Spiritual Quests: The Art and Craft of Religious Writing

This book is the manicured transcript of an event in New York City in the 1980s. This seminar featured six prominent writers influenced by different faith traditions. They spoke on how their religious beliefs/practices changed the way they wrote. By commenting on a practice as timeless as writing, this account captures much of religious writers’ sentiments towards their craft.

All of these six speeches were interesting. They covered faith traditions as disparate as Roman Catholicism, Protestantism, Christian Orthodoxy, African-American Methodism, Judaism, and meditative religions. I especially enjoyed the thoughts shared by two of my literary heroes, Frederick Buechner and Jaroslav Pelikan. I will share my reflections on their show more reflections below.

Buechner has published in the genres of fiction, theology, and memoir. His clarity at seeing religious practice in life captured my attention as a sixteen year old. I especially appreciate his honesty and his circuitous optimism. He is obviously well schooled, and having converted as an adult, he approaches faith as a peculiarity. Faith always seems like an external object to him and something that he wants to carefully bring evermore within. To borrow phraseology from another author, he is always a resident alien in the Christian world.

Pelikan is a well-known scholar of early Christian history. He writes with precision and conveys his message from his erudition. In this work, he describes the autobiographical nature of scholarship in the lives of Augustine of Hippo, John Henry Newman, and Boethius. Of course, as with all scholars, Pelikan is ultimately speaking of his own experiences and capabilities. He shares how they and he have found writing on religious themes to be nourishing to their souls.

This work is especially relevant to those who produce religious texts professionally – pastors, teachers, and (of course) writers. Despite its age, its messages are fresh to the contemporary reader. I wonder what Zinsser, a great teacher of modern writing, would have done were he offered to hold this seminar in 2020 instead of 1988. Who would he bring on board to relate their experiences? What traditions would garner the most attention? Zinsser has since deceased, and we will never know. Fortunately, these transcripts remain to guide us in our writing and lives today. show less