Why Life Sentences

What's in a name?

Hello, Life Sentences subscribers.

Just to make sure everyone understands the score, a new episode will be released every other Sunday, so you can look forward to listening to episode two next Sunday 28th July.

Like episode one, episode two focuses on St Leo the Great. You’ll learn about his extraordinary life and times and, in his Sermon 49, hear him go deeper into what you could call the spiritual anthropology of asceticism: the picture of the human person that underpins the Christian practices of fasting, almsgiving, and contemplative prayer.

Also, in addition to offering the bi-weekly podcast, on the off week I’ll publish a written piece. This is the first!

But before I start, I want to extend heartfelt thanks to all of you who have decided to join this in-depth exploration of the Church Fathers. A special thanks to those of you kind enough to take out a paid subscription—what a vote of confidence! I cannot tell you how much I appreciate it. Supporting this effort, I hope, will prove well worth it.

Now, a lot of people have asked me, why did I choose the name Life Sentences for this new Substack? Good question.

The Substack emerged out of a weekly reading group that I led at my local parish during Lent earlier this year. The concept was much the same: after making some introductory remarks, I would read out a work by one of the Church Fathers, stopping regularly to clarify or explain the text as best I could. The sessions went down well, and I enjoyed them too. So much so that I thought, perhaps there is an audience out there for something similar, in podcast form.

How I wish I’d saved the piece of paper on which, having decided to launch the Substack, I scribbled down name ideas as they came to me, brainstorm flotsam that would no doubt make for funny reading now. Branding and anything related to branding, such as creating a so-called personal brand, has never been my strong suit. And having settled on Life Sentences, it is obvious now that I should have researched the name better because, my goodness! There are a lot of blogs, podcasts, and newsletters called Life Sentences out there already. Whoops.

But Life Sentences just clicked. Because after all, sentence by sentence, we’re reading through these ancient texts, drilling down into them, trying to uncover what’s hidden in the depths. Texts that purport to explain the way in which real life is truly lived, life in eternal mode, beyond the ceaseless flux of everyday life, beyond ordinary experience which can be so confusing, even deranging, permeated as it is by ignorance, doubt, and uncertainty.

The secret of how to escape from that confusion is what the Church Fathers claim to know—and from experience I’m convinced they’re right.

But more than that, the metaphorical sense of Life Sentences leapt out at me. A life sentence is when you’re condemned to spend the rest of your life in prison. And at first glance, there’s no doubt that traditional Christian spirituality can look like a prison sentence, especially given the emphasis it puts on asceticism, on restraining so-called fleshly desire, on cutting off all attachment to objects of sense perception.

The Fathers regarded the pleasure principle as something dangerous and contemptible. And so, when I first encountered the Church Fathers twenty-five years ago, this dimension of their teaching, which occupies so much of their attention, was extremely off-putting. What a bunch of killjoys, I thought. But, failing to grasp the underlying logic of their ascetic doctrine, I was blind to how that logic related to the more alluring, romantic dimensions of Christianity—or of spirituality in general, really—to which I was so instinctively attracted.

Now I know better. Asceticism is the foundation. Without it, sure, the higher graces can now and then break through the surface of the soul and even blossom, momentarily. But without asceticism providing a base, those higher graces cannot take root—and so they quickly wither and die.

Compared to the way that we normally live our lives, which are oriented towards maximising comfort, enjoyment, pleasure, ease, fascination, a sense of adventure, stimulation, excitement, and indulgence; as I say, compared to normal life, the Way of the Cross as described by the Church Fathers can feel like being put in prison.

But that impression is mistaken. Because in fact the Way of the Cross, when embarked upon properly, is a liberation.

At least, so I shall argue in Life Sentences.

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Please don’t hesitate to comment on posts, whether these written pieces or the podcast episodes. If you think I’ve misunderstood something, or if something isn’t quite clear, just ask and I’ll try to make it clearer.

Private, direct messages through Substack work equally well.

In fact, engaging with you directly on these interesting, weird, and sometimes apparently perverse topics is something I’m looking forward to. No doubt your questions and comments will feed into the written pieces. I certainly hope they will.

And please, take a second to share Life Sentences with anyone you think would find it interesting.