Fiction with catholic themes

[FireFromHeaven]

A lot of the science fiction I read has atheistic or at best agnostic themes. Does anyone know of good science fiction with a more catholic world view? Or for that matter any good catholic fiction? Beyond LOTR of course.

 

[Dorothy]

Excellent Catholic fiction is written by Michael D. O’Brien.

Some of the titles are:

Father Elijah

The Father’s Tale

Strangers and Sojourners

Island of the World

A Cry of Stone

and several others…

You can read commentary about these novels on Amazon.com

Some of the books were quite long and I could barely put the book down until it was finished.

 

[Peggy_in_Burien]

While not Catholic, C.S. Lewis wrote his Space Trilogy, which I highly recommend.

 

[Deana83]

“Les Miserables.” by Victor Hugo

 

[J_Peterson]

Can’t think of any Sci-Fi. As far as regualr fiction, I’ve been reading The Violent Bear it Away by Flannery O’Connor and read a couple of her short stories. So far I’ve been liking her stuff. It seems like it’s mostly character based and you need to do a lot thinking to figure out what she’s driving at (at least I do anyway).

 

[tuscany]

**Although not scienc fiction, if you like history, Brother Cadfael is like a 12th century cross between Columbo and CSI.

Brother Cadfael is the fictional main character in a series of historical murder mysteries written between 1977 and 1994 by the linguist-scholar Edith Pargeter under the name “Ellis Peters”. The character of Cadfael himself is a Welsh Benedictine monk living at Shrewsbury Abbey, in western England, in the first half of the 12th century. The historically accurate stories are set between about 1135 and about 1145, during “The Anarchy”, the destructive contest for the crown of England between King Stephen and Empress Maud.

As a character, Cadfael “combines the curious mind of a scientist/pharmacist with a knight-errant”. He entered the cloister in his forties after being both a soldier and a sailor; this worldly experience gives him an array of talents and skills useful in monastic life. He is a skilled observer of human nature, inquisitive by nature, energetic, a talented herbalist (work he learned in the Holy Lands), and has an innate, although modern, sense of justice and fair-play. Abbots call upon him as a medical examiner, detective, doctor, and diplomat.**

 

[Avila123]

If you like fantasy fiction try Christopher Statshaff (hope I spelt it right). Young lapsed Catholic chap is transported to another reality where the industrial revolution never happened. It’s the prayer and faith that is awe inspiring. Won’t say more as it would spoil it.

 

[The_Reginator]

While not Catholic, C.S. Lewis wrote his Space Trilogy, which I highly recommend.

That series really got me to think. (Ouch!)
One of the points made reminds me of various homilies and also of Jesus’ teachings on wanting to experience pleasure over and over. Here’s a quote:
(From benedictseraphim.wordpress.com/2003/06/23/out-of-the-silent-planet-chs-12-17/)

‘A pleasure is full grown only when it is remembered. You are speaking, Hman, as if the pleasure were one thing and the memory another. It is all one thing. The seroni could say it better than I say it now. Not better than I could say it in a poem. What you call remembering is the last part of the pleasure, as the crah is the last part of the poem. When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing. Now it is growing something as we remember it. But still we know very little about it. What it will be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then–that is the real meeting. The other is only the beginning of it. . . .’
. . .
‘And indeed,’ he continued,’the poem is a good example. For the most splendid line becomes fully splendid only by means of all the lines after it; if you went back to it you would find it less splendid than you thought.’

I hear a great song. I want to hear it over and over. -]I eat a cinnamon bun, and I want more, more, … never mind that. /-] What I gained from that was simply that we waste so much time looking for and repeating pleasure that we leave only a slim amount of time for God.
When you read with yours eyes open and from a Catholic perspective you can learn a lot.

 

[The_Reginator]

If you like fantasy fiction try Christopher Statshaff (hope I spelt it right). Young lapsed Catholic chap is transported to another reality where the industrial revolution never happened. It’s the prayer and faith that is awe inspiring. Won’t say more as it would spoil it.

Were you thinking of this lad?:
christopher.stasheff.com/
I’d like to read some of what you describe. Do you recall the name of the book(s)?

 

[Avila123]

Were you thinking of this lad?:
christopher.stasheff.com/
I’d like to read some of what you describe. Do you recall the name of the book(s)?

Yes you are right. Just dug out one of the books. The series is called A Wizard in Rhyme and the books are:

Her Majesty’s Wizard (1st book)
The Oathbound Wizard (2nd book) - what happens when you mistakenly make an oath.
The Witch Doctor (3rd book) - Yes it does involve healing witches.

