“Fools for Christ”

It’s 80 degrees at 8:00pm and I’m sitting on my balcony enjoying this book by Heather King. The title is Fools for Christ: Fifty Divine Eccentric Artists, Martyrs, Stigmatists, and Unsung Saints.

I had trouble putting it down to take the photo. Let me back up: you’re here because you are interested in the obscure, forgotten, and undiscovered—we both are, that’s why the title grabbed my attention—and the essays held it.

From the back cover:

“Fifty short essays on notable Catholics, for a full spectrum of humanity! Two criteria: the subject can’t (yet) have been canonized, and he or she has to be dead.”

“Some are hardly known, Jacqueline de Decker, for example, wore a neck brace, drove a red convertible, and hung out with prostitutes in her native Belgium. She also offered herself as a victim soul to help Mother Teresa.”

Some “fools” are better known, including Dorothy Day, Michelangelo, and Flannery O’Connor, but the author introduces us to obscure facts and inspirational tidbits of their lives. Did you know Sir Alec Guinness was a daily communicant?

Well-known or little-known, they should all be known—and remembered—like Jan Tyranowski, of whom, King tells us, John Paul II said, “Tryanowski was truly one of those unknown saints, hidden among others like a marvelous light at the bottom of life at a depth where night usually reigns.”

Glancing at the list of fifty in the Table of Contents, there are many names I do not recognize, so this book is totally “up my alley” because they are, well, obscure, forgotten, or undiscovered.

Cheers!