Thomas Howard is one of the most erudite and
literate Catholic authors in recent history. He was raised in a prominent
Evangelical home (his sister is well-known author and former missionary
Elisabeth Elliot), became Episcopalian in his mid-20s, then entered the
Catholic Church in 1985, at the age of 50. Dr. Howard was a highly regarded professor
of English and literature for more than 30 years and is the author of
numerous books, including Dove
Descending: T.S. Eliot’s “Four Quartets,” Evangelical Is Not Enough, Chance or the Dance?, Lead Kindly Light, On Being Catholic, and The
Secret of New York Revealed. He recently was interviewed, by email, by Carl
E. Olson, editor of Catholic World Report,
about the new edition of his book Hallowed
Be This House: Finding Signs of Heaven in
Your Home (Ignatius Press, 2012), as well as the state of
American culture, secularism, Anglicanism, and great literature.
CWR: How did the
idea for Hallowed Be This House
originally come about? Do you think there is an even greater need today for a
sense of the hallowed and the sacred than there was when you first wrote the
book in the 1970s?
Thomas Howard: I think the
original idea for the book came to me gradually. It must have been the fruit of
a lifetime of reading and teaching Western literature, where one finds, up
until at least the Enlightenment, the assumption of an ordered, hierarchical,
and blissful Universe. Even the pagans assume this. But in my young adulthood,
I found myself moving from the very faithful and good Protestant Evangelicalism
of my family into the Anglican Church, where at least the notions of hierarchy,
sacrament, and liturgy are remembered. Also, of course, I became soaked in the
works of C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, and their friend Charles Williams. In all
of these writers, one finds the ordinary stuff of quotidian life treated as
though that stuff bespeaks—what shall we say? Glory? Ultimacy? The Truth of
things? Splendor? Yes—all of that. The ordinary is not ordinary. It trumpets
joy, freedom, and virtue to us mortals if we will pay attention.
Is there a greater need today to see things
this way than when I wrote the book in the 1970s? Yes. In the decade of the
1960s, when my wife and I were living in New York, which became the eye of the
storm, Western Civilization as it has been known for millennia collapsed. The
moral order was overthrown with great zest, and this overthrow is always,
inevitably, the prelude to the collapse of any civilization. I myself would see
signs of hope, however, in the papacies of John Paul II and of Benedict XVI,
with, in the latter case, the promulgation of the Year of Faith. This is a
clear call to the Church to reassert, very strongly, the real substance of the
Catholic Faith, which is more, far more, than a matter of “it’s nice to be nice,”
which perhaps has been the impression conveyed to the laity in common parish
homiletics in the wake of what obviously concerns the Holy Father at the moment—namely
the training of seminarians, for perhaps a century, in “the historical critical
method” of reading Scripture.
CWR: Can you give
an example or two of how our houses are, or can become, hallowed? How can we
better develop a sense of sacramentality and an incarnational perspective?
Howard: How do we
“hallow” the household? In one sense, we might repeat what fierce nuns used to
lay upon young parochial school children to do when they skinned a knee or did
badly on a quiz: “Offer it up!” That, like all such clichés, hints at something
true. The business of “offering” touches on the very center of things. God
“offered” his Son for our salvation. Jesus Christ always “offers” his whole
being to his Father in the mystery of the Holy Trinity, and offered himself for
us poor mortals on the Cross for our salvation. Anything that is thus “offered”
can become holy, that is, “set apart” for God.
We see this in the Eucharist, and we are
invited to see it in the ordinary routines (often, to be sure, dull or
nettlesome) of common household life. The love of a man and woman in the
nuptial mystery; the nurture and training of children; peeling carrots;
carrying out the trash: all of these supply us with the chance to see
ordinariness as the very sacrament of Love, that is, the chance to say to each
other, “My life for yours,” which is what Love says, e.g., “Here—let me hold
this door for you.” “Here—let me wash the dishes for a change.” “Here—let me
get up at 3 am to give the infant
a bottle, and let you rest for a few minutes.” And of course, all of this is
“sacramental” in that the sacraments themselves entail, in every case, a
physical point at which holiness and eternal truth touch our mortal life.
