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A review by jbmorgan86
Godric by Frederick Buechner
5.0
I took courses on church history in both college and seminary. However, I didn't know anything about Godric of Finchale (1065-1170). Apparently, he was an English hermit who life was chronicled by another monk named Reginald of Durham. Frederick Buechner took the scant details of Godric's life and created a beautiful novel about the "unofficial" saint.
Godric is a "messy" figure. He sells fake relics to pilgrims, practices piracy, and is filled with greed. However, after a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, his life is changed. He spends the rest of his life in solitude (with the exception of his pet snakes), wrestling with his inner demons. Though the rest of the world sees him as a saint, he sees himself as a doubtful, lustful, greedy, prideful wretch.
Buechner has written a beautiful novel. The language "feels medieval" (if that makes sense). Occasionally I had to look up words throughout to understand their meaning. There are moments of humor and utter sadness. The story is not told chronologically, but rather in more of a "memoir" style.
Some of my favorite quotes:
"What's lost is nothing to what's found, and all the death that ever was, set next to life, would scarcely fill a cup.”
"What's prayer? It's shooting shafts into the dark. What mark they strike, if any, who's to say? It's reaching for a hand you cannot touch. The silence is so fathomless that prayers like plummets vanish into the sea. You beg. You whimper. You load God down with empty praise. You tell him sins that he already knows full well. You seek to change his changeless will. Yet Godric prays the way he breathes, for else his heart would wither in his breast. Prayer is the wind that fills his sail. Else drift with witless tides. And sometimes, by God's grace, a prayer is heard."
"He also said we should carve in the year and place where I was born, but I said no. As a man dies many times before he's dead, so does he wend from birth to birth until, by grace, he comes alive at last.”
Godric is a "messy" figure. He sells fake relics to pilgrims, practices piracy, and is filled with greed. However, after a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, his life is changed. He spends the rest of his life in solitude (with the exception of his pet snakes), wrestling with his inner demons. Though the rest of the world sees him as a saint, he sees himself as a doubtful, lustful, greedy, prideful wretch.
Buechner has written a beautiful novel. The language "feels medieval" (if that makes sense). Occasionally I had to look up words throughout to understand their meaning. There are moments of humor and utter sadness. The story is not told chronologically, but rather in more of a "memoir" style.
Some of my favorite quotes:
"What's lost is nothing to what's found, and all the death that ever was, set next to life, would scarcely fill a cup.”
"What's prayer? It's shooting shafts into the dark. What mark they strike, if any, who's to say? It's reaching for a hand you cannot touch. The silence is so fathomless that prayers like plummets vanish into the sea. You beg. You whimper. You load God down with empty praise. You tell him sins that he already knows full well. You seek to change his changeless will. Yet Godric prays the way he breathes, for else his heart would wither in his breast. Prayer is the wind that fills his sail. Else drift with witless tides. And sometimes, by God's grace, a prayer is heard."
"He also said we should carve in the year and place where I was born, but I said no. As a man dies many times before he's dead, so does he wend from birth to birth until, by grace, he comes alive at last.”