Review: The History of the Congregation of Holy Cross

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The History of the Congregation of Holy Cross, James T. Connelly, C.S.C. Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2020.

Summary: A history of the Congregation of the Holy Cross, describing its beginnings, its focus on education and missions, its approval in Rome, the succession of Superiors General, and the growth of the Congregation until Vatican II and decline in more recent years.

Growing up in a midwestern heavily Catholic town, I had friends who aspired to attend the University of Notre Dame, either to play football, or to get a Catholic education at one of the top universities in the country. What I came to understand in reading this history was that the University of Notre Dame is only the most prominent of a global commitment to education of the Congregation of Holy Cross, from which Notre Dame arose.

It all began at a clergy retreat in 1818 in the French village of Le Mans, at a diocesan retreat where the need for school masters to lead schools in the parishes. They envisioned an order of brothers and priests and entrusted the work to Jacques-Francois Dujarie’ and what became the Brothers of St. Joseph. Rev. Basile Moreau preached the 1831 and 1832 retreats for the brothers and assumed the office of superior in 1835 when Dujarie retired. James T. Connelly traces the history of the development of the Congregation from these humble beginnings.

Moreau was the leader responsible for the Order’s recognition by Rome, having agreed to send priests and brothers on mission to Bengal. Already, he has sent priests and brothers to Canada and the U.S., including Father Edward Sorin, who went to northwestern Indiana, training priests and brothers, starting schools, and a college in South Bend that became Notre Dame.

The history is one of courageous missions, often ending in the early death of those who went. It is one of tension between leaders and provinces–priests, brothers, and sisters. In the U.S., the divisions of the Civil War became reflected divisions between north and south. One of the most notable tensions was between the founding province in France and Edward Sorin and the US. When Sorin succeeded Moreau, the focus of power shifted from France to the U.S., even while the formal center remained in France.

Gilbert Francais followed Sorin and oversaw expansion of the Order throughout the world, even as it was legally persecuted in France and decimated in 1903. Connolly traces the growth of the Order up until Vatican II, which seemed to be a watershed. From then on, the numbers declined by half by 2000, most dramatically in North America, replaced by vocations from Africa, India, Bangladesh and Haiti. The structures changed, reflecting this shift in demographics.

Connelly’s history is granular in detail, and traces developments country by country during each period. Especially in the early years he focuses extensively on the Superiors General, especially Basile Moreau, a deeply spiritual man who failed to administer the growing order well, engendering growing dissatisfaction. Only later was his reputation rehabilitated and he was beatified in 2007. As in many situations, ambition and pride was not absent among his rivals.

At the same time, there is the less prominent but significant work of priests and brothers who founded or took over schools, of which the University of Notre Dame was the epitome. There were the saintly priests like Andre Bessette who established a notable healing ministry at the Oratory of St. Joseph and was canonized in 2010.

I’ve read many evangelical histories of global mission. This is a valuable work to read, to learn of Catholic efforts during roughly the same time frame to evangelize the world, to establish educational institutions, and develop indigenous leaders. In both, there is a period of American ascendancy, a growing struggle with modernity, and a shift of dominance from the West to countries that once were the objects of mission but now are evangelizing the west. Lastly, it is the lesson of the mustard seed writ large in this history–a humble beginning in a French village spreads to much of the world in 150 years.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher via Edelweiss. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

Review: Letters for the Church

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Letters for the Church: Reading James, 1-2 Peter,1-3 John, and Jude as Canon, Darian R. Lockett. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2021.

Summary: A study of the catholic epistles, arguing that they ought be read together and exploring their shared themes and particular emphases.

The books between Hebrews and Revelation, known as the catholic epistles, often seem to get less attention, except perhaps for James, 1 Peter, and 1 John. There were questions early on about the canonicity of some of the books. In contemporary scholarship, books on the gospels and Pauline subjects seem to be in the preponderance.

Darian R. Lockett contends that not only were these books accepted into the canon as a collection but that they ought be read as a collection that concern common themes of concern to all the churches of the day–hence “catholic.” He gives a brief history of the early church’s discussion about affirming these books as part of the canon and talks about their importance as scripture, as instruction on resisting false teaching inside and outside the church, and for their emphasis on practiced faith.