(Yes—even Confession: there must be a priestly set of ears and a penitent’s
voice box. We can’t text or email our confessions.) So, by the same token, the
small, unnoticeable routines and tasks of household life, being
characteristically physical events (laundry, sweeping)—these touch on, and even
“mediate” to us, the chance to take a small step into the Hallowed: things
become holy by being offered to God. I can do this with my daily household
tasks.
CWR: Several of
your books, including this one, analyze and critique and address the secularism
that seems to infect and infest almost every aspect of modern life. When did
you, as a young man, first begin to take the measure of secularism and
skepticism? How has secularism changed in, say, the past 50 years? What can be
done by the ordinary Catholic in the pew to cope with secularist influences and
challenges?
Howard: I think my
beginning to “take the measure of secularism and skepticism” came about
gradually. The household in which I grew up was profoundly Christian
(Evangelical), so the notion of holiness was, so to speak, in the air. One
gradually becomes aware that what is at work in Christian love, which one
slowly learns at home, is not noticeably at work out in “the world.” People
don’t take God into account. This state of affairs, which has characterized the
world of us men since the day after the expulsion from Eden, took an
exponential leap forward, I would propose, in the 1960s, when the hubris, venality,
lechery, vanity, and predatoriness native to our fallen humanity exploded out
across society, and became, eventually, sovereign in the public realm.
Erstwhile canons of politesse, self-control,
reticence, modesty, and integrity were overthrown. “Let it all hang out!”
became the ensign under which we were told to march.
For the “Catholic in the pew,” surely the
tactic for coping with this firestorm that rules the contemporary world is the
old tactic: stay close to the Center; walk with the Lord, in prayer, quietness
(when possible!); the reading of Sacred Scripture daily (if only briefly); and,
of course, “assisting at” Mass (that is the old phrase for it), at least
weekly, and, if possible, more often. And of course it’s not a bad idea to
minimize the occasions (TV, cinema, and rock music plugged into one’s ears)
when that firestorm can assault us with particular energy.
CWR: Your book, Chance or the Dance? (Ignatius Press) was originally published in
1969 as An Antique Drum: The World as
Image. It is remarkable in its insights regarding a whole host of problems,
and it is already shot through with a deeply sacramental understanding of the
world. How did you, as a young Evangelical, come to that understanding? What
role did it play in your decision to eventually enter the Catholic Church?
Howard: I don’t think
I ever heard the words “sacrament” or “sacramental” in my family’s household.
The Protestant Reformers had pretty thoroughly evacuated the Faith of any such
notion. They were certainly faithful to the Scriptures and the Creeds as they
understood them, and were stout defenders of the Faith. But Protestant religion
is primarily a religion of “the Word.” It can often seem as though God has
revealed himself in cerebral, verbalist, discursive, propositional terms. Of
course they believe in, and defend energetically, the doctrine of the Incarnation; but their worship and piety is
virtually 100 percent focused on the text of Scripture, and on preaching.
“Communion” is something of an embarrassment, and it was consigned to the
margin of things at the Reformation, some denominations marking the Lord’s
Supper only four times a year.
So I think that, in my own case, the notion
of the sacramental began to take shape in my young imagination by means of a
desperate yearning. I was not at all sure what it was that I yearned for, but
it seemed to lie vaguely in the direction of the liturgy of the Anglican
Church. And it was during the 25 years of my life as an Anglican that I learned
about the idea of sacrament. As far as my being received into the ancient Roman
Catholic Church goes, I had, through reading (Newman, Karl Adam, Louis Bouyer,
Romano Guardini) moved steadily in the direction of the Church until, in 1985,
at the age of 50, I was received. The question “What is the Church?” was the
single, implacable, remorseless question that became the catalyst here. As an
Anglican, I had the best music, the best vestments, the most beautiful church
buildings, and the thickest incense that there was. But “What is the Church?” would not leave me alone.
CWR: As a student
of history and a teacher of literature, how would you describe the current
state of American culture in general? What bothers you the most about popular
culture? Any signs of hope?
