Hart. Commonweal 11/16/17.
  • Hot Air vs. Capital Punishment: A Reply to Paul Griffiths and David Bentley Hart, by Edward Feser. Catholic World Report 11/28/17. "Griffith's review [is] largely devoid of substantive engagement with the book’s arguments. And Hart’s review in Commonweal is so rhetorically over-the-top and dishonest that the effect is more comical than offensive."
• A Philosophical Case Against Capital Punishment, by Christopher O. Tollefsen. Public Discourse 11/13/17. / Doubting Thomas (Aquinas) on Private and Public Killing Public Discourse 11/14/17.
  • Capital Punishment, Catholicism, and Natural Law: A Reply to Christopher Tollefsen by Edward Feser. Public Discourse 11/21/17.
• On capital punishment, even the pope’s defenders are confused, by Edward Feser. Catholic World Report 10/21/17. "There simply is no way to make an absolute condemnation of capital punishment consistent with past scriptural and papal teaching. The only way out of the mess is for Pope Francis to issue a clarification that reaffirms traditional teaching."
  • Capital Punishment and the Papal Magisterium: A Response to Dr. Edward Feser, by Robert Fastiggi. Catholic World Report 10/24/17.
  • Catholic theologians must set an example of intellectual honesty: A reply to Prof. Robert Fastiggi, by Edward Feser. Catholic World Report 10/30/17.
  • Is there really a definitive teaching of the Church on capital punishment? - A second response to Professor Edward Feser, by Robert Fastiggi. Catholic World Report 11/10/17.
• Catholic Tradition, St. John Paul II, and the Death Penalty, by E. Christian Brugger. Public Discourse 10/23/17. "Four conditions must be met for a teaching of the Catholic Church to be considered infallible. Acceptance of the death penalty meets none of them. St. John Paul II laid down theoretical markers that provide a clear basis for a Catholic teaching rejecting the death penalty in principle." Part two of a two-part essay.
• Capital Punishment is Intrinsically Wrong: A Reply to Feser and Bessette, by E. Christian Brugger. Public Discourse 10/22/17. "Edward Feser and Joseph M. Bessette’s new book asserts that Catholics cannot legitimately reject the death penalty as wrong always and everywhere. They are wrong." Part one of a two-part essay.
  • Traditional Catholic Doctrine on Capital Punishment is Irreversible: A Reply to E. Christian Brugger, by Edward Feser. Public Discourse 11/19/17. "E. Christian Brugger is wrong: neither scripture nor tradition could justify a reversal of the Church’s millennia-old teaching on capital punishment."
  • St. John Paul II Did Not Change Catholic Teaching on Capital Punishment: A Reply to E. Christian Brugger, by Edward Feser. Public Discouse 11/20/17. "If E. Christian Brugger is right, then the Church has been teaching grave moral error and badly misunderstanding scripture for two millennia. Nothing less than her very credibility is at stake."
• The Church and Capital Punishment ETWN interview with Edward Feser and Joseph Bessette.
• A Catholic Case for Capital Punishment - Edward Feser [Audio] Catholic Answers Focus. July 2017.
• Msgr. Stuart Swetland’s confusions, by Edward Feser. 07/20/17. "The monsignor claims that the Church could in the future teach that capital punishment is “intrinsically evil.” Second, he claims that, whether or not capital punishment is intrinsically evil, Catholics are now obliged to oppose it in practice. ... both of these assertions are false."
• Discussion: By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment Catholic Media Apostolate. Roger McCaffrey and Fr. Gerald Murray. 07/13/17. (Audio)
• Review: By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment, by Lucas G. Westman. The Socratic Catholic 06/01//17.
• Can the Church ever bless the death penalty?, by Dan Hitchens. Catholic Herald 05/25/17.
• Edward Peters on By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed, Edward Feser. 05/23/17.
• Book Review: By Man Shall His Blood Be Shed: A Catholic Defense of Capital Punishment, by William M. Briggs. OnePeterFive. 07/07/17.
• The curious case of Pope Francis and the “new natural lawyers”, by Edward Feser. 06/03/17. "It would by no means be surprising if “new natural lawyers” appealed to at least some of Pope Francis’s statements on capital punishment as evidence of papal support for their extreme abolitionist position. Yet to my knowledge, they have not done this."
• Why the Church Cannot Reverse Past Teaching on Capital Punishment, by Joseph M. Bessette, Edward Feser. Catholic World Report 06/07/17.
• Why the Death Penalty is Still Necessary, by Joseph M. Bessette, Edward Feser. Catholic World Report. 07/21/17.