Although a scholarly work, offering bibliographies for further reading and “going deeper” sidebars, Lockett has designed the book for reading through the catholic epistles in one’s study. A chapter is offered on each of the epistles, except for a combined chapter on 2 and 3 John. Each chapter includes discussion of authorship, audience, setting, and the occasion for the letter, the structure and outline of the letter and then a section by section commentary on the text, with further reading suggestions for each letter at the end of the chapter. While reviewing the alternatives in terms of authorship, Lockett seems to prefer the traditionally attributed authors (including Peter for 2 Peter). He does make an interesting case for 2 Peter as testamentary literature based on 2 Peter 1:12-15, comparing it to parallels. Regarding James, he offers a “going deeper” discussion on justification, comparing James and Paul in terms of their use of “righteousness.” He addresses the shared material in 2 Peter and Jude, believing that 2 Peter draws this from Jude but notes addresses different challenges–false teachers inside the Christian community in 2 Peter as opposed to the intruders from outside in Jude.

The commentary is well-suited for reading along with the text, dealing with key textual issues without becoming technical and tracing significant arguments and themes. Both in discussions of each letter and in a concluding chapter, Lockett traces recurring themes in the catholic epistles, the major of which are:

  • Love for one another
  • Enduring trial
  • Allegiance to God and the world incompatible to each other
  • Faith and works
  • Guarding against false teaching

I have studied these books individually but had never considered studying them as a canonical unit. Lockett makes a strong case for doing so and provides a great resource for those interested in making such a study. As I read along in the biblical text, his argument rang true–I had never observed the connections apart from the shared content in 2 Peter and Jude. Lockett’s book serves as a great introduction to reading this less familiar part of the New Testament.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

Growing Up in Working Class Youngstown — Thomas G. McDonald

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Thomas G. McDonald, Photo from Youngstown Vindicator, July 13, 1930 (via Google News Archive)

He oversaw the development of Carnegie Steel’s (later U.S. Steel) Ohio Works and the construction of the McDonald Works which were named after him, as was the village that grew up around these mills, McDonald, Ohio. He was Thomas G. McDonald, who was described in an editorial in the Youngstown Vindicator of July 14, 1930 (two days after his death) as “one of the old type of steel men who began at the bottom and by mastering every detail of the industry gradually worked their way up to the top.” From all I can find out about him, this is a fitting summary of his career.

McDonald was born in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania November 11, 1848. He learned to work hard on his father’s farm. Then, after public schools, he enrolled at the Iron City Commercial College, graduating to the carpenter’s trade in 1868. His first job was as a carpenter working on the construction of Carnegie Steel’s Edgar Thompson. He never left the company. He worked his way up in the company, learning all the details of manufacturing steel. In 1880, he became night superintendent at the converting department of their plant in Braddock. Then, in July 1880, he was assigned night superintendent at the Allegheny Bessemer Works in Duquesne, Pennsylvania. It was probably during this time that he became a close confidant of Andrew Carnegie, with whom he was a lifelong friend.

The company brought him to Youngstown in 1893 as general superintendent of the Ohio Works. Based on his advice, the plant decided to increase their equipment beyond the two 8 ton converters they had originally intended. He oversaw the instruction and the first heat in 1895. By 1897, monthly output exceeded 30,000 tons every month. Eventually, it would exceed 50,000 tons.

In 1906 Carnegie Steel promoted McDonald to general superintendent of the Youngstown District which included the Ohio Works, Upper and Lower Union Mills, Greenville Mills, and the Niles Furnace. Then in 1909, Carnegie Steel acquired land across the river from Girard for a new mill. In 1916 the new mill, whose construction was overseen by McDonald produced its first steel. Recognizing his leadership, Carnegie named the mills the McDonald Works. As it turns out, McDonald not only built the mill, he built the town of McDonald, building housing for the workers. The Village of McDonald was incorporated December 12, 1918. When it became apparent that workers with families would not come without schools, the company built schools, opening McDonald High School in 1929. It is still in use, having been renovated by Ricciuti, Balog and Partners in 1990.

