Catholic or Evangelical, Read Thomas Howard

If you’re in the mood for some profoundly thought-provoking reading, I recommend working your way through some of Thomas Howard’s books. Whether you adhere to the teachings of the Catholic church, or find your comfort in Evangelical doctrines, the writings of Thomas Howard will move you. Ten of his books are being made available on your Logos digital library for pre-order in the Select Works of Thomas Howard.

Why read Howard? Because he is perhaps the most articulate convert from Evangelicalism-to-Catholicism of the past century (read his personal history here). His intellect is vast, but his prose sublime, and his message for the church and the individual believer is that God is to be found and worshipped in ways both sacramental and incarnate.

Such a message is timely for this generation of believers who have lived through a year or more of little to no sacred communal church experience due to a global pandemic. Thomas Howard’s writings, with their recurring theme of seeking “splendour in the ordinary,” may hold a key of hope for the church as it returns to corporate observance of the sacraments such as Communion, but also the lost “sacraments” of corporate singing, and even just corporate gathering, that have been denied the church for many months.

Another reason to read Thomas Howard that his delightful character bleeds through every page of his books. He was a wonderful human being and godly man, a brilliant and generous personality, even if characterized at the time of his conversion to Rome as a traitor to the Reformation.

Fr. Dwight Longenecker wrote that “He played the part to the full with his T.S. Eliot manners, his tweed suits, bow ties and witty repartee. . . He was an actor and raconteur and reveled in the joy of language. His speech was not so different from his writing style … full of fun words, unexpected turns of phrase, amusing observations and a sense of wonder in it all.”

Also, if you’re a love of C.S. Lewis, then you’ll be delighted to discover Howard’s extensive writings on two of the Inklings, including Lewis and Charles Williams (and if you don’t yet know Williams, you need to add his novels to your reading list, too). Howard’s Narnia and Beyond: A Guide to the Fiction of C.S. Lewis, included in the Logos collection, is required reading for anybody wanting to grasp the deeper narrative at work in Narnia et al.

Ulimately, the ten books in the Thomas Howard collection will deepen your appreciation for exceptional writing, for sacramentality, for the wonder hidden within ordinary life. As such they deserve a place in your library (and on your reading list!).