Book Review: The Liturgical Year

A while ago, I signed up for a program through which I receive free books in exchange for a fair review. As of yet, I haven't really enjoyed any of the books that I've reviewed. Until now. The Liturgical Year is another installment in The Ancient Practices series overseen by emergent-ecumenical-ancient-modern-guru Phyllis Tickle. The author, Sister Joan Chittister, does a great job as a Catholic in introducing an ignorant Protestant like me to the almost 2,000 years of church year tradition. Having been raised in more non-denominational & charismatic circles, our focus is always on "the new" or "the fresh thing." While there is nothing inherently wrong with that focus, I can't help but feel like we've lost a bit of our roots.

This book serves as an excellent introduction not just to the what or how of the church year, but to the why. As Chittister puts it,

We do not develop a liturgical life to look good to other people. We do not develop a liturgical spirituality to affect a kind of spiritual dimension to our lives. And we certainly do not go to Mass regularly to avoid hell. We live a liturgical life to learn to think like He thinks. To do what He would do. To mak Him the center of our lives - not our work or our money or our status...Liturgical spirituality is about learning to live an ordinary life extraordinarily well.

The author does a good job as a Catholic to be welcoming and inviting to Protestants through her writing. With the exception of the very last chapter on the Marian feasts - which I found to be a incongruent with what I know of Catholic doctrine - there was almost nothing that I had any significant theological quibbles with. I appreciated her focus on the major issues without getting bogged down into Catholic dogma.

The first few chapters felt a little repetitive and unnecessarily touchy-feely, but much like the church year itself, the book picks up steam and gets more and more exciting as we head toward the ending chapters on Resurrection Sunday. The writing style is accessible and is an easy read. 5 stars from this non-liturgical Protestant for this book.