He retired in 1921 but continued working as a consulting manager. He was involved in a number of civic causes in the Youngstown area including service as a vice president of the Youngstown Chamber of Commerce and director of the Youngstown and Northern Railway Company. He served several terms on the Board of Education and as a director at First National and Dollar Banks.

He celebrated his 50th anniversary with Elizabeth on November 27, 1928. On July 1, 1930, in his 82nd year he was hospitalized at North Side Hospital in critical condition with a kidney infection. He died on July 12, 1930. He is buried in Belmont Park Cemetery.

From all I can read, everything McDonald built, he built well with a vision for the future. In fact, a portion of the McDonald Works is still making steel as McDonald Steel. The complex of plants he oversaw outlasted him by nearly fifty years until U.S. Steel ended operations in 1979. One wonders “what if” the area’s steel industry had enjoyed leadership like his throughout its history. What he did do is contribute to the capacity that helped make the Steel Valley the third largest steel maker in the country. That is no small thing.

To read other posts in the Growing Up in Working Class Youngstown series, just click “On Youngstown.” Enjoy!

Review: Rules of Civility

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Rules of Civility, Amor Towles. New York: Penguin Books, 2012.

Summary: The year that changed the life of a young woman in New York, remembered when photographs trigger a flashback twenty-eight years later.

Katey and her husband Val are part of the social elite at an exhibition opening at the Museum of Modern Art in 1966. For the first time, photographs taken by Walker Evans on New York’s subways in the late 1930’s are on exhibit. Among those photos are two of him. One elegantly dressed, a portrait of subdued power. The other, more gaunt in the tattered clothes of a laborer, but with a smile. Tinker Grey. And it brings back the year in between and how Katey’s life changed, beginning her rise from a working class immigrant background.

At the end of 1937, Katey and her roommate Eve decide to do the town for New Years. Eve is from the midwest with high hopes. Katya, now Katey Kontent (accent on the second syllable) is working in a secretarial pool for a New York law firm, living by her wits and struggling to make ends meet, but also enjoying the city. They are in a jazz club and in walks Tinker Grey in a cashmere coat. They end up ringing in the New Year, and Tinker leaves his monogrammed lighter behind, giving them a chance to see him again. A subsequent night on the town ends in an accident leaving Eve with leg injuries and a scar. Tinker offers his home to recover. They fall in love, and Katey is nudged out.

It’s a story that traces Katey’s year of 1938 in her voice, one that is whip-smart and shrewd. Both her external and internal dialogue make this book, a feat for a male writer. We see her rise from the secretarial pool to editorial assistant for a new magazine launched by the publisher of Conde’ Nast. She recounts the nights at the clubs, the jazz of the Thirties, and her relationships with Wallace Wolcott and Dicky Vanderwhile, the latter on the rebound from one with Tinker Grey after Eve refused to marry him and went to Hollywood. One of the most interesting characters is Anne Grandyn, whose wealth helped make Tinker. She made him in other ways, and unbeknownst to Katey, helps make her as well. Instead of being a rival for Tinker, in an odd way, she is an ally.

Meanwhile Tinker’s life unravels. From Central Park, he moves to a flop house, in some ways following his late artist brother–and hence that second picture in the gallery. And yet the move in his life is from a learned upper crust civility, schooled by George Washington’s The Rules of Civility to rediscovery of the New York he loved best.

Not only does Towles do a masterful job at writing in a woman’s voice, he captures the resurgence of New York on the eve of World War Two as the country climbed out of the Depression. He explores questions of class and upward mobility. Both Tinker and Katey rise from modest beginnings on their wits, yet come to different ends. We wonder if the 1966 Katey, confronted with the images of Tinker, wonders about the life she’s embraced. Or perhaps she was reminded of the year in which her life turned, the gains and the losses, and the course that was set.

I went back to read this after reading Towles’s masterful A Gentleman in Moscow earlier this year. It is hard to believe this is a first novel. So often, we just live our lives. In both of Towles’s works, we see characters who not only live their lives, but, through circumstances, are brought to reflect upon their course and what they’ve meant, inviting the reader to do the same.

