There are books where you know what to expect and there are others that give meaning to the old adage of not judging one by its cover. One of those rare, latter exceptions is Francois Mauriac's Holy Thursday. But a brief look at the preface makes it clear: this book is always a bit of a surprise no matter what you expected.
For those who knew Mauriac's other works a treatise on Holy Thursday would certainly seem out of the ordinary. Mauriac was a French novelist, well known, and recieved the Grand Cross of the Légion d'honneur as well as the Nobel Prize in Literature. He was a lifelong Catholic but this little volume would never stand out on a shelf of his best selling works.
Meanwhile for Catholics looking for spiritual instruction a polemic, politically active novelist would seem low on the list of recommended reading compared with the great Saints.
Yet Mauriac's work stands, for both parties, as a bridge between his sincere, heartfelt literary style and the wellspring of Catholic faith that can be see in the characters of all his other works. Holy Thursday takes us through the course of that long, spring day with parallels between the Mass, Mauriac's childhood in Bordeax, and the events of Calvary. What he accomplishes in this short volume is superb.
For Catholics it will bring new appreciation for Our Lord's bitter passion and greater joy in the resurrection on Easter Sunday. For those solely interested in literature it is a feat in its own right . This memoir, Passion story, and retelling of events that the world partakes in again and again every year until the end of time is indispensable for anyone who wants to know an author's true motivations in his own words.
There are only a couple versions of it in print in the English translation, and not all of them are pretty. This edition from Sophia Institute Press is quite nice. If you find any others let us know!
Comments