Gordon S. Wood on "Revolutionary Character" (and the rise of Donald Trump)

I'm reading a book by revolutionary war scholar Gordon S. Wood (Revolutionary Characters: What Made the Founders Different). It is a collection of essays (some previously published and expanded upon) on the lives of our founding fathers, and an attempt to explain in part why for all of our celebration of them, we'll likely never see the likes of their calibre again. It also touches, at least in my mind, on the rise of Donald Trump as a presidential candidate.

According to Wood, there was a time in American history where qualities of the ideal man were vigorously pursued -- "politeness, taste, sociability, learning, compassion, benevolence" were marks of civilization, just as "virtue, disinterestedness, an aversion to corruption and courtierlike behavior" were marks of good political leadership. The pursuit of being a "gentleman" (displayed by classical conceptions of virtue and self-sacrifice) was given a moral meaning. One's public reputation actually mattered, and they took great lengths to preserve that honor by what they said and did.

"Disinterestednesss" at that time was understood to be "superior to regard of private advantage; not to be interested by private profit", especially in the conduct of public service. (Of course, wealth was a factor in cultivating such in that its advantages diminished the motivation for personal advancement; men of leisure were naturally expected to participate in governance because they could afford to -- public office was considered an obligation). Unfortunately, this meaning of the ancient ideal of "disinterestedness" has changed over millennia and has come to acquire negative connotations, now being characterized as "ambivalence".

However, being a gentlemen was not necessary rooted to bloodline or heredity -- Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Franklin, Hamilton, Madison, Paine -- the first generations were all considered "self-made men". Of those who signed the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution, only eight are known to have fathers who attended college. And yet despite being "sons of reputable mechanics or farmers" (Benjamin Rush, 1790), it was thought possible that men of low birth could attend college, acquire a liberal arts education and through self-cultivation could become true gentleman as well.

The aristocracy of virtuous public character, such as it was being pursued by the founding fathers, is what distinguished themselves from later generations -- and as the years progressed, Woods contends that what we now value most in American society, democracy and egalitarianism, has proven to be the recipe for our undoing. "The founding fathers had succeeded only too well in promoting democracy and equality among ordinary people, indeed they succeeded in preventing any duplication of themselves." America continues to celebrate the ideal of being a "self-made man" -- but the original understanding of such as the classical cultivation of moral character has faded into obscurity. Now we have Kanye West and the Kardashians.

(Drawing from Woods' line of thought) Trump, you might say, is the thoroughly contemporary American -- the cultivation of moral virtue, honor and "reputation" in the highest sense of the term, has no concern and seems utterly lost on him. He displays no sense of moral character, exemplified in part by his behavior and conduct towards women and vulgarity of speech. He is of course concerned about his own "reputation" -- but this extends only as far as the material advancement of his ego, especially as it consists in turning himself into a commodity to be foisted on the masses for personal gain. In other words, he is the furthest thing from the 1700's ideal of a "gentleman", but Woods might argue that he is the President we deserve.

Samuel Gregg and David B. Hart on Global Capitalism

• Christians, Capitalism, and Culture: A Response to David Bentley Hart, by Samuel Gregg. The Public Discourse 12/10/15.
• Mammon Ascendant, by David B. Hardt. First Things June 2016.
  • Global Capitalism versus Christianity? A Response to David Bentley Hart, by Samuel Gregg. Public Square 05/17/16. "Christianity has never seen the pursuit of virtue as incompatible with private possession of wealth."
  • The Pelagian Criticism of Wealth, by Fr. Gregory Jensen. Palamas Institute for Orthodox Christian Pastoral Studies. 05/18/16.
  • Capitalism Beyond Caricatures, by R.R. Reno. First Things 05/18/16.

For God and Profit: How Banking and Finance Can Serve the Common Good, by Samuel Gregg
The Crossroad Publishing Company, 300 pgs.

