Come Down, Zacchaeus: Spirituality and the Laity

by Thomas H. Green

Book Overview

The laity is not called to live some distant and detached monastic life, but to live the gospel on the ground of their ordinary daily lives. Marriage, family, work -- the whole way of life -- "is... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0877933731
• ISBN13: 9780877933731
• Release Date: January 1988
• Publisher: Ave Maria Press
• Length: 176 Pages
• Weight: 0.58 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.4" x 5.5" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

Must read by the laity.

This is one of the best books written describing the author's take on what really happened at Vat II concerning the laity (and he actually uses Church documents to buttress his thesis). Should be read by all.

The revelation bears out

"Come Down Zacchaeus" was published by Thomas H. Green, S.J. in 1988. Now it comes into its own, bearing out its essential prophecy. It is an analysis of the essential import of Vatican II. Vatican II was the convening of 2,000 Bishops in 1962, under the direction of Pope John XXIII, and it was continued under his successor Pope Paul VI, until its completion in 1965. It produced 16 documents concerning War & Peace, Birth Control, Social Justice, the Development of Nations, and International Relations, the Liturgy of the Mass, and the Sacraments, Spirituality, Ecumenism and Interfaith Relations, and even the role of the United Nations. It was an attempt to bring the Catholic Church into living dialogue with the modern world. The purpose of Vatican II was to make the gospel of Jesus Christ relevent to the men and women of our time. Author Green gives a critical account, concerning one of his professors at Woodstock College in Maryland, who was one of the experts called upon by the Vatican to render a decree on "religious liberty". The professor was asked intently by his students upon return from one of the Vatican II sessions; "What's the Council all about?" The professor replied that only the Holy Spirit really knew, and that not even the Bishops knew what the Council meant in God's design, and that it would take 50 years to see clearly "what the Spirit was doing." Green's book begins to examine the design after 25 years. He finds that what is happening is an emerging age of the Laity, of which the model is represented in the account of Luke concerning Zacchaeus the tax collector. Zacchaeus was not called to "leave everything behind" as were the disciples, but was called to live in "the world" but with a changed life, and without having to climb the tree of celibacy. In this regard, an apostolic call to "leave everything behind" is viewed as not the only way, the better way, or even the necessary way. Essential to the understanding of Green's premise, is a comprehension of the role of the LAITY in church history. There were two great movements emergent from the Early Church. The first came in the period of the third century, and centered in Alexandria, Egypt. In this period, much of the earlier persecution was slowing, and it appeared that Christianity itself might be entirely absorbed by the life of "the world" and the convention in the life of the cities. What happened, was the rise of Asceticism, in which many Christians escaped to the desert and the life of the hermit. These became the Desert Fathers. Subsequent to this movement, was the rise of Monasticism, framed so well by St. Benedict in his "Rule". So what is so important about all of this? Isn't it all just familiar history by now? No, it isn't just familiar history. It contains a history in which the essential fact has escaped the most prominent of obs

Rich history of the Early Church

A friend handed me a copy, and I assumed that this would just be a book of "religious fluff" as I so often see; but as I began reading, I found author Green to present deep foundational material. For example, in the early chapters the author identifies the two essential movements which delineate all of church history: (1) the Desert Fathers (2) the Monastic movement The informative element is that Green demonstrates that both movements were LAY movements. This is powerful in every context, because it deviates from any ordinary presupposition that centralized church authority charted the future course of the church. Instead, Green identifies that it is the LAITY that charted the churches course. This is significant information for us today, for it may be that it is to be the Laity again, who resurrects and renews the church by charting anew the course of action in service. This is a critical understanding of history and theology together, for it identifies power in the hands of the Laity, rather than in the institution of the church proper. Author Green goes on to discuss the impact of Saint Benedict whose formulation of Monastic rule is what we have inherited today. Green identifies that Saint Benedict, while not the only personality involved with the development of the monastic model, was identified with a novel understanding of HOLINESS. Green cites Saint Benedict as teaching that Holiness was not characterized by the doing of "extraordinary" things, but by the doing of "ordinary" things, but with great love. I find Green's book to be powerful, and his other literature to be well worth reading. --Bruce Bain