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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Ecclesiastical biographies
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Cara
Shipmate
# 16966
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Posted
Karen Armstrong's Spiral Staircase , mentioned above, is wonderful.
Paul Elie has written a brilliant multiple study of Dorothy Day, Thomas Merton, Flannery O'Connor and Walker Percy--I was reminded of it by the mention of Dorothy day above. None of them clergypersons exactly but it is a well-written, interesting, and inspiring book. The life you ave may be your own: an American Piligrimage
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Pondering.
Posts: 898 | Registered: Feb 2012
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
A recent female ecclesiastical biography is that of Elsie Chamberlain which has good reviews.
If you keep your eyes open in the next three years there should at least be one autobiography of Constance Coltman, the first woman ordained in modern times into a main stream denomination in England (Congregational, in 1917). The Unitarian's were earlier (1904) with Gertrude Von Petzold. German aristocrat, went to Scotland for degree (was one of the early women at St Andrew's University and resident of University Hall). Trained for the ministry at Manchester College Oxford, served for a while in UK and then returned to Germany.
Jengie
[ 19. December 2013, 07:39: Message edited by: Jengie Jon ]
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
Ah, so now we know what you're doing your PhD on, then? ![[Smile]](smile.gif)
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My beard is a testament to my masculinity and virility, and demonstrates that I am a real man. Trouble is, bits of quiche sometimes get caught in it.
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
No, I am doing my PhD on what I say I am.
I think I have a good idea who is writing a biography but it is NOT me and I have not officially been told.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
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Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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Amos
Shipmate
# 44
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Posted
Penelope Fitzgerald's book about the Knox Brothers (also about their father who was the first Bishop of Manchester) is wonderful: possibly my favourite ecclesiastical biography of all time.
Next to it I'd put George Bell (yes, that George Bell)'s biography of Archbishop Randall Davidson. Do not be put off by the size of this volume, which you can probably find cheaply second-hand. It not only deals well with Davidson's early life and family, but is also the best introduction to the code of episcopal letter-writing I've ever come across. Read this, and you'll always be able to figure out what a bishop is saying in a letter.
Humphrey Carpenter was the son of a Warden of Keble, and so known to Runcie since babyhood. Runcie, who was a shrewd man generally, was disarmed by this fact and so said things to Carpenter off the record which of course ended up in print. The biography itself was a bit of a hatchet-job anyway--as were most of Humphrey Carpenter's biographies IMNSHO.
John Pridmore's book about his time at Hackney Parish Church is really good, I think, though it's not quite an autobiography.
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At the end of the day we face our Maker alongside Jesus--ken
Posts: 7667 | From: Summerisle | Registered: May 2001
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Albertus
Shipmate
# 13356
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Jengie Jon:
No, I am doing my PhD on what I say I am.
Jengie
Ah. Never looked at that: never had any reason to.
Posts: 6498 | From: Y Sowth | Registered: Jan 2008
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Amos
Shipmate
# 44
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Posted
The Pridmore book is called 'The Inner-City of God: The Diary of an East-End Parson.'
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At the end of the day we face our Maker alongside Jesus--ken
Posts: 7667 | From: Summerisle | Registered: May 2001
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
Joy Carroll, 'Beneath the Cassock', which - as Svitlana says - was the model for the Vicar of Dibley. It's a salutary read, not least to remind us what a short time ago it was almost unthinkable to have women priests in the Church of England. It's a pity she then moved to the States, as it would have been interesting to see how her role developed in the UK as time went by.
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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Sir Kevin
Ship's Gaffer
# 3492
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Clotilde:
Has anyone read a biography of Robert Runcie, I haven't noticed one about him, so havent read one.
Never read one, if indeed an authoritative volume exists, but I did meet Lord Runcie at church back in the 20th century. He was charming and erudite.
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If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Writing is currently my hobby, not yet my profession.
Posts: 30517 | From: White Hart Lane | Registered: Oct 2002
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geroff
Shipmate
# 3882
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Posted
Returning to the Runcie biography question- There is this one by Margaret Duggan which I borrowed from my mother when my wife was at Cuddesdon - it was quite a good read.
