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Daily Archives: April 10, 2011

Book review & links: “The Spirit of Catholicism”, by Karl Adam

10 Sunday Apr 2011

Posted by neobonaventurean in Apologetics, Baptism, Bible, Books, Born Again, Catholic, Christian, Church, Doctrine, EBooks, Eucharist, God, Grace, History, Jesus Christ, Liturgy, Mysticism, Papacy, Prayer, Religion, Sacraments, Saints, Salvation, Spirituality, Theology

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I. Review

The Spirit of Catholicism is a work of high theology written for a lay audience, eschewing technical terms for lucid and often beautifully poetic language. It is widely acknowledged to be one of the best introductions to Catholic Christianity available today; even George Orwell, non-believing but fair-minded (unlike many prominent Englishmen nowadays, alas), praised it in his own snarky way. Thus, it comes highly recommended by leading lay evangelists like Scott Hahn, a convert from Protestantism, and Dave Armstrong, who describes it as “perhaps the best book written about the Catholic Church in the 20th century. Must reading for Catholic and non-Catholic alike”.

In The Spirit of Catholicism, Karl Adam presents a panoramic view of the Catholic Faith from the perspective of the Incarnation, the revelation that God the Son became man in Jesus Christ for humanity’s salvation. The Incarnation shows that, even as salvation is entirely a Divine act, it is carried out through human freedom and cooperation: God the Son saved man by living and dying as a man; He shares this salvation with humanity through a community of human beings, the Church; and He supernaturally joins individuals to Himself through means appropriate to our spiritual and material life, which are called sacraments. In Chapter VII, Adam writes:

“The Catholic cannot think of the good God without thinking at the same time of the Word made Flesh, and of all His members who are united to Him by faith and love in a real unity. The God of Catholicism is the transcendent, absolute God, who became Man for us in His Son, and therefore no solitary God, but the God of angels and saints, the God of fruitfulness and abundance, the God who with a veritable divine folly by the incomprehensible decree of His most free Will takes up into Himself the whole creation that culminates in human nature, and in a new, unheard of supernatural manner, “lives in it,” “moves” in it, and in it “is” (cf. Acts XVii, 28).”

Adam shows the essence of salvation to be communion, a share in the supernatural life of Christ that is given to us through the Church, “which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all” (Ephesians 1:22-23), which baptizes us into the body of Christ (1 Corintians 12:12-13) and shares with us His life through sacraments like the Eucharist (John 6:52). Nor is salvation a solitary relationship between God and the individual; rather, it is the Christian’s adoption into a family of love, among fellow-children of the Father who, being in the body of Christ, share in His Sonship. Adam writes in Chapter VIII:

“As our Lord, in the great prayer which He taught His disciples, joined all who pray into a single unity and directed them to appeal out of this unity to their common Father, and as St. Paul especially enjoined prayer for one another (Rom. xv, 30; 2 Cor. i, 11; Eph. i, 15, etc.), so the Church prays, not in the name of any individual, nor as the mere sum of all individuals, but as a fellowship, as a priestly unity, as the visible priesthood of Christ.

“It is not I and you that pray, but the mystical Christ…”

This emphasis on the role of the Church as the whole Christ would become the ecclesiology of the encyclical Mysticum Corpus Christi (1943). Although it was downplayed after the “people of God” imagery of the 1960s returned the emphasis on the juridical, rather than the mystical, nature of the Church, Adam’s ecclesiology remains influential; and I myself believe that it helped pave the way for the rise of modern covenant ecclesiology and for Pope Benedict XVI’s emphasis on communion as the nature of the Church.


II. Links

See this worth-it book & ebook:

  • The Spirit of Catholicism, by Karl Adam, translated by Dom Justin McCann, O.S.B.
    • The printed book be purchased on this page of the Catholic Answers Shop (Catholic Answers Press), on this page of St. George Books & Gifts, on this page of Ignatius Press (2016), on this page of the Ave Maria University Store (Angelico Press); and at Amazon.com (Kessinger Publishing, 2010), Amazon.com (Angelico Press, 2012), Barnes & Noble (CreateSpace Publishing, 2016), and Amazon.com (Image, 1960).
    • The ebook may be purchased at Amazon.com (Papamoa Press 2017) and Amazon.fr (Papamoa Press, 2017), and Barnes & Noble.

Note: Updated 8 April 2018 to remove links to online copies of the work, after we learned that both the author and the translator died less than 70 years ago, hence not long enough in the past for the work to have passed into the public domain. Updated 27 May 2018 to add links to pages where the work may be purchased.

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Leonine Prayer (from SanctaMissa.org)

O God, our refuge and our strength, look down with mercy upon the people who cry to Thee; and by the intercession of the glorious and immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God, of Saint Joseph her spouse, of the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and of all the saints, in Thy mercy and goodness hear our prayers for the conversion of sinners, and for the liberty and exaltation of the Holy Mother the Church. Through the same Christ Our Lord. Amen.

