By the time of his death in 1933 Henri Bremond, priest and member of the elite Academie francaise, had established himself in France, and increasingly in England and the United States, as a distinguished historian of Christian spirituality and as a Catholic modernist who helped to shake the church out of its dogmatic slumbers by embracing ""pure love,"" artistic-poetic expression, and mystical prayer as the privileged manifestations of spiritual truth. Drawing on substantial new scholarship in France, that has resuscitated and reinterpreted Bremond's work for our own times, and that sees Bremond as an important precursor of current trends in literary interpretation as well as spirituality, Gorday surveys the entirety of Bremond's corpus of writing, setting his work in its context of his personal struggles, as well as the wider setting of French historical and cultural development. ""Bremond's inquiries led him to some culminating reflections on the relation between mystical experience and poetry, anticipating the contemporary interest in 'text' and posing for us the question: Are we merely left with 'words, words, words'? Or do the words crystallize the mystical experience, though metaphorically rather than conceptually? Gorday traces these many developments of a complex thinker sensitively and articulately, in dialogue with the latest French discussions of Bremond."" --Eugene TeSelle, Emeritus Professor of Theology and Church History, Graduate School of Theology, Divinity School, Vanderbilt University ""Considering the volume of work that Henri Bremond published, the many subjects it engaged, and the degree of recognition that it received from his contemporaries, Bremond has been a figure underrepresented in scholarship. Gorday has mastered Bremond's considerable output, set it in context, and presented it in an accessible and attractive way. His Histoire litteraire provocatively rated by Emile Goichot as the most successful of all of the modernist writings, Bremond undertook his work of historical retrieval not out of antiquarian interest, but because he judged it of continuing significance for his own time. Gorday has done that for Bremond himself."" --C.J.T. Talar, Professor of Church History, University of Saint Thomas (Houston) Peter J. Gorday is a retired Episcopal priest, parish pastor, and marriage and family therapist in Georgia. With a PhD in Religion (Vanderbilt), and ThM in Pastoral Counseling (Columbia Presbyterian), he has authored studies in the history of Biblical Interpretation and the relations of theology and psychoanalysis, as well as a biography of Francois Fenelon (2012).
By the time of his death in 1933 Henri Bremond, priest and member of the elite Academie francaise, had established himself in France, and increasingly in England and the United States, as a distinguished historian of Christian spirituality and as a Catholic modernist who helped to shake the church out of its dogmatic slumbers by embracing "pure love," artistic-poetic expression, and mystical prayer as the privileged manifestations of spiritual truth. Drawing on substantial new scholarship in France, that has resuscitated and reinterpreted Bremond's work for our own times, and that sees Bremond as an important precursor of current trends in literary interpretation as well as spirituality, Gorday surveys the entirety of Bremond's corpus of writing, setting his work in its context of his personal struggles, as well as the wider setting of French historical and cultural development.
Discover the wisdom of this controversial theologian whose counsel and meditations have found a wide audience for more than three centuries. François Fénelon was a seventeenth-century French archbishop who rose to a position of influence in the court of Louis XIV. Amid the splendor and decadence of Versailles, Fénelon became a wise mentor to many members of the king’s court as well as to the controversial Madame Guyon. Later exiled from Versailles for political reasons, Fénelon set out to improve the lot of peasants of his diocese and to deepen the spiritual life of all with whom he came in contact. Until his death, he corresponded with those at court who had become his spiritual “children.” Twenty-first century Christians are rediscovering the wisdom of this spiritual thinker. Together with Pascal—who was an old man in Fenelon’s youth—he showed how it was possible to have devotion and faith in the Age of Enlightenment. He battled heresies, faced charges of heresy himself, and wrote masterful books of insight into the spiritual life. “Peter Gorday’s life of Fenelon is a gem. I recommend it to anyone with an interest in Fenelon or Christian mysticism in general.” –Dr. Chad Helms, Professor of Modern Foreign Languages, Presbyterian College, and editor of Fenelon: Selected Writings (Classics of Western Spirituality) “Gorday traces the complex situation in Fenelon’s time and the varying perspectives of his interpreters. He declares him not cunning but tough as a thinker. In this book, we get not only a fascinating story but also a subtle guide to self-examination.” -Dr. Eugene TeSelle, Emeritus, Vanderbilt Divinity School
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