[ 31. December 2013, 14:45: Message edited by: geroff ]
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"The first principle in science is to invent something nice to look at and then decide what it can do." Rowland Emett 1906-1990
Posts: 1172 | From: Montgomeryshire, Wales | Registered: Jan 2003
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Chorister:
Joy Carroll, 'Beneath the Cassock', which - as Svitlana says - was the model for the Vicar of Dibley. It's a salutary read, not least to remind us what a short time ago it was almost unthinkable to have women priests in the Church of England. It's a pity she then moved to the States, as it would have been interesting to see how her role developed in the UK as time went by.
Not too much of a tangent, I hope, but why did she go to the USA? Don't they have more than enough of their own priests??
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
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Jengie jon
Semper Reformanda
# 273
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Posted
That reminded me of Scarlet Ribbons A Priest with Aids, which created quite a response here when it came out. Then Dinnington is not that far away.
Jengie
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"To violate a persons ability to distinguish fact from fantasy is the epistemological equivalent of rape." Noretta Koertge
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Posts: 20894 | From: city of steel, butterflies and rainbows | Registered: May 2001
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Chorister
Completely Frocked
# 473
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SvitlanaV2:
quote:
Originally posted by Chorister:
Joy Carroll, 'Beneath the Cassock', which - as Svitlana says - was the model for the Vicar of Dibley. It's a salutary read, not least to remind us what a short time ago it was almost unthinkable to have women priests in the Church of England. It's a pity she then moved to the States, as it would have been interesting to see how her role developed in the UK as time went by.
Not too much of a tangent, I hope, but why did she go to the USA? Don't they have more than enough of their own priests??
She met, and subsequently married, an American.
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Retired, sitting back and watching others for a change.
Posts: 34626 | From: Cream Tealand | Registered: Jun 2001
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SvitlanaV2
Shipmate
# 16967
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Posted
Ah. I wonder if she continued in the same career. It's not often we hear of British clergy pastoring churches in the USA, but it often seems to happen the other way round. She ought to be encouraged to write Part Two!
Posts: 6668 | From: UK | Registered: Feb 2012
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leo
Shipmate
# 1458
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Clotilde:
Thats interesting, leo. When was it published. I only ask because its so fast moving on the C or F and gay priests!
It was only published in 2013.
Posts: 23198 | From: Bristol | Registered: Oct 2001
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Enoch
Shipmate
# 14322
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Posted
I also think Karen Armstrong's Spiral Staircase is excellent. Her description of herself when being verbally picked over by an earnest and slightly aggressive person who was determined that any single lady of her intelligence and circumstances must be have some exciting erotic skeleton hidden in her cupboard is brilliant - quote:
"I explained that I was a failed heterosexual"
I'm not sure this counts as he's a religious journalist, not an ecclesiastic, and it's mainly about Sweden rather than church, but I enjoyed Andrew Brown's Fishing in Utopia. I'd also recommend The Book of Margery Kempe for its demonstration that an engaging mix of piety and complete battiness is neither a new thing nor exclusive to the wilder shores of revivalism.
But the work I would always regard as my favourite, for all the question marks about its provenance, is beyond any doubt The Way of the Pilgrim. I'd say that every Christian ought at least to try it, just to see if it sparks with them.
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Posts: 7610 | From: Bristol UK(was European Green Capital 2015, now Ljubljana) | Registered: Nov 2008
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uffda
Shipmate
# 14310
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Posted
I thought Ian Ker's biography of John Henry Newman was good.
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Invincibly ignorant and planning to stay that way!
Posts: 1031 | From: Buffalo, NY | Registered: Nov 2008
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Clotilde
Shipmate
# 17600
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Posted
i found Richard Holloway's book disappointing. Readbale, but sad.
What an attitude to his wife!
At one point he even, refers to her as 'she who bore my children'!
And after all the turmoil of the autobiography we are left with very little except that finally in the last two or three pages he seems to wake up to the fact that he has a family and having given up on the church he discovers the value of family life and his children.
A rather sad work, I thought.
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A witness of female resistance
Posts: 159 | From: A man's world | Registered: Mar 2013
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