The Operation of Grace

by Gregory Wolfe

Overview

The Operation of Grace collects a decade's worth of essays by Gregory Wolfe taken from the pages of Image, the literary journal he founded more than a quarter century ago. As he notes in the preface, his Image editorials, while they cover a wide range of topics, focus on the intersection of ""art, faith, and mystery."" Wolfe believes that art and religion, while hardly identical, offer illuminating analogies to one another--art deepening faith through the empathetic reach of the imagination and faith anchoring art in a vision beyond the artist's ego. Several essays dwell on how aesthetic values like ambiguity, tragedy, and beauty enlarge our understanding of the spiritual life. There are also a series of reflections that extend Wolfe's campaign to renew the neglected and often misunderstood tradition of Christian humanism. Finally, there are sections that contain more personal meditations arising from Wolfe's involvement in nurturing and promoting the work of emerging writers and artists. The Operation of Grace demonstrates once again why novelist Ron Hansen has spoken of Wolfe as ""one of the most incisive and persuasive voices of our generation."" ""Greg Wolfe has done something very remarkable for both the Christian community and the fractured, fractious culture we inhabit in the North Atlantic world. In his work as editor of the most energizing and imaginative periodical we have in the field of faith and the arts, he has continually reminded us all of why Christianity still draws the attention of the most imaginative spirits, orthodox and not-so-orthodox. These essays amply show how a theologically informed perspective can generate a serious, adult, joyful inhabiting of creation. They go well beyond journalistic polarities and never fail to give fresh light on our condition. A joy and an enrichment."" --Rowan Williams, former archbishop of Canterbury ""Greg Wolfe's essays in Image--the latest batch having been collected here in The Operation of Grace--have a knack for getting the head and the heart in tune. Each of these essays is an invocation--an act of summoning, a preparation for transfigurations yet to come."" --Annie Dillard, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek ""It's tempting to read Greg Wolfe as a voice speaking to us from an earlier age, when faith and culture were not antagonists, but two sides to the same coin. This would be a mistake: the humane, intelligent essays in The Operation of Grace exist to remind us that that time isn't past at all."" --Christopher Beha, author of What Happened to Sophie Wilder ""These 'occasional pieces' in fact add up to a marvelous whole--an erudite, provocative whole, at times winsome and at times bracing. They are abundant with wisdom about the pursuit of art, faith, and mystery (our pursuit of them, or, sometimes more properly, their pursuit of us). They are, in short, a gift."" --Lauren F. Winner, author of Girl Meets God and Still ""For over a quarter-century, Gregory Wolfe has been illuminating and fostering the sometimes overlooked but vital matrix upon which religion and art encounter one another, not just as belief and creative work but as a singular manifestation of 'real presence' in which God and beauty body forth as grace. This new collection of essays--wise, acute, and compelling--is a bold and necessary dispatch from an essential writer."" --Robert Clark, author of Mr. White's Confession and Dark Water ""Gregory Wolfe is to the burgeoning art and faith movement what Camille Pissarro was to the Impressionist movement--a central pillar, a wise teacher, an irreplaceable presence. One simply cannot imagine today's art and faith conversation without his voice. Here in The Operation of Grace, his eloquent, challenging writing invites us to a feast--the very feast that Image journal has been serving up for nearly three decades."" --Makoto Fujimura, Artist, Director, Brehm Center Gregory Wolfe is editor of Image, one of America's leading quarte

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781625640574
Publisher:	Cascade Books
Publication date:	10/27/2015
Pages:	224
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Gregory Wolfe is editor of Image, one of America's leading quarterly journals. He serves as Writer in Residence and Director of the low-residency MFA in Creative Writing program at Seattle Pacific University. His literary imprint, Slant Books, is published by Wipf & Stock. Wolfe's books include Beauty Will Save the World, Intruding upon the Timeless, Malcolm Muggeridge: A Biography, and Sacred Passion: The Art of William Schickel. He has served as a judge for the National Book Awards.