Things That Bring Joy to a Page Admin

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Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Most of the people I know who are group or page admins on Facebook have thoughts about giving it up. I do. It’s not easy, and more people can mean more problems. Spam posts, comments, and messages. People who openly defy page or group rules. Deciding when to shut down a thread that is going sideways. Banning people. I know. I’ve curated a book page for three years that has grown to a community of 35,000.

The headaches are well known. There is another side–the things that make it worth it. I thought I would share a few of those. Online spaces can be good spaces when we work together to make that happen. Here are some of the things that bring joy:

  1. Knowing that the page has made at least a bit of a difference in someone’s life. It was heartening when someone jotted a note saying that our page was one of the things that was helping them get through the pandemic.
  2. I love when I see people helping each other out. They share enough about a book and what they love that another person finds the next book they want to read.
  3. It gives me joy when I see people trying to learn from their disagreements, asking questions rather than flinging arguments past each other.
  4. It is a delight when people from different cultures share books and ideas that may be new to others of us. I’m glad when others take note and affirm them.
  5. I like it when people can have fun with something that is fun and not feel they have to pontificate or disagree.
  6. I enjoy reading threads where no one feels the need to leave comments like, “I never read anything by Steinbeck, in fact I really don’t like to read, but just thought I ought to say something.”
  7. It’s fun when someone adds an article or quote or even thought that is totally on point and enlarges the discussion.
  8. I like it when people on the page invite their book-loving friends to join the fun. It is encouraging when people think our page is a good enough place that they aren’t embarrassed to share it with their friends.
  9. My heart is touched when someone shares about hard things they are going through and others care without trying to “fix’ them.
  10. I’m grateful for a day when I haven’t had to delete spam comments or messages or ban anybody. But I’m glad to keep our growing “neighborhood” a good and safe place.

None of this is about numbers or platforms or making money. It is about shared conversation around a shared interest–in my case, books. I’ve learned about new authors and read some of them. Most of all, it has been a rich community of very different people–not perfect but pretty good (do we ever get better than that, at least this side of eternity?). While I created and admin the page, I like to call it “ours” because the others who are part of the community help make it what it is. Despite the hassles, I’d say this, and pages or groups like it, are some of the best things on Facebook. And when you find one, be sure to thank the admin who works to make that happen. When people do that, it makes my day.

Review: The Servant of the Lord and His Servant People

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The Servant of the Lord and His Servant People (New Studies in Biblical Theology #54), Matthew S. Harmon. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2021.

Summary: A study of the application of the term “servant” to a number of key figures in scripture culminating in Jesus, and the way these were used by God to form a servant people.

In most contexts the idea of servitude at very least is an undesirable state, and, if involuntary, a breach of human rights. Yet one of the curious themes in scripture underscored by this book, is the idea of being a “servant of the Lord.” Matthew S. Harmon notes the cultural overtones, but also addresses the dignity of those who serve the Lord.

This work centers on key figures who “serve the Lord” through scripture: Adam, Moses, Joshua, David, the servant of Isaiah, Jesus, and the apostles. There is another group as well. Throughout scripture, it becomes clear that God is out to form a servant people–first Israel and then the church. Harmon devotes a chapter to each of these key people or groups of people.

We begin with Adam the servant of the Lord who rules over all creation and is the priest and guard of God’s garden-temple. Adam fails in his task, but in his descendants God continues to call servants–Noah, Abraham, and the patriarchs through whom God begins to form a people. Then Moses becomes the servant of God, a kind of prophet, priest, and king. Harmon traces the language of “servant” relative to Moses through the Torah and the Prophets and Writings. Then Joshua follows as the faithful servant who does what Moses commands, through whom God works similar acts, and who calls Israel as a people to serve the Lord at the end of his life.

Yet when the generation who led with Joshua dies, Israel turns to serve other gods, and are given over by God as prey for the surrounding nations. They want a king. Saul fails to serve God wholeheartedly and David is anointed and becomes the next servant of the Lord. He is not only the king through whom God gives Israel rest in the land from their enemies, but priest who prepares for the construction of the temple, and prophet who wrote songs to God. One of the songs is about David’s greater son. Solomon starts out well but is drawn off to other gods, as are most of his successors. Israel and Israel’s kings have failed at their servant calling. Isaiah writes about this failure and about the servant who will fulfill the service in which Israel fail, suffering for the sins of the people as he does so.