From Christianity’s very beginning, it has had a difficult relationship with the world of money. Through developing sophisticated understandings of the nature and wealth-creating capacity of capital, Christian theologians, philosophers, and financiers exerted considerable influence upon the emergence and development of the international financial systems that helped unleash a revolution in the way the world thinks about and uses capital. In For God and Profit, Samuel Gregg underscores the different ways in which Christians have helped to develop the financial and banking systems that have helped millions escape poverty for hundreds of years. But he also provides a critical lens through which to assess the workings—and failures—of modern finance and banking. Far from being doomed to producing economic instability and periodic financial crises, Gregg illustrates that how Christian faith and reason can shape financial practices and banking institutions in ways that restore integrity to our troubled financial systems.

“For God and Profit is a formidable book, packed with interesting and regularly unacknowledged and unknown historical information, especially about the contribution of Christian thinking to the development of banking, the rise of the markets and Western prosperity. It is also closely argued with Christian and natural law categories of right and wrong being used to evaluate the economies and financial systems of today and yesterday." — Cardinal George Pell, Prefect of the Secretariat for the Economy, Vatican City

“Christians have long been suspicious of the worlds of finance and capital. But Samuel Gregg has produced just the book we need. It is ecumenical, patient in explaining concepts and practices that Christians of all confessions should know, characterized by logic and clear moral analysis, and attentive to the contributions made by Christians throughout history to the development of modern finance systems. At a time when finance not only seems bereft of a moral compass but also to be lurching from crisis to crisis, this is a book sorely needed by Christians today." — Michael Novak, author, The Spirit of Democratic Capitalism

Related

• How Medieval Monks Changed the Face of Banking American Banker 05/06/16.

"Remaining in the Truth of Christ"

Remaining in the Truth of Christ: Marriage and Communion in the Catholic Church
Ignatius Press (October 7, 2014).

In this volume five Cardinals of the Church, and four other scholars, respond to the call issued by Cardinal Walter Kasper for the Church to harmonize "fidelity and mercy in its pastoral practice with civilly remarried, divorced people".

Beginning with a concise introduction, the first part of the book is dedicated to the primary biblical texts pertaining to divorce and remarriage, and the second part is an examination of the teaching and practice prevalent in the early Church. In neither of these cases, biblical or patristic, do these scholars find support for the kind of "toleration" of civil marriages following divorce advocated by Cardinal Kasper. This book also examines the Eastern Orthodox practice of oikonomia (understood as "mercy" implying "toleration") in cases of remarriage after divorce and in the context of the vexed question of Eucharistic communion. It traces the centuries long history of Catholic resistance to this convention, revealing serious theological and canonical difficulties inherent in past and current Orthodox Church practice.

Thus, in the second part of the book, the authors argue in favor of retaining the theological and canonical rationale for the intrinsic connection between traditional Catholic doctrine and sacramental discipline concerning marriage and communion.

The various studies in this book lead to the conclusion that the Church's longstanding fidelity to the truth of marriage constitutes the irrevocable foundation of its merciful and loving response to the individual who is civilly divorced and remarried. The book therefore challenges the premise that traditional Catholic doctrine and contemporary pastoral practice are in contradiction.

"The encroachment of the buzz."

The book – the physical paper book – is being circled by a shoal of sharks, with sales down 9 per cent this year alone. It's being chewed by the e-book. It's being gored by the death of the bookshop and the library. And most importantly, the mental space it occupied is being eroded by the thousand Weapons of Mass Distraction that surround us all. It's hard to admit, but we all sense it: it is becoming almost physically harder to read books.

In his gorgeous little book The Lost Art of Reading: Why Books Matter in a Distracted Time , the critic David Ulin admits to a strange feeling. All his life, he had taken reading as for granted as eating – but then, a few years ago, he "became aware, in an apartment full of books, that I could no longer find within myself the quiet necessary to read". He would sit down to do it at night, as he always had, and read a few paragraphs, then find his mind was wandering, imploring him to check his email, or Twitter, or Facebook. "What I'm struggling with," he writes, "is the encroachment of the buzz, the sense that there's something out there that merits my attention."

