Vinson Cunningham’s constant application of a critical eye in his work for The New Yorker must have helped in composing his first novel, “Great Expectations.”
Kevin Spinale
Kevin Spinale, S.J., a Jesuit priest, is an assistant professor in the Curriculum and Teaching Division of the Fordham University Graduate School of Education.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
Unveiling the history of Black Catholic nuns: Shannen Dee Williams’s ‘Subversive Habits’
Shannen Dee Williams’s ‘Subversive Habits’ uncovers—with authoritative, painstaking scholarship—a great deal of what was hidden and some of what has been erased concerning white supremacy in the Roman Catholic Church.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
Race, religion and roundball: Two new books on basketball
Father Kevin Spinale, S.J. offers his thoughts on the two latest selections of the Catholic Book Club: ‘Miracles on the Hardwood’ and ‘I Came as a Shadow’.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
The gift and challenge of love in Kirstin Valdez Quade’s ‘The Five Wounds’
‘The Five Wounds’ causes the reader pain. Call it compassion. Call it empathy. Call it the Christian experience of being heart-stretched.
Posted inArts & Culture, Ideas
A defense of learning Latin and Greek (Also: Why does it even need defending?)
Princeton University is dropping the requirement for knowing Latin and Greek to major in Classics. Its decision is a frightening one and augurs ill for the future of the field.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
The crux of religious belief: Walter Miller Jr.’s ‘A Canticle for Leibowitz’
Parsing the pros and cons of ‘A Canticle for Leibowitz,’ the latest selection of the Catholic Book Club.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
The gleeful language of Niall Williams’s ‘This Is Happiness’
The latest selection of the Catholic Book Club, this novel by Niall Williams is full of lively, dancing imagery sure to bring glee to the reader.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
When Thomas Jefferson rewrote the Bible
Peter Manseau, the curator of American religious history at the Smithsonian, offers his definitive description of Thomas Jefferson’s eclectic efforts to remake the Bible in the Catholic Book Club’s latest selection.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
Reading John Howard Griffin’s challenging ‘Black Like Me’
Kevin Spinale, S.J., offers his initial thoughts on John Howard Griffin’s ‘Black Like Me,’ the latest selection of the Catholic Book Club.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
We need John Kennedy Toole’s ‘A Confederacy of Dunces’ now more than ever
Among the many clichés operative in Covid-time (“in these uncertain times,” “the new normal”), there is the sturdy cliché, “now more than ever.” Well, I think we need comedy now more than ever.