And so we come to Jesus, the culmination toward which all the other servants looked. One of the distinctive aspects of Harmon’s treatment is that he shows how Jesus fulfills what the other servants anticipate. He reverses Adam’s failure in his victory over Satan in the wilderness. He is the prophet greater than Moses, the Joshua who brings his people into eschatological rest. He is the Davidic king whose rule never ends. His whole history from his exile in Egypt on recapitulates Israel’s story. He is the servant whose death and resurrection save his people–all people.

The final two chapters focus on groups. First there are the apostles who speak of themselves as servants of the Lord, even his two brothers, James and Jude. He traces this through the letters they wrote. But there is another group, and we are part of it. The church is portrayed as the servant people of God. It is a people who follow Jesus in his sufferings, but also fulfill the Adamic call to reflect the character of God to all things.

In his conclusion, Harmon considers the implications of this call to be a servant people. It is a call to a new freedom from the tyranny to self, sin and Satan. It is a call to be shaped in a community in the form of love that serves each other, washing each others’ feet. It is a call to be a light to the surrounding world, that others would find their way into this community as we did through repentance and faith. Finally, it is a call to become servant leaders, exercising the kind of kingship of the king who stoops to serve and even die.

This monograph cannot help challenge the contemporary church’s quest for power and influence, the celebrity culture, and the obsession with political influence and access at the expense of humble service. It indicates how little the Servant of the Lord captures our imagination and our allegiance. What may be equally challenging to think about is why we hear so little of this overarching biblical theme from the pulpits of many of our churches. It may be that we are working off the wrong script.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

Review: Love in the Time of Coronavirus

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Love in the Time of Coronavirus, Angela Alaimo O’Donnell. Brewster, MA: Paraclete Press, 2021.

Summary: A collection of poems written over the first year of the pandemic exploring the pilgrimage of those confined to their homes, exploring the ways we come to terms with endless days, the small gifts of love, and moment of hope amid the horror.

We all remember those days of 2020 when we discovered how an invisible virus changed our world–all the precautions, the lockdowns, the empty streets, and rising infections. Angela Alaimo O’Donnell lives in New York, which became the epicenter of horror last spring, with morgue trucks outside of hospital. Like most, the scope of her and her husband’s life narrowed down to the confines of an apartment. With the lockdown, she began a pilgrimage in words to chronicle her experience.

She takes us through the seasons of the first year of the pandemic: lockdown and rising cases, illness, recovery and relapse, staring at an unworn wardrobe, and finding herself oddly touched by the thank you’s of students on Zoom. The growing realization that this is not going away quickly, the relief of a contemporary lull, injuring oneself exercising in one’s apartment, Advent and the advent of a new wave of cases, standing in line for vaccines and the tentative steps of emerging into the world. We trace the church year from Easter to Advent, unchanging hope of resurrection and Christ’s coming in a changed and dying world.

The poems, nearly sixty, are written more or less in the form of sonnets. The songs capture both the small things of daily life and the horror of mass graves on Hart Island. The changing of the seasons reminds us of the resurgence of life as does the resurgence of wildlife in a world temporarily devoid of people. There is love. The lost love of the aged who have died too soon. There is the love for children one cannot visit, for students on a screen, for the small kindnesses of delivery. All this is dwarfed by the love in the ICU: “The old man who gave up his/breathing machine to the young man beside/him. The nurse who grieved him as he died./The EMT who knelt beside the body/long after the heart had ceased to beat.”

This collection captures the deep passion we have to live, to love, and to hope in the face of the most daunting challenge we have collectively faced in our lifetimes. We grieve, we tremble, we sicken, and hopefully recover. Then we enjoy the beauties we see in a simple walk. As the author concludes, “The virus can’t destroy/this urge to bless our life & praise/even these pandemic days.”

What is striking though is that this collection reflects a particular posture, a particular response to the pandemic. One that allows the pandemic to deepen and transform, a metamorphosis of sorts. Instead of clamoring and contending, there is a kind of quiet acceptance that the pandemic is what it is, but the things that truly make life worth living, goodness, truth, beauty, and faith, hope, and love only shine more brightly when the distracting noise of our pre-pandemic normal is silenced.

