Author Andrew Knowles and Luke Penkett; Mark Galli
Publisher Lion Scholar, £19.99 2019
Format pbk
ISBN 9781912552245
Condensing two of the most seminal figures in church history into a single book might sound a big challenge, but reviewing said book in a single paragraph will have to tread still more lightly over two men who changed the course of western Christianity. These books were initially published separately, by the different authors, and remain entirely separate within one handy volume. What the first book, on St Augustine, does capture so well is the context in which he developed so much of his theology, and in particular the correspondents with whom he was arguing. Augustine’s complex and lengthy considerations of original sin, sex, freedom and baptism can only be fully understood in terms of what and who he was arguing against, his thinking compromised by close engagement with some problematic and challenging theology. As for St Francis of Assisi, the problem is almost the reverse. So original was his thinking, his ideas and his way of life it is difficult to explain just how much they corresponded to the spiritual crises of the day. But correspond they did, and the author does an admirable job explaining Francis’ extreme witness in terms of both his personal biography (a wayward youth) and the church’s parlous state as the materialism of the age threatened to engulf it. St Augustine regarded his theological legacy as essential to the future of Christianity itself, whereas St Francis recognised even during his lifetime that his own order was in danger of forgetting his founding vision. Both are equally well-served in this convenient digest of two remarkable and ever-relevant lives.
NICK MAYHEW SMITH
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