B I B L I O N - ENGLISH VERSION
any attempt to impose Catholicism as the
Universal Religion to be doomed to failure.
In several chapters of the book, Chester-
ton dedicates special attention to St. Francis
of Assisi and defends a point of view that
highlights his similarities with Jesus Christ,
arguing that,
“if St. Francis was like Christ, Christ was
to that extent like St. Francis. (...) What I
mean is this; that if men find certain riddles
and hard sayings in the story of Galilee, and
if they find the answers to those riddles in
the story of Assisi, it really does show that a
secret has been handed down in one religious
tradition and no other. It shows that the casket
that was locked in Palestine can be unlocked
in Umbria; for the Church is the keeper of
the keys.”
Being even more enlightening when it co-
mes to Jesus Christ, Chesterton affirms that,
“It is truism to say that Christ lived before
Christendom (...) the medium in which He
moved was not the medium of Christendom
but of the old pagan empire.”
Chesterton uses his signature oxymora to
present us the austere St. Francis in a unique
perspective, sometimes taking the stance of
the skeptical and of the atheist to question
practices that the (Catholic) Church reveres as
exemplar, but that author exposes with critical
thinking, leaving the author to form his own
opinion on those issues.
A coincidence or not, a large part of the
texts selected for this book show us Ches-
terton’s rough, perhaps even defiant posture
towards religion, especially Christianity. The
absolute dogma of the Roman Catholic Chur-
ch and its indifference towards what Protes-
tants accept or reject in the Catholics, stating,
“nothing amuses Catholics more than the
suggestion, in so much of the old Protestant
propaganda, that they are to be freed from the
superstition called Mariolatry.”
The chapter dedicated to religious compa-
rison is a fascinating one, where Chesterton,
after suggesting Confucianism is a civiliza-
tion, advocates there should be an alternative
classification for different religions. Chester-
ton maintains that these should be divided
psychologically in order to better identify the
spiritual experiences over the inconsequential
comparisons.
He ends, much in the role of a chaperone,
in a quite personal visit to Jerusalem, using
the steep paths and narrow streets to once
again make known his characteristic pers-
pective on the Holy Land. He narrates the
guided visit from the Zion Gate and a key
center of history, where nations and religion
coexist, with all its identity, architecture and
prophecies. The Temple Square and Omar’s
Mosque, as he likes to name it (and there’s a
lengthy explanation on why he names it so!),
the Mount of Olives and the Church of the
Holy Sepulchre are all included in the tour
described by our illustrious guide. Bon voyage!
PA U L O S É R G I O G O M E S
A B C S O F T H E C H R I S T I A N L ife – T he U lti m ate A ntholog y of the P rince of Para do x , D E G . K . C H E S T E R TO N .
P U B L I S H E D B Y AV E M A R I A P R E S S , U S A
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