{"id":1142,"date":"2009-01-27T10:04:00","date_gmt":"2009-01-27T10:04:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/deaconsbench\/2009\/01\/this-all-too-human-church.html"},"modified":"2009-01-27T10:04:00","modified_gmt":"2009-01-27T10:04:00","slug":"this-all-too-human-church","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2009\/01\/this-all-too-human-church.html","title":{"rendered":"“This all-too-human Church…”"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a><\/p>\n

“The Church was a billowing desert tent, once so tiny it held but a single man, wearing the simple clothing of the people of his time. It was now a vast tent, cobbled onto, ripped asunder, patched so many times in so many places, its poles bending in the wind, yet not breaking. A tent sweeping wider and wider so that no one would be denied shelter under its tattered roof. A tent not of man’s work or devices, but of God’s.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
In one corner of the tent, I could hear a feverish African drum Mass, in another, a Mass in Latin for those who would have it no other way. There, a great pipe organ; beyond, guitars and marimbas. In jungles and high rise office buildings, this was a Church presided over and attended by saints and scoundrels. All under this vast tent. Theologians debating the fine points of the Incarnation; a peasant in a field of maize, kneeling at the sound of the Angelus bell. And those men in lace, Curia officials, going about their work. The saints, the molesters. This all-too-human Church, gathered under the great tent of God’s love.”\u00a0<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
— Paul Wilkes,\u00a0<\/div>\n
\n
in his sensationally good memoir “In Due Season,”<\/a> to be published in March.\u00a0<\/div>\n

I’ll write more about this book soon. (One perk of my perch in the blogosphere is occasionally getting advance copies of things in the mail. This was a real gem.) I’ll just say this for now: the writing is gorgeous, the memories vivid, and the journey of the author nothing less than astounding. You will be stirred, moved, challenged and ultimately uplifted. \u00a0“In Due Season” is a story of death and resurrection — a perfect book, in fact, for Lent. Look for it. <\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“The Church was a billowing desert tent, once so tiny it held but a single man, wearing the simple clothing of the people of his time. It was now a vast tent, cobbled onto, ripped asunder, patched so many times in so many places, its poles bending in the wind, yet not breaking. A tent…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":365,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-links-r-us"],"yoast_head":"\n"This all-too-human Church..." - The Deacon's Bench<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/deaconsbench\/2009\/01\/this-all-too-human-church.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\""This all-too-human Church..." - The Deacon's Bench\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"“The Church was a billowing desert tent, once so tiny it held but a single man, wearing the simple clothing of the people of his time. 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