If we look back over the last year, and have second thoughts about our own responses, a new variant and another wave offer fresh chances to lean into the lessons of the pandemic. Someday our grandchildren will ask us about this time. Will we change the subject or share a glimpse of the depths we cultivated in these years? These poems give words to what all of us have experienced. We still have time, it appears, to be formed for better, or for worse. These poems invite us into the better. Will we follow?

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

Review: Perhaps

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Perhaps, Joshua M. McNall. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2021.

Summary: Advances the idea of “perhapsing” that allows for the exploration of the space between doubt and dogmatism through close reading of scripture, asking hard questions, exercising imagination, and the practice of holy speculation.

Many of us feel pulled apart by the discourse of our times. On one hand, we encounter unbending and sometimes partisan dogmatism, and on the other unbridled doubt or an outright cynicism about truth. Then there are those who find ourselves in the middle of these extremes. We believe God and yet don’t possess either the certainty or the arrogance of the dogmatists. We don’t doubt in the sense of being in two minds or are we given over to the unwillingness to believe of the hardened cynic. We have questions. We wonder if there is room to wonder or set aside the pronouncements of the certain and the cynic to look afresh at the scriptures to hear its message through the noise and to use our imagination to explore how both/and might be possible when all we’ve been presented is either/or.

Joshua McNall affirms this longing for a space between doubt and dogmatism, proposing that this is the place of “perhaps.” He contends for the recovery of what some would consider a dangerous practice, that of holy speculation, a “faith seeking imagination” that is not without boundaries but opens us to be surprised by God. “Perhaps” may function to take us from a place of questions to the embrace of an orthodox faith. It may also give us the space to not feel we need to be certain about everything, particularly some of the important but contended questions that may be considered adiaphora.

McNall observes that this was the kind of speculative imagination necessary for monotheistic Jews to embrace the possibility that Jesus, come in human flesh was God and that, somehow, the One God was also Three. He then goes on to consider other instances of “perhapsing” in scripture. He considers what I think one of the toughest parts of scripture, Genesis 22. He proposes the possibility that Abraham, caught between the fulfilled promise of a son from two people as good as dead reproductively and the command to sacrifice his son, “perhapsed” that God could even raise the dead Isaac and so did receive him back from death (cf. Hebrews 11:17, 19). He then considers three historical exemplars, Origen, Julian of Norwich, and Jonathan Edwards. I found his treatment of Edwards especially fascinating. He notes how Edwards brings together the truths that God does all for his glory with the observation of the human longing of joy and that our greatest joy is the pursuit of God and his glory. He also notes Edwards’ distinctive thinking on immaterialism, occasionalism, and continual creation as other examples of a kind of holy and disciplined speculation.

McNall then talks about “guardrails” in our “perhapsing,” recognizing speculation can go off the cliff. He offers ten principles drawn from a dialogue between theologians from Augustine to Edwards with writers like Cormac McCarthy and E. M. Forster that is so good, I will not list the ten because it will not do justice to his exposition of them. One that I appreciated was Number eight: “Seek Noncontrastive Connections.” Later, he illustrates this in wrestling with the goodness of God and the existence of animal suffering and death before the fall.

Parts Two and Three contend against both dogmatism and doubt. He names the issue of the shrillness of dogmatism, contrasting it with the dancing and weeping of real prophetic Christianity. He shows how the quest for certainty often ends up in nihilism rather than obedient trust. Against the fashionability of doubt in our culture, he names the dividedness of heart that occurs when doubt becomes a way of life. Against this, he proposes the example of Martin Luther, ascending the steps of Santa Scala to pray for his grandfather in purgatory, assailed with questions about the steps, the power of relics and the reality of purgatory. McNall writes:

“Luther’s attitude is one of obedience. The question does not lead him to depart for a weeklong bender in the Roman brothels. Nor does it correspond directly to a repudiation of church tradition. This shift would come later through his outrage at indulgences, and by reading Paul. At the moment, Luther simply walks down the stairs. He descends Santa Scala–because a willingness to walk and wait and pray is the best response to doubt” (p. 126).