The Warlock Books have monks but do not have such a central Catholic theme.

 

[UbiCaritas]

If you want sci-fi, it’s hard to beat A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter Miller. It’s set in and around a post-apocalyptic Catholic monastery. In terms of humor, it reminds me of a little of Tolkien, but the storyline and ideas are entirely the author’s own. I reread it every year.

(The sequel, however, was truly ghastly. IIRC, Miller didn’t complete it, but someone did so after he died and then published it. Ugh.)

Rumer Godden’s *In This House of Brede *and *Five for Sorrow, Ten For Joy *are both wonderful novels with Catholic themes. Both are set around Catholic religious communities. Nothing Godden ever wrote, however, falls into the horrible “Christian fiction” category–ie, very badly-written dreck with moral themes. Her novels are truly excellent writing. She wrote quite a lot of other books, too, but those are among the best.

I do second the Michael O’Brien recommendation.

 

[The_Reginator]

Re A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter Miller: when I’ve read that book I was a little concerned by the fact that there is no mention of the continuation of the Catholic Church, just a lot of words and imagery … as far as I can recall at least.

There are two (or more) Christian (but not Catholic) books I’ve read more than once.
The author is a lady named Zenna Henderson, the books: Pilgrimage: The Book of the People (1961) and The People: No Different Flesh (1967).
I am not familiar with her other work, but those two books are great.

 

[Arizona_Mike]

There’s lots of Catholic-themed SF for you (not all written by Catholics, but the ones that I know who are have an asterisk*):

Fr. Robert High Benson* - “Lord of the World” and “The Dawn of All” (a Catholic dystopia and utopia, respectively)

“Utopia” by St. Thomas More* - hey, science fiction by an actual Saint (although Chesterton has been proposed for canonization, so we may have more.)

“A Case of Conscience” by James Blish (Manicheanism)

“The Quest for St. Aquin,” “Balaam” and “Star Dummy,” short stories by Anthony Boucher* I love the alien version of the Lord’s Prayer in the latter story, as did C.S. Lewis.

“The Man,” “Bless Me Father For I Have Sinned,” “The Messiah,” “The Fire Balloons,” and “The Dog in the Red Bandana” by Ray Bradbury.

“A Clockwork Orange” by Anthony Burgess* (yeah, the book is deeply concerned with Catholic themes of free will - make sure you get the British edition with the final chapter that is missing from the American edition), also his “The Wanting Seed” (Augustinianism vs. Pelagianism)

“The War With the Newts” by Karel Capek* (Social Justice)

“The Man Who Was Thursday” by G.K. Chesterton* (The nature of God - and much more)

“The Pre-Persons” by Philip K. Dick and “Croatoan” by Harlan Ellison (Abortion)

“Catholics” by Brian Moore (The Latin Mass)

“Children of Men” - P.D. James (Openness to Life)

Most anything by Dean Koontz* since his conversion, especially his Odd Thomas books, or my favorite (because I love dogs) “The Watchers.”

Anything by R.A. Lafferty*, especially “Past Master” and “The Flame is Green”

Walter Miller* - “A Canticle for Leibowitz” (Church history, and monasticism, and human dignity), but also his “Conditionally Human” (abortion)

Walker Percy* - especially his SF works “Lost in the Cosmos,” “Love in the Ruins,” and “The Thanatos Syndrome.”

Jerry Pournelle* - “Inferno”

Tim Powers* - most anything, but especially “Declare”

Fred Saberhagen* - especially “Love Conquers All” and “Brother Berserker”

Clifford Simak - “Project Pope” and “Mastodonia”

Morris West - “The Shoes of the Fisherman” - as has been said, if you stick a president in a near-future SF story, it becomes a “political thriller.”

Gene Wolfe* - anything and everything, but especially his short stories “The Detective of Dreams,” “La Befana.” Man, I love his writing.

Oscar Wilde* - “The Selfish Giant” A sweet fable from a man who reached out to the Church at the end of a tragic life.

Poul Anderson - “Operation Chaos”

Mary Doria Russell - “The Sparrow” and “Children of God” - the problem of evil (and, Jesuits in space!)

 

[Spiritu]

John C Wright is a science fiction author and convert to Catholicism. (His most famous novels, *The Golden Age *and its sequels, were written while he was still an atheist.)

