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Book Review: Patron Saints for Postmoderns by Chris Armstrong
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Chris Armstrong. Patron Saints for Postmoderns: 10 From the Past Who Speak to Our Future. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press. $16.00 paperback. 249 pages. ISBN 978-0-8308-3719-9
Despite the somewhat misleading title of the book, Patron Saints for Postmoderns: 10 From the Past Who Speak to Our Future by Chris Armstrong, this is a superb piece of literature that combines the historical with the commentary, with the spiritual formation with the theology. I say the title is misleading because it is not just “patron saints” discussed (but in fact three women for three chapters as well) and “postmoderns” as this is not a book about postmodernism per se, but rather the gist of the book is that everyone knows about traditional saints like Augustine, Luther, et al. but there are in fact “lesser known” saints on which we can glean superb Christian thought and Christian praxis. As Armstrong rightly notes as regard to the Church and how we got where we are: “We needed to know whose shoulders we were standing on.” (pg. 10)
To be sure, those shoulders whom the modern Church and Christians stand on stretch out over a considerable amount of time with differing contexts, needs, and we must remember too the different working of the Spirit in those differentiated times. Alas, Armstrong’s concern with the modern (apathetic?) state of American Christianity, our memory of history, Church history especially, is about as short as the amount of time we spend in prayer for revival.
This is a Church history book very unlike other Church history books. It is also a spiritual formation book, but very much unlike other spiritual formation books. It is also a book about historical-theology, but (you guessed it) very unlike other books on historical-theology. What makes Armstrong’s book so unique, yet so familiar to the reader? To be honest, I think it is because Armstrong cares. And cares deeply about the subject matter. And cares deeply that you the reader know the subject matter, and then live it out. Perhaps it’s my sense of discernment or perhaps it’s that I could literally not put this book down, but the reader is quickly thrust into the story of each chapter (and each figure, “saint”), as if s/he is there living then and experiencing what they are experiencing.
Despite centuries have passed in many instances, you intimately connect with Dante Alighieri (of the famed Divine Comedy) where like the character Beatrice in his stories are not just stories, but true life (Beatrice was a long-lost love of Dante); and where you learn of the love of God that heals those wounds of Dante’s (and ours) that gives us a hope and desire for the life to come. That makes Paradisio all the more exciting, and Inferno all the more quivering.
Similarly, the most famous hymn in the world, Amazing Grace, penned by the continually broken and rebellious John Newton becomes all the more poignant when you know the background of Newton’s debilitating realization of his own depravity, and then the life transforming beauty of God’s grace in his life. In Armstrong’s well-written pages, you become John Newton. Not in an ontological sense of course, but you become Newton because Newton is all of us. Newton is a human man with a story and eventually his heart decided to join the Story of God, and begone the silliness of the rat race of rebellion from the Divine once and for all. As it is with us.
Unfortunately, I’m afraid that this book will not see the shelves of many libraries. Armstrong is not a terribly well-known author. Many people don’t like to read history. There are no catchy one-liners for spiritual growth that you can stitch on a throw pillar here. But what is here in these pages are ten stories of people who came from all different walks of life and in different times and places. And yet, they are all alike too. They all decided to fit their own personal story into something bigger than themselves. Their story became part of the greater Story. And now their stories are stories that we read centuries later, as we all hope to fit our own stories into the greater Story of the Kingdom of God, knowing Him and making Him known. That’s what these ten “saints” have done, their inspirations and legacies living on far after they themselves are gone. What is your story, and how do you want to be remembered? With the help of these ten and the countless others in the “cloud of witnesses” before us, we can learn from them and ultimately too become more Christ.
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