Howard: As far as “the
current state of American culture” goes, I, having deep pessimism in my bones
and marrow, would take the most melancholy view possible in this regard. Surely
all the signs of a disastrously decadent civilization are there? I have nothing
new to say here: the loud and brash “sexual revolution” would be the vanguard,
I should think, with its concomitant collapse of the family, its assault on the
most fundamental quality of our status as men and women—namely, gender—and the
sovereignty of philosophical atheism, and
now, the explicit attack on the Catholic Church globally—these would, to my
mind, be the signs.
I don’t look to politics or education now as
a remedy for our malaise. The Enemy is too strong for any human tactics. As a
Protestant Fundamentalist (i.e., Evangelical), I was taught to look for “the
blessed hope and the glorious appearing of Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.”
We believed, on tiptoe as it were, in the Parousia. As a Catholic of course, I
would not venture to attach any date to this event. But it’s hard to fix much
hope on human efforts to quench the firestorm, although of course I believe
what the Church teaches, namely, that our task is always, always—no matter what
century or civilization we live in—to alleviate human suffering and need, and to
testify to the only Anodyne for our troubles, Jesus Christ.
CWR: You were an
Anglican for many years before becoming Catholic. Recently, the Church of
England voted—to the surprise of many—to not allow female bishops. Do you think
the inevitable has merely been postponed? What is the future, do you think, of
theologically liberal, or “progressive,” Christian groups and movements?
Howard: The Church of
England (Anglican) has just now voted to deny the office of bishop to women. Is
this a sign of that Church’s orthodoxy and fidelity to the ancient apostolic
Church’s tradition? I myself would not attach much confidence to the move,
since the power structure of the Anglican Church, namely the bishops and
clergy, voted in favor of opening the episcopal office to women, and it was the
laity who blocked the move. In that church, the view is that “the faithful are
not yet ready” for various moves “forward,” e.g., same-sex marriage, women
bishops, gender-neutral language, and so forth. But the inevitable forward
movement of time will bring all that to pass (it already has, in some of those
sorts of questions).
Very much the same notion is at work in the
American Episcopal Church. And when it comes to the future of liberalism and
progressivism in Protestantism, again, I would not foresee any check in the
surge towards hegemony of these -isms. What Pio Nono (or was it Pius XII?) saw
coming and named “modernism” has burgeoned and flourished and gained almost
total control in seminaries all over the world. This is what Benedict XVI is
explicitly addressing. But even as the Supreme Pontiff, he has a staggering
task facing him. Even Catholic faculties (I know this from teaching in a
Catholic seminary) sometimes chuckle and wag their heads knowingly over the
Holy Father’s efforts. The academic dean at one seminary, when I pressed Veritatis Splendor on him 25 years ago,
read it at my shrill behest, came into my office, and threw the booklet down
with the remark, “The pope’s exegesis is so
bad that I couldn’t read further.” Period.
CWR: As a longtime
professor of English literature, what are the essential works of literature you
recommend every Catholic read?
Howard: What books might make good reading for
Catholics now? I’d have to say that the reading of the Fathers (there’s an
Oxford paperback edited by Henry Bettenson entitled
The Early Christian Fathers which contains easy-to read excerpts
from these men)—that the reading of such volumes as this would provide a great
rush of encouragement and fervor to any Catholic. In my own case, I was greatly
helped by John Henry Newman’s
Essay on
the Development of Christian Doctrine (Penguin paperback), and by Karl
Adam’s
The Spirit of Catholicism. I
would also recommend
all of the works
of Romano Guardini. His main book,
The
Lord, is (I tell people) “the best book written since the Bible.” One can
read only one chapter at a time, not because it is too difficult, but because
it opens out on such gigantic vistas of the Faith and the spiritual life, that
one can take only so much at a given time. And of course, we now have the works
of Benedict XVI. They’re not bedtime reading: but I can, I think, guarantee
that any reasonably intelligent Catholic adult will find himself thrilled. Also
anything by Josef Pieper. And then, naturally, any and all of the works of C.S.
Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.