The Shadow of His Wings by Max Temescu
Augustine Institute/Ignatius Press, £12.99
Subtitled “A Graphic Biography of Fr Gereon Goldmann”, this book makes an original contribution to biographies of holy people: it is a graphic novel. As much of Fr Goldmann’s story takes place over the course of the war, during which, having been conscripted into the SS, he worked as a medical orderly, it is a narrative style that makes sense. It is full of dangerous and desperate situations, during which the young seminarian, training to become a Franciscan priest, brought solace and Communion to dying Catholic soldiers.
Fr Goldmann’s life was full of improbable small miracles, such as meeting an elderly nun during the war who had prepared him for his First Holy Communion as a child, and who told him she had been praying for him for 20 years – prophesying that he would go to Lourdes and then meet the Pope in Rome. Everything turned out as the nun, Sister Solana May, had foretold.
The book gives many instances of the power of prayer and I would recommend it wholeheartedly as a Confirmation present for a teenage boy, combining as it does warfare, bravery under fire and the providential action of God under the most appalling circumstances.
Remembering God’s Mercy by Dawn Eden
Ave Maria Press/Alban Books, £9.99
The author has made the message of how God can heal painful memories her special apostolate. Here, with her subtitle “Redeem the Past and Free Yourself from Painful Memories”, Eden shows how that can be done, using the lives of three Jesuits: St Ignatius of Loyola, St Peter Faber and Pope Francis – the first Jesuit pope.
At first our painful memories have to be acknowledged. Then we have to recognise that they necessarily colour the way we perceive God and live our faith. Finally, we have to allow God to transform them through our renewed understanding of how salvation history touches us as individuals.
Herself the victim of childhood sexual abuse, Eden leads the reader to see that in the light of Christ, negative memories can be “purified”: “Through … Jesus’s glorious wounds, I am able to see the past for what it is. It is a manifestation of the love of God, who awaited me and who, through his mercy, enabled all that I have done and suffered – even the painful and irreversible effects of sin – to work towards my salvation.” As she emphasises, quoting Pope Francis, “Any attempt to cope with pain will only bring partial results, if it is not based on transcendence. It is a gift to understand and fully live through pain.” Eden shows that the Year of Mercy reveals the story of God’s unfailing mercy towards us.
Christ’s New Homeland – Africa: Contributions to the Synod on the Family by African Pastors Ignatius Press/Gracewing, £12.99
To those who might think that this book is out of date because the family synod is over, I would respond that the questions raised and the reflections on the true meaning of marriage contained in these pages are perennial and worth considering. The title itself provides a hint as to the contents, with its implicit suggestion that a European hegemony of the faith has now been transferred to Africa.
The book is divided into three parts: part one, largely written by Cardinal Robert Sarah, focuses on the meaning of pastoral mercy towards the family. Part two concerns the “Gospel of the Family”, and part three is about the “Pastoral care of families that are hurting”. As Cardinal Sarah, underlining the title, observes: “Now most practising Christians are found no longer in the northern hemisphere but rather in the young churches [in Africa].” Aware that the voice of the African Church is “disregarded” in Europe, the cardinal, as he always does in his writings, seeks to place the new pastoral approach to marriage within an encounter of Christ so that “in spirit and in truth this encounter might result in a call to begin a new life”.
Indeed, he adds, if you set God and doctrine aside, you “create major pastoral confusion” – as we have seen in the media debates before and after last October’s synod. The cardinal is both critical (of an approach that puts problematic marital situations before conversion) and hopeful – the only solution, as he sees it and as the saints have echoed throughout the ages, is “to make God present once again in people’s lives.”
The anthropology widespread in the West is, the cardinal asserts, the opposite of the anthropology of man “created in the image and likeness of God”. Indeed, the secularised world “that believes in neither God nor the Devil nor in humanity … is ruining its own anthropological foundations.”
The cardinal’s voice, together with the voices of his fellow African members of the hierarchy, provides a welcome change from the malaise affecting the Church in the West. Despite huge social and other problems, the Church in Africa is youthful, faith-filled, deeply pro-family and ardently pro-life.
Areas of Catholic Herald business are still recovering post-pandemic.
However, we are reaching out to the Catholic community and readership, that has been so loyal to the Catholic Herald. Please join us on our 135 year mission by supporting us.
We are raising £250,000 to safeguard the Herald as a world-leading voice in Catholic journalism and teaching.
We have been a bold and influential voice in the church since 1888, standing up for traditional Catholic culture and values. Please consider donating.