In the last part of the book he offers three examples of practicing “perhaps. As noted previously, he considers the suffering and death of animals before the fall, exploring three proposals that perhaps the significance may reside in some for of self-sacrificial instinct pointing toward a greater sacrifice. Second, he considers Romans 9:22-23, that some humans are “vessels prepared for destruction.” He notes how verse 23 breaks off mid-sentence and wonders if this might be a descriptive but not determinative statement, particularly in the context of Romans 11:32 which says, “God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.” Then he turns to C. S. Lewis and his novel, The Great Divorce. It is a “perhaps” between rigid exclusivism and unbounded universalism. George MacDonald, who affirmed a kind of universalism is present as a character and witnesses the refusal of some of the residents of hell to believe. Yet not all turn away.

One of the distinctives of McNall’s account is his appeal to story and imagination even as he uses discursive reason. Interwoven in the chapters is the narrative of two young women, Eliza and Claire, one in the process of losing her faith and the other finding faith. It offers a narrative rendering of what “perhapsing” might be like. It also underscores a contention of McNall that the theological imagination of “perhaps” is cultivated by the reading not only of great theologians but great writers of fiction. He models this by literary references throughout and offers a specific challenge to these two types of reading in his conclusion.

Perhaps is an important word for all who teach and pastor in this divided age. McNall captures the distress of many young Christians I know who do not want to walk away from the goodness of Christ, but are disillusioned by the shrill dogmatism of so many of his followers in positions of leadership in the church. McNall cogently diagnoses the real dangers of the divided heart of disillusioned doubt. And he articulates the desperately needed third way for those of our generation, the way of perhaps that leads to an imaginative and supple orthodoxy without dogmatism that addresses the challenges of our age.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

Growing Up in Working Class Youngstown — Alfred L. Bright

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Alfred L. Bright, Youngstown Vindicator, August 15, 1971 via Google News Archive

I was reminded of Al Bright about a year ago when reading Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste. In the book she tells the story of a city championship Little League team that celebrated with a picnic and swimming outing at one of Youngstown’s pools. One member of that team was Black. He had to remain outside the fence, with teammates bringing him food. They couldn’t bring him the pool. After parents argued with the pool management, the boy was allowed to sit in a raft to be pulled around the pool by a lifeguard. For a few minutes. Everyone else had to exit the pool. The lifeguard whispered to him, “Whatever you do, don’t touch the water.” That Black Little Leaguer was Al Bright. The year was 1951. (Source: Sydney Morning Herald).

That was racism in Youngstown in 1951. That would have discouraged many others. Not Bright. The picture above is from a 50 year old news story in The Vindicator on August 15, 1971, noting that Bright was going to be the featured speaker at the National Junior Achievers Conference and was going to be awarded Speaker of the Year Award. The article also notes that he had joined Junior Achievers in 1958, was president of the chapter in 1959, and won the Achievers of the Year Award that same year. At the national conference in 1959, he was persuaded by the president of Colgate-Palmolive, S. Bayard Colgate, to go to college instead of barber school. He won a scholarship at Youngstown University and graduated in 1964 with a Bachelor of Science. A year later, he added a Master of Arts in painting from Kent State.

He taught art and painting at Youngstown after graduation. Louis Zona, executive director of the Butler was one of his students! Then, in 1970, he established the Black Studies program at Youngstown State and directed it for 18 years. He was the first full-time Black faculty member at Youngstown. During this time, he hosted Alex Haley, Jesse Jackson, Maya Angelou, and Shirley Chisholm at the university. Marvin Haire, one of Bright’s first students in the program, wrote:

“[The black studies program] sought to infuse the systematic study of African people into university curriculum and do that in a way that provided exposure to a wide range of what we would call the black experience, including music, art, history, politics and education. So the original vision was to build a program that offered that kind global awareness to students who took courses.”

He never stopped painting and his works are part of permanent collections at The Butler Institute of American Art, the Kent State University Gallery, the Harmon and Harriet Kelly Collection of African-American Art, Canton Museum of Art. Roanoke Museum of Fine Arts and Northeastern University. He exhibited his art in more than 100 solo exhibitions over his career. In 2012, he painted “Portals in Time” to a live jazz performance at the Akron Art Museum.

