cais 's review for:

The Power and the Glory by Graham Greene

5.0

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"He couldn't say to himself that he wished his sin had never existed, because the sin seemed to him now so unimportant and he loved the fruit of it."

My third Greene book in a row and this took me the longest of the three to read not because I wasn't enjoying it, but because of its intensity and palpable tension.

A priest, a so-called whisky priest, is on the run after authorities in regions of Mexico are on a mission to vanquish Catholicism. Priests can either renounce their faith and prove this by getting married or they can be die by firing squad.

Our unnamed priest travels long and hard, motivated not only by his desire to avoid death, but also by his sense of duty as a priest. By the rules of his own faith he is a sinner and he alternately feels guilt for his sins and tries to justify them. One moment he seems to to truly exhibit a sense of compassion for people, then in another he seems to act only with self-interest, arrogant with his sense of importance.

The priest's relationship to his own religion is complicated. At a later point in the book he recognizes that as a young priest, long before having to go on the run, life may have very easy for him, but he didn't really feel love for anyone. After his sinning, his corruption, after his experiences fleeing for his life...maybe he has learned what love really feels like.

Greene is quite ambiguous about religion here, neither fully condemning nor fully defending the priest's Catholicism. He is equally ambiguous about the authorities' alternate plan for a totally irreligious society. This ambiguity is a big part of what makes this novel so compelling. This story is filled with suspense, and Greene maintains the tension of this well, but it is also a novel about belief, intention, and, yes, power and glory.

One of the many fascinating aspects of this book is the recurrence of some secondary characters, people the priest has brief encounters with who reappear, again briefly, towards the end. Their small parts are actually rather haunting and I find myself thinking about them as much as the priest.

A masterful work, gripping and incredibly vivid, a thoughtful examination of both the corporeal and the spiritual.