Why is every book Catholic?

Good question. Obviously not every author is Catholic. Some authors are vehemently against all religion, altogether. Are their books still Catholic? My view is yes, they are, because Catholicity is not about subjective intent. Any attempt to engage in the creative act just can’t help but be Catholic, and creative output can only be understood for what it really is through a Catholic lens. Let me start with explaining the latter, and then the former:

Everybody has a perspective. It is impossible to view the world except through the lens of our individual existence. This individual existence includes our education, life experiences, implicit and explicit biases, hopes and dreams, psychological and emotional conditions, circumstances of birth, cultural and family influences, and so on. It is functionally impossible to remove all these means by which we process and interpret the world. This is akin to the fact that our eyes do not actually “see” an object as it truly is, but rather that the eyes process the light reflecting off the object, and then our brains make a model of the object.

So we can only see through these types of subjective distortions, or else see nothing at all. We don’t intellectually grasp things the way they really are, any more than our literal eyeballs see the objects in the world as they actually are. And there is no way around this. Our human limitations make us incapable of accessing unfiltered reality.  

Some schools of philosophy hold that the truly objective point of view—unburdened by any distortions—is not a perspective that actually exists. But even if it is just a fiction, it is a necessary fiction, if we are going to believe that our individual attempts to know truth (such as via the scientific method) are going to be worth anything. Objectivity is at least useful, even if it’s not real.

As a Catholic, of course I believe and know it is real. Objectivity is God’s view of the world. His view does not contain any distortions or limitations. The One who made all knows all. And He sent his Son to take on human flesh so that we could imitate the life of a human being who operates in perfect truth, who himself IS perfect truth. By becoming one with his body, we align our limited human perspective to the one who is truth himself. That is looking at things from the Catholic lens. When we do that, we see how beautiful things really are.

Does looking at things through a Catholic lens overcome our human limitations? Yes and no. It is true that we can do through Christ what is impossible to do ourselves. If we seek to know his view, he will show us. But as human creatures, we are completely incapable of having the intelligence and capacity to see the world entirely through God’s eyes. That is when we walk by faith, not by sight, trusting that the One who has all knowledge is a lot smarter than us. God doesn’t get rid of the subjectivity inherent in our nature, but rather He gives us the beautiful opportunity to hand it over to Him so He can sanctify it and help us align it to Himself. It's our best chance of seeing truth, and the goal of our lives is to keep seeking the graces to get better and better at it.

If we don’t do this, we’re naturally going to align with some variation of a subjective perspective. There are a lot of points of view and ideologies that are competing with God for this control of our mental eyeballs. We can’t just be “empty” of any interpretative lens, if we want to think about anything. But all those other interpretative lenses were created by our fellow human beings. No matter how smart they sound or how much they hit our emotional biases, they’re completely incapable of helping us see the truth. Only God’s point of view given directly to us through Jesus Christ can do this.

On a side note, plenty of people argue that the Christian worldview is just another subjective worldview like all the rest. Why elevate it over a Marxist worldview, or a feminist worldview, or Buddhist, or capitalist, or whatever other worldview?

To that argument, my main reply is that's correct if we are talking about Jesus through a Protestant theology. I believe Protestantism is an attempt to reduce Jesus Christ into a box of human understanding, rather than accepting him in his fullness, which he expresses through the Church that he built and uses to communicate. If you are trying to see the world through the eyes of Jesus Christ, but you want to control who he is, then you have indeed reduced Christianity to another subjective worldview.

But enough of that—we are talking about Catholicism! And I believe to the core of my being that the truth of Jesus Christ—communicated through Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium of the Catholic Church—is THE truth. And I want to know what it is, because what is true is good; what is true is beautiful. That is why I want to consume art through a Catholic lens.

All artists are trying to say something true. It could be the truth about their feelings, their thoughts, their view of the world. It could be what they think is true about people, about relationships, about pleasure and pain, about purpose. But no artist is trying to be a liar. Art is an earnest communication. And any attempt to say something true is an attempt to say something about God, since God IS the truth.

Now of course some artists get closer to this truth than others. But even if what is communicated falls terribly short, and the artist is wounded and unable to connect with truth in a healthy way, the work still contains something honest. Looking at it through a Catholic lens helps draw out that beauty. I have found this to be true even when the artist is very openly and firmly against all things God-related. Creation itself is a co-participation in God's plan for our holiness. The very act of creating cannot help but have some beauty and seeds of redeemable qualities.

That said, I am not advocating for consuming blatantly evil or corrupted material. We have to be humble enough to know that some things are so distorted with sin that we aren’t strong enough to consume it without ourselves becoming corrupted. The location of that line is different for each person depending on their circumstances—the art that we review and consume here at GCBC is only stuff that does not cross our personal line. We encourage you to be mindful of yours.

The books and other art that we examine here are those that we believe are saying some very true things, even some very true things about God. In many cases, that is not necessarily the author’s intent. Some, like Foundation author Isaac Asimov, were anti-Catholic, avowed and vocal atheists up to death. And yet Foundation is sweepingly thoughtful in its consideration of the purpose and final ends of the human race. It is an attempt to understand and say something true about God's creation….and that truth can only be revealed through the Catholic lens.

Other authors are intended to not only say something true about God, but to say something true about God as the author understood Him to have revealed Himself. C.S. Lewis is one such author. Even though he maintained an aversion to the Catholic Church up to death, the beautiful stories in The Great Divorce have amazing depth when pondered through a Catholic lens.

Ultimately I want to enjoy good art. I want to not only read good books, but wring every last bit of wisdom and enjoyment out of them. I want them to transform me and help me grow in holiness. Good books can be food on my spiritual journey. Luckily, the Lord Jesus Christ gave us every part of himself as spiritual food—he turns bread into the Eucharist, and he turns art into intellectual and emotional food through the Scriptures and teachings of the Church. So why wouldn’t I make every book Catholic? That’s how we get the best out of art.

Looking forward to sharing this journey of spiritual nourishment in communion with all of you in our book club in 2025!