LONDON - 25 October 2005 - 358 words

'Holiness, Speech and Silence'

'Holiness, Speech and Silence' by Nicholas Lash (Ashgate 2004) ISBN 0-7546-5039-1

Dr Bill Chambers

This book is an expanded version of the Prideaux Lectures given by the author at the University of Exeter in 2002. I have found it hard to summarise, but one theme is about the darkness of our contemporary British culture which has lost the concept of "God".

The first chapter on "The Question of God Today" considers the marginalization of theology. What does "god" mean? Originally, he says, "gods are what we worship", but "in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the word 'god' came to be used, for the first time, to name the ultimate explanation of the system of the world."

Chapter 2 is entitled "Globalisation and Holiness". Lash brings out the "interconnectedness of everything, the primacy of relations", a theme to be contrasted with the older world view of the world as a collection of individuals. Unfortunately this "globalisation" leads to terrible injustices and imbalances, and we need a "global imagination" to counter these. Christianity can help here with its emphasis on "church" and "communion" and "sharing". He also contrasts two world-views: In the first the purpose of the world is power: "strength conquers weakness and it is violence which makes the world go round." In the second we "understand all things as given, an expression of the giving that is God's own self, and the outcome of all giving to be life and harmony." In Chapter 3 (Cacophony and Conversation) he analyses how the first of the above viewpoints renders even conversation impossible. In the final chapter (Attending to Silence) he contrasts God's answering of Job out of the whirlwind with the silence of the Father in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Each chapter is followed by bibliographical notes, and there is an index of proper names and biblical references.

I can't see this book being a roaring popular success, but it provides many interesting ideas for anyone prepared to work at it. An academic work, but written because of an urgent need to speak out, and not in order to swell a publications list.

© Independent Catholic News 2005

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