Pages

  • List of Free eBooks (Arranged by Title)
  • List of Free eBooks (Grouped by Subject)
    • Anti-Catholicism and Persecution
    • Apologetics
    • Art and Architecture
    • Bibles and Commentaries
    • Catechisms and Explanations of the Faith
    • Church and Ecclesiology
    • Church Documents
    • Death and Life Everlasting
    • Early Christianity
    • Eastern Catholicism
    • Education
    • Ethics and Moral Law
    • Evangelization and Missions
    • God and Christ
    • Grace and Salvation
    • Heresies and Errors
    • History and Biography
    • Homiletics and Pastoral Theology
    • Homilies and Lectures
    • Humanity and Human Life
    • Journals and Periodicals
    • Law, Ecclesiastical
    • Law, Secular
    • Letters
    • Literature
    • Marriage and the Family
    • Music
    • Mysticism and Spirituality
    • Philosophy
    • Practices and Customs
    • Prayers and Devotions
    • References
    • Religious Orders and Religious Life
    • Revelation and Faith
    • Sacraments and Liturgy
    • Saints, especially Mary
    • Science
    • Society and Social Teaching
    • Theology
  • List of Worth-It Catholic Books & eBooks
  • Sources of Free Catholic eBooks
  • Special Posts and Selections
  • What is the Catholic eBooks Project?
April 2011
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Reviews and Updates

  • Online ebook: A Comparison of the Theology of the Body by Pope John Paul II with St. Thomas Aquinas, by Thomas Petri January 28, 2019
  • Online ebook: “The Beauty and Truth of the Catholic Church”, volume 2, adapted and edited by the Rev. Edward Jones January 13, 2019
  • Online ebook: “A Treatise of Spiritual Life”, translated by D.A. Donovan January 4, 2019
  • Free ebook: “The Creed Explained”, by Rev. Arthur Devine January 2, 2019
  • Online ebook & audiobook: “Mary”, by Peter Kreeft January 1, 2019
  • Free ebook: “New Practical Meditations for Every Day in the Year, on the Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ”, by Father Bruno Vercruysse, S.J. December 31, 2018
  • Online text: “On Chastity, Marriage, the Family, and Virginity”, by the Vatican II Preparatory Commission December 30, 2018
  • Online text: Regensburg Address on “Faith, Reason and the University”, by Pope Benedict XVI December 27, 2018
  • Online text and video: “Martyrdom for the Faith in Our Times”, by Cardinal Raymond Burke December 26, 2018
  • “The Everlasting Man”, by G.K. Chesterton: online ebook, audiobook, worth-it book  December 25, 2018
  • Online ebook: “Confraternity Bible: New Testament and Supplemental Commentary” December 11, 2018
  • Online text: “Conceptual Foundations of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights”, by Dr. Thomas Finegan December 10, 2018
  • Online text: “On Promotion of Catholic Missions”, by Pope Pius XII December 9, 2018
  • Free ebook: “The Immaculate Conception of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God”, by J.D. Bryant December 8, 2018
  • Online text: “Catholic Action: A Particular Lay Vocation”, by Father Pietro Baudena December 5, 2018
  • Online ebook: “The Preparation of the Incarnation”, by Henry James Coleridge December 2, 2018
  • Free ebook: “Sermons Delivered before Mixed Congregations”, by Henry B. Altmeyer December 1, 2018
  • Free ebook: “The Miraculous Medal”, by M. Aladel November 27, 2018
  • Online text: “The Feast of Christ the King”, by Pope Pius XI November 25, 2018
  • Online text: “Human Persons Created in the Image of God”, by the International Theological Commission November 24, 2018

Notices

1. This weblog lists down links to only those texts that appear to be legally readable and/or downloadable, and are NOT pirated or illegally scanned or reproduced. I do not claim any right of any kind to the books or their contents.

2. This weblog does not copy or reproduce ebooks but only provides links to the webpages where they may be found; and to the best of our knowledge, all the books, tracts, and other texts thus indexed may be linked to on the websites that contain them.

3. Some of the books indexed on this blog were released online subject to conditions with which readers must comply.

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5. The images on this weblog are taken from Wikimedia Commons, and their use is believed to be lawful.

6. Comments will be moderated (with some delay, I’m afraid). Any links in the comments that lead to webpages or materials that contravene authentic Christian teaching or calumniate the one true Church will be removed.

7. Comments providing corrections or suggesting other Catholic Christian ebooks or ebook sources will be most appreciated.

8. If there is a problem with the foregoing, or if you find that: a link is NOT WORKING; the ebook listed SHOULD NOT BE LINKED TO or is NOT LEGALLY AVAILABLE (for example, because it’s actually unlawfully reproduced); the ebook or site linked to is NOT FAITHFULLY CATHOLIC; or there’s some other problem with the link, the linked work, or this weblog–then please comment immediately so we can remove the offending link or otherwise fix the problem.

God bless ye all.

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