I think most of us have this sense today, if we are honest. If you read a book with your laptop thrumming on the other side of the room, it can be like trying to read in the middle of a party, where everyone is shouting to each other. To read, you need to slow down. You need mental silence except for the words. That's getting harder to find.

Johann Hari: How to survive the age of distraction The Independent June 24, 2011.

"Six Types of Reading"

Ben Myers (Faith and Theology) provides "a typology of six types of reading".

For fellow readers and book lovers ... "best books of 2009"

I know, I know -- the decade is not yet over -- but as we had into the final year, some compilations of recommended reading and "best of the decade" lists.

• The best theology books of 2009, by Ben Myers (Faith and Theology).

• "The top ten pro-liberty books of the decade" as selected by the Atlas Economic Research Foundation. (Additional reactions from Damon Root and readers of the libertarian magazine Reason).

• The best "Philosophy of Religion" books of the decade, by Andrew Moon (The Prosblogion).

• The editors, authors and staff of Ignatius Press on "the best books I read in 2009".

• The curmudgeonly Arturo Vasquez has compiled "a list of books that I think every convert and convert at heart should read" (Reditus: A Chronicle of Aesthetic Christianity).

• The Guardian selects "50 books that defined the decade".

• The Times (UK) selectes "the 100 Best Books of the Decade".

• And when it comes time to engage in the painful, but necessary, task of weeding your library -- the proprietors of New York's famous Strand bookstore offer strategies for those "books you can do without" (New York Times' "Room for Debate").

Subjective, of course.

Q: What books did you read this year? Liked? Or perhaps disliked? -- Did you accomplish your reading goals? I welcome your comments!

"The encroachment of the buzz"

A predicament which I -- and I suspect many others -- can surely identify with in this age:

Reading is an act of contemplation, perhaps the only act in which we allow ourselves to merge with the consciousness of another human being. We possess the books we read, animating the waiting stillness of their language, but they possess us also, filling us with thoughts and observations, asking us to make them part of ourselves. This is what Conroy was hinting at in his account of adolescence, the way books enlarge us by giving direct access to experiences not our own. In order for this to work, however, we need a certain type of silence, an ability to filter out the noise.

Such a state is increasingly elusive in our over-networked culture, in which every rumor and mundanity is blogged and tweeted. Today, it seems it is not contemplation we seek but an odd sort of distraction masquerading as being in the know.

[...]

For many years, I have read, like E.I. Lonoff in Philip Roth's "The Ghost Writer," primarily at night -- a few hours every evening once my wife and kids have gone to bed. These days, however, after spending hours reading e-mails and fielding phone calls in the office, tracking stories across countless websites, I find it difficult to quiet down. I pick up a book and read a paragraph; then my mind wanders and I check my e-mail, drift onto the Internet, pace the house before returning to the page. Or I want to do these things but don't. I force myself to remain still, to follow whatever I'm reading until the inevitable moment I give myself over to the flow. Eventually I get there, but some nights it takes 20 pages to settle down. What I'm struggling with is the encroachment of the buzz, the sense that there is something out there that merits my attention, when in fact it's mostly just a series of disconnected riffs and fragments that add up to the anxiety of the age.

From "The Lost Art of Reading", by David Ulin. Los Angeles Times August 9, 2009.

(HT: Vox Nova)

Most of my reading these days takes place on the 30-45 minute commute to / from work in Midtown, Manhattan. When I initially get home, family time w/ wife and son take precedence. When I do find a little time to read in the late evenings, I can relate to Ulin's perpetual need to un-plug and contend with the many distractions of our age.

(Still, a small victory: I finished Michael Burleigh's Sacred Causes last night.)

Update! Related musings by John W. Martens, on reading the Bible:

How do you receive the word of God when you do not read? This is a strange question to ask in an age of unprecedented literacy, at a time when access to data, texts, and knowledge is constant. No longer need one rely on books taken from the library; you can carry Kindle and have over a thousand books at your fingertips. No longer need you sit at your home computer, you can bring a laptop to thousands of wireless hot spots, or simply carry your Iphone and get internet access almost anywhere. The question I pose is not a question of illiteracy as much as a reality that I have encountered with more and more people who do not like to read or read very poorly. With access to the written word at an all time high, our ability to read seems to be plummeting.