Table of Contents

Preface: A Metaphorical God ix

Prologue: Returning to the Cave 1

The Cave and the Cathedral 3

Art Speaks to Faith 9

The Wound of Beauty 11

The Tragic Sense of Life 17

Singularly Ambiguous 23

Strange Pilgrims 27

Secular Scriptures 31

Shouts and Whispers 35

Fully Human 39

Faith Speaks to Art 45

Thirty Seconds Away 47

Religious but Not Spiritual 53

Current Event 59

East and West in Miniature 63

Picturing the Passion 69

Why the Inklings Aren't Enough 75

Art and Faith in the Public Square 79

The Culture Wars Revisited 81

Always Now 87

Two-Way Traffic 91

Keeping a Private Address 95

Conservative Elegies 101

Poetic Justice 107

Christian Humanism: Then and Now 113

Looking for a Renaissance 115

Giotto's Ratio 121

Follies Worldly and Divine 127

The King's Great Matter… and Ours 131

Becoming the Other 139

Words and the Word: The Writing Life 145

The Humiliation of the Word 147

Stalking the Spirit 151

The Operation of Grace 157

Who's Afraid of Geoffrey Hill? 163

The Poetry of Exile 169

Scenes from a Literary Life 175

The Voice of This Calling 177

Scenes from an Editorial Life 183

The Four Cultures 189

Mugg, Hitch, and Me 195

Breath 201

Acknowledgments 207

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"Greg Wolfe has done something very remarkable for both the Christian community and the fractured, fractious culture we inhabit in the North Atlantic world. In his work as editor of the most energizing and imaginative periodical we have in the field of faith and the arts, he has continually reminded us all of why Christianity still draws the attention of the most imaginative spirits, orthodox and not-so-orthodox. These essays amply show how a theologically informed perspective can generate a serious, adult, joyful inhabiting of creation. They go well beyond journalistic polarities and never fail to give fresh light on our condition. A joy and an enrichment."
—Rowan Williams, former archbishop of Canterbury

"Greg Wolfe's essays in Image—the latest batch having been collected here in The Operation of Grace—have a knack for getting the head and the heart in tune. Each of these essays is an invocation—an act of summoning, a preparation for transfigurations yet to come."
—Annie Dillard, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

"It's tempting to read Greg Wolfe as a voice speaking to us from an earlier age, when faith and culture were not antagonists, but two sides to the same coin. This would be a mistake: the humane, intelligent essays in The Operation of Grace exist to remind us that that time isn't past at all."
—Christopher Beha, author of What Happened to Sophie Wilder

"These 'occasional pieces' in fact add up to a marvelous whole—an erudite, provocative whole, at times winsome and at times bracing. They are abundant with wisdom about the pursuit of art, faith, and mystery (our pursuit of them, or, sometimes more properly, their pursuit of us). They are, in short, a gift."
—Lauren F. Winner, author of Girl Meets God and Still

"For over a quarter-century, Gregory Wolfe has been illuminating and fostering the sometimes overlooked but vital matrix upon which religion and art encounter one another, not just as belief and creative work but as a singular manifestation of 'real presence' in which God and beauty body forth as grace. This new collection of essays—wise, acute, and compelling—is a bold and necessary dispatch from an essential writer."
—Robert Clark, author of Mr. White's Confession and Dark Water

"Gregory Wolfe is to the burgeoning art and faith movement what Camille Pissarro was to the Impressionist movement—a central pillar, a wise teacher, an irreplaceable presence. One simply cannot imagine today's art and faith conversation without his voice. Here in The Operation of Grace, his eloquent, challenging writing invites us to a feast—the very feast that Image journal has been serving up for nearly three decades."
—Makoto Fujimura, Artist, Director, Brehm Center

Editorial Reviews

"Greg Wolfe has done something very remarkable for both the Christian community and the fractured, fractious culture we inhabit in the North Atlantic world. In his work as editor of the most energizing and imaginative periodical we have in the field of faith and the arts, he has continually reminded us all of why Christianity still draws the attention of the most imaginative spirits, orthodox and not-so-orthodox. These essays amply show how a theologically informed perspective can generate a serious, adult, joyful inhabiting of creation. They go well beyond journalistic polarities and never fail to give fresh light on our condition. A joy and an enrichment."
—Rowan Williams, former archbishop of Canterbury

"Greg Wolfe's essays in Image—the latest batch having been collected here in The Operation of Grace—have a knack for getting the head and the heart in tune. Each of these essays is an invocation—an act of summoning, a preparation for transfigurations yet to come."
—Annie Dillard, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

"It's tempting to read Greg Wolfe as a voice speaking to us from an earlier age, when faith and culture were not antagonists, but two sides to the same coin. This would be a mistake: the humane, intelligent essays in The Operation of Grace exist to remind us that that time isn't past at all."
—Christopher Beha, author of What Happened to Sophie Wilder

"These 'occasional pieces' in fact add up to a marvelous whole—an erudite, provocative whole, at times winsome and at times bracing. They are abundant with wisdom about the pursuit of art, faith, and mystery (our pursuit of them, or, sometimes more properly, their pursuit of us). They are, in short, a gift."
—Lauren F. Winner, author of Girl Meets God and Still

"For over a quarter-century, Gregory Wolfe has been illuminating and fostering the sometimes overlooked but vital matrix upon which religion and art encounter one another, not just as belief and creative work but as a singular manifestation of 'real presence' in which God and beauty body forth as grace. This new collection of essays—wise, acute, and compelling—is a bold and necessary dispatch from an essential writer."
—Robert Clark, author of Mr. White's Confession and Dark Water

"Gregory Wolfe is to the burgeoning art and faith movement what Camille Pissarro was to the Impressionist movement—a central pillar, a wise teacher, an irreplaceable presence. One simply cannot imagine today's art and faith conversation without his voice. Here in The Operation of Grace, his eloquent, challenging writing invites us to a feast—the very feast that Image journal has been serving up for nearly three decades."
—Makoto Fujimura, Artist, Director, Brehm Center

From the Publisher