He writes regularly about religion and science fiction on his blog, and sometimes reviews new SF works: johncwright.livejournal.com/

 

[yankeeredneck]

A lot of the science fiction I read has atheistic or at best agnostic themes. Does anyone know of good science fiction with a more catholic world view? Or for that matter any good catholic fiction? Beyond LOTR of course.

I am not much for reading anymore, but as far as feature films, it’s hard to beat the original “The Day the Earth Stood Still”, with Michael Rennie, for a Jesus parallel. An all-powerful being from the heavens comes to Earth to make life for us better and save us from destroying ourselves. He is immediately shot, out of fear, and brought to a military hospital, where he escapes, wearing a suit he “borrowed” from the hospital dry cleaner, belonging to a “Major Carpenter”. He poses as “Mr. Carpenter” throughout the film. When he is finally tracked down and mortally wounded, he sends a message through a woman to his loyal robot (Holy Spirit?) to come and get him. The robot brings him back to the ship and resurrects him, but only for a short period of time (the original script called for a total resurrection, but they were afraid of the public repercussions).
Finally, he preaches to the gathered crowds and ascends into the sky in his speceship, having left the hope of peace in the world.

 

[The_Reginator]

Re A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter Miller: when I’ve read that book I was a little concerned by the fact that there is no mention of the continuation of the Catholic Church, just a lot of words and imagery … as far as I can recall at least.

There are two (or more) Christian (but not Catholic) books I’ve read more than once.
The author is a lady named Zenna Henderson, the books: Pilgrimage: The Book of the People (1961) and The People: No Different Flesh (1967).
I am not familiar with her other work, but those two books are great.

I am almost finished re-reading A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter Miller: It seems to be a whole lot more Catholic than I remembered. The Church, in one way or another, does NOT appear to disappear.
It is certainly worth the read. There is humour in it too, but I miss it at times. (The first time I read it I was totally unaware of any humour.)

Another good point: The book provides a great chance to bone up on your Latin.

 

[Arizona_Mike]

I am almost finished re-reading A Canticle for Liebowitz, by Walter Miller: It seems to be a whole lot more Catholic than I remembered. The Church, in one way or another, does NOT appear to disappear.
It is certainly worth the read. There is humour in it too, but I miss it at times. (The first time I read it I was totally unaware of any humour.)

Another good point: The book provides a great chance to bone up on your Latin.

There’s a lot of Catholic issues near the end, including an impassioned argument on euthanasia (not to mention the risk of nuclear war, a much more likely possibility when the book was written.)

 

[The_Reginator]

There’s a lot of Catholic issues near the end, including an impassioned argument on euthanasia (not to mention the risk of nuclear war, a much more likely possibility when the book was written.)

Yes. I was just reading the anti-euthenasia arguments last night.

I found the following at kirjasto.sci.fi/wmiller.htm

At school Miller had called himself an atheist but in 1947, at the age of 25, he converted to Roman Catholicism. However, he never considered himself a devout Catholic and actually A Canticle for Leibowitz is not Catholic in its faith.

 

[Arizona_Mike]

Yes. I was just reading the anti-euthenasia arguments last night.

I found the following at kirjasto.sci.fi/wmiller.htm

Well, he certainly had periods of doubt and mental torment, which were probably contributing factors to his suicide. He had some very bad wartime experiences in WWII (one of which led to him writing Canticle.) The SF writer Joe Haldeman, a Vietnam veteran who knew Miller, has said Miller had one of the worst cases of undiagnosed PTSD he had ever seen, which was probably a contributing factor and hopefully, an extenuating one. We should pray for his soul, even as we appreciate his literary achievement.

 

[Contarini]

I don’t see how you can argue that Canticle isn’t “Catholic in its faith.” I have heard that Miller became disaffected with the Church later. A bit like Graham Greene, perhaps.

I came to this thread too late–most of the good ones have already been cited, and Arizona Mike’s excellent list had some entries I want to explore . . .

I would however add Orson Scott Card’s Speaker for the Dead and its sequels (these are themselves sequels to the famous Ender’s Game. The Speaker series has a pretty sympathetic portrayal of Catholicism, even though Card himself is a Mormon and his experience with Catholicism was ironically gained as a Mormon missionary in Brazil.

Also Frederick Pohls’ “Happy Birthday, Dear Jesus,” while it doesn’t reference Catholicism specifically (I think the Christian family are referred to as Anglicans, though they don’t sound like typical Anglicans to me), is a good satire on secular Christmas and the differences between it and Christian liturgical celebration.

Edwin