Beyond Tenebrae: Christian Humanism in the Twilight of the West

Beyond Tenebrae is about Christian humanism in all its breadth and depth, and the persons and groups best embodying it (quite apart from any particular social or political stance) in the last century and a half. Modern readers who sense the greatness of the “Republic of Letters” that commenced with the wisdom of the ancient Greeks and has endured for over two millennia will benefit from being introduced to the great men and women presented in these pages, ranging from lesser-known figures (T.E. Hulme, Canon Bell, Clyde Kilby, Theodore Haecker) to the more famous (Irving Babbitt, Christopher Dawson, Russell Kirk, Alexander Solzhenitsyn). Nor does the author, Bradley Birzer, a keen student of literature and poetry, neglect literary figures with strong humanist motivations, again ranging from the celebrated (Willa Cather, J.R.R. Tolkien, and Flannery O’Connor) to those who are forgotten or controversial (Shirley Jackson, Walter Miller, Margaret Atwood). We are treated as well to vignettes of those who influenced Birzer’s own life as a conservative and a humanist. By an interweaving of philosophical reflections with vivid biographical portraits, a vision emerges of a broad, responsible, humble, self-aware Christian humanism that can be a light shining in the darkness of the postmodern West.