08 January 2009

Rest in peace, Father Neuhaus

Joseph Bottum anounced the passing of Father Neuhaus at the First Things website this morning. His fight -- and not the fight against the cancer with which he suffered -- is over.

Bottum's tribute,

I weep, rather for all the rest of us. As a priest, as a writer, as a public leader in so many struggles, and as a friend, no one can take his place. The fabric of life has been torn by his death, and it will not be repaired, for those of us who knew him, until that time when everything is mended and all our tears are wiped away,
reminds me of something General Lee said of Stonewall Jackson:

He has lost his left arm; and I have lost my right hand.
I would like to offer my own tribute, but Kevin, at After Existentialism, Light, does better than I have time to offer:

During the early semesters of my undergraduate studies, a close friend of mine introduced me to First Things. We would read and discuss the articles, and both of us (he, a confessional Presbyterian, and myself, a devout Baptist) were freed from the limitations of our heritage. Christian scholars were more than just exegetes; they were scientists, philosophers, social theorists, and so on. Strange as it may sound, FT played no small role in saving our faith; otherwise, we would have been overwhelmed by the coherence and interpretive power of the secular narrative, a mechanistic existence presupposed in our coursework.
I also discovered FT during my undergraduate years as I experienced my own struggle not to have my new-found faith "overwhelmed by the coherence and interpretive power of the secular narrative, a mechanistic existence presupposed in [my] coursework."

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James Frank Solís
Former soldier (USA). Graduate-level educated. Married 26 years. Texas ex-patriate. Ruling elder in the Presbyterian Church in America.
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