He was awarded the the Distinguished Teaching Award from YSU in 2006. He died October 28, 2019 at age 79. For my last two years at Youngstown State, I worked in the Student Development Program. Bright spoke for the program regularly and helped open the eyes of this white guy from the Westside to the beauty of black culture and the outlines of black history. I was struck that I never was diminished in my own racial identity but enlarged in my appreciation of the culture and history of Blacks in Youngstown. He built bridges with people rather than walls. He could have been bitter. Instead, he was better, as a program founder, an artist, as a mentor to younger Black leaders. He was born and died in Youngstown. His life was a gift to the city.

To read other posts in the Growing Up in Working Class Youngstown series, just click “On Youngstown.” Enjoy!

Review: Test Gods

/ rtrube54 / 1 Comment

Test Gods, Nicholas Schmidle. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 2021.

Summary: An account of Virgin Galactic’s effort to become a space tourism company focusing on the intersection of Richard Branson’s vision and the work of test pilots and engineers to make it work.

On July 11, 2021, Virgin Galactic, Sir Richard Branson’s space tourism company achieved its first fully crewed flight with Branson aboard. This was the culmination of a seventeen-year program that began when Branson joined forces with Burt Rutan of Scaled Composites to design an air-launched space ship that would land like a plane. Test Gods traces this history through 2019, centered on one of the key test pilots throughout the program, Mark Stucky.

The author, Nicholas Schmidle, the son of an ace fighter pilot, was embedded with the company for four years, from 2014 to 2018 and became close to Stucky. He traces the design and testing of what was initially called Spaceship Two and the launch vehicle White Knight Two. Space vehicle development has been dotted with disasters and the Virgin Galactic program was no exception. He describes the tragedy of the fuel tank explosion during rocket development in 2007 in which three engineers died.

Then the testing program begins, first, captive flights, attached to White Knight Two, then glide flights and finally longer and longer rocket flights. Each pushes an unknown envelope that often comes with new control problems. Stucky does many of these, and the line between temporary losses of control or anomalies and disaster was a thin one. Each time leads to modifications that improve the vehicle.

Then came the setback that delayed the program several years and led to the separation of Virgin Galactic from Scaled Composites. On a flight Stucky did not fly in 2014, fellow test pilot Mike Alsbury had his first experience of going transonic in the vehicle, and in the exhilaration made the fatal error of deploying the “feather,” a kind of air brake that should not have been deployed during the transonic phase. Stucky saw it unfold in the control room, realized the fatal error that Alsbury was making, and witnessed the subsequent breakup of the vehicle. Alsbury died; his co-pilot Pete Siebold survived.

It wasn’t until 2016 that Virgin Galactic would fly. This gave time to address safety issues and pilot training arising from the crash. Stucky was a key, in setting a tone of rigor in flight training. Finally, on December 13, 2018, Stucky and co-pilot C.J. Sturckow reached Mach 3.0 and an altitude of 51.4 miles, and received their astronaut wings.

Schmidle explores what made Stucky so successful–the combination of risk and preparation. It turns out his most serious injuries were a couple paragliding episodes. His work destroyed his marriage and Schmidle explores his eventual reconciliation with his children, including son Dillon, present at that December 2018 flight. It also causes the author to reflect on his relationship with his own father, whose footsteps he didn’t follow.

One of the most fascinating interactions was that between test pilots and engineers. For the engineers, it was often the case that they always wanted to make things safer, especially after the crash, whereas the test pilots wanted to know if it was safe enough–they understood there was always risk, both known and unknown.

The material on Branson is interesting. On the one hand are his “vapor” promises of being able to do commercial flights as early as 2011, mostly to attract investors and customers. Yet he never compromised safety. And later on when Mohammed bin Salman offered him $1 billion, he left the money on the table. He would not take the money of the man who ordered the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

Branson was the one who did all the interviews after the July flight. What this book fills out is the story of all those who contributed to that success, especially the test pilots (and their wives or partners who lived with the fear of every flight), and the engineers who built the rocket motors and space craft. This is a great inside look at one private space company, and what a challenging goal they have already achieved, albeit at great cost.

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Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.