by Loyola Press on March 31, 2009
In My Life with the Saints, James Martin, a Jesuit priest and associate editor of America magazine, shows that the saints are much more interesting and accessible—and sometimes, funny—than many people think they are. Rather than modeling unattainable levels of sanctity, the saints reveal that the call to holiness consists in being oneself.
Though he grew up as a lukewarm Catholic with little knowledge of church culture, Martin can trace the presence of saints throughout his life, from a plastic mail-order statue of St. Jude he kept in his sock drawer as a teen, to a TV program on Thomas Merton that led him to the priesthood. His real education in the saints, though, came after his fast-track corporate career at General Electric was derailed by a newfound faith that led him to the priesthood.
Studying the saints’ lives and finding that they had human foibles was a great consolation, Martin says. Especially someone like Thomas Merton, in whom one sees both sin and sanctity. “Seeing that someone so human could be holy gives me great hope,” Martin says. “None of us are meant to be Therese of Lisieux or Thomas More. We’re meant to be ourselves, and to allow God to work through our humanity.”
Martin enjoys introducing people to his favorite saints, and meeting new ones himself. “I think one reason we are initially attracted to a saint is that he or she is already praying for us,” Martin says. He credits Saint Jude, who, “all those years stuck inside my sock drawer, prayed for a boy who didn’t even know that he was being prayed for.”
My Life with the Saints
by James Martin, S.J.
Hardcover $22.95, Paperback $15.95
ISBN: 0-8294-2001-0
by Loyola Press on March 31, 2009
A writer for an alternative weekly newspaper, film buff and music fan, 30-year-old Matthew Lickona may sound like another Gen-Xer working on his hipster credentials. Or, as a wine connoisseur, foodie and admitted coveter of “stuff,” he might be taken for an aspiring yuppie. Lickona, however, is one of the “New Faithful” among his generation, committed to traditional Catholicism. In his book Swimming with Scapulars: True Confessions of a Young Catholic (Loyola Press, $19.95), he describes a faith that transcends the times.
Being Catholic means being “Other” in more profound ways than fish on Fridays. It’s not easy to abide by the teachings of the church, Lickona acknowledges. His willingness to let sex be always open to life, as the church instructs, is part of the reason that before he was 30, he and his wife had four children. “More kids runs counter to the cult of cool,” he says. “Who can be cool when changing a diaper?”
His faith is a source of great joy, however, particularly communing with God through the sacraments. “If you ask me why I am a Catholic, my first answer is the Eucharist,” he says. “I want that communion with God. I need it.”
It’s a faith that not even the priest sex abuse scandal can cloud, though he endured an encounter with a priest whose excessive displays of affection crossed the line. He can muster pity for the priest, but his anger is reserved for the hierarchy’s defensive reaction. “I can understand wayward flesh,” Lickona says, “but when the response from the pastors of that flesh gives the impression of one Episcopal eye being cast toward the courtroom, I have a harder time forgiving.”
A cradle Catholic, his faith is both gift and habit, he says, and these “true confessions” are an attempt to wipe away the tarnish brought on by familiarity, allowing a clear look at what and why he believes. Lifelong intimacy with “God, the devil, heaven and hell, Jesus and Mary, sin and salvation” may offer a feeling of security, but it can breed complacency, too. He tells of his not-always-successful striving to remain attentive to what lies at the core of his faith: “the redemptive and exemplary suffering of Jesus Christ.”
Chronicling his life as a Catholic, Lickona tells of how he has been sustained by the robust intellectual tradition of the church, but also by old-fashioned sacramentals like the scapular and statues of the saints; his appreciation of his parents’ deep faith—even while sometimes chafing at his mother’s piety; his embarrassment when asked to explain his beliefs; and his grappling with personal sin and moral issues from anger to almsgiving.
He says he knows there are those will think he is a loon. “Eating Jesus? Home-schooling families with ten kids? Lighting candles in front of statues, confessing sins to a priest in a box? Fanatics.” But perhaps coming from a fanatic, he muses, “the message of God’s love will regain some of its wonderful outrageousness: ‘Listen, I have a secret. I eat God, and I have His life in me. It’s the best thing in the world; it leads to everlasting life. But first, you have to die to yourself.”
Swimming with Scapulars: True Confessions of a Young Catholic
Matthew Lickona
Hardcover $19.95
ISBN: 978-0-8294-2471-3
