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Unapologetic, by Francis Spufford
Get Free Ebook Unapologetic, by Francis Spufford
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About the Author
Francis Spufford, a former Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year (1997), has edited two acclaimed literary anthologies and a collection of essays about the history of technology. His first book, I May Be Some Time, won the Writers' Guild Award for Best Non-Fiction Book of 1996, the Banff Mountain Book Prize and a Somerset Maugham Award. His second, The Child That Books Built, gave Neil Gaiman 'the peculiar feeling that there was now a book I didn't need to write'. His third, Backroom Boys, was called 'as nearly perfect as makes no difference' by the Daily Telegraph and was shortlisted for the Aventis Prize. His fourth, Red Plenty was called 'odd, brilliant and crazily brave' in the Evening Standard, longlisted for the Orwell Prize and translated into eight languages. His latest book, Unapologetic, was described by Nick Hornby as 'an incredibly smart, challenging, and beautiful book'. In 2007 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. He teaches writing at Goldsmiths College and lives near Cambridge.
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Product details
Paperback: 240 pages
Publisher: Faber & Faber; Main edition (March 7, 2013)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0571225225
ISBN-13: 978-0571225224
Product Dimensions:
5 x 0.7 x 7.7 inches
Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:
4.0 out of 5 stars
95 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#340,541 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Despite its title, "Unapologetic" by Francis Spufford, is, in part, an apologia, a defense, of Christianity and the Church, arguing not from first principles of science and logic, but from emotion and experience.This is a book, not unlike others I have read by Brennan Manning or Donald Miller or Rob Bell, that I expect some will put down as too rambling, too verbose, too overwrought, too profane. And it is all these things - and vile and irreverent to boot. Nevertheless, it is also good and real and captures the human condition like few other books written in the expository style. Stories carry most of the theological water for me, but this cruises past many a novel or autobiography.Yet, where the apologia stops, the love story begins. The author does reach limits with his love story: his description of his Beloved and even his love of Christianity and the Church are dissonant at times. But he doesn't let that stop him. He writes on, weaving and meandering, stumbling even, stretching metaphors, trying to finish fights started long ago, allowing himself ecstasy, until, vocabulary exhausted, he falls into a heap and looks up and admits he has no more. Still, I pressed on, trying not to get too bogged down in his labyrinthine prose. And there, surprisingly, I found quite a few nuggets along the way: ways of seeing which I hadn't seen before; keys to doors previously locked; and even doors to rooms I hadn't known existed. "Unapologetic" is solid and filling and ethereal and free-wheeling all at once.It's no cakewalk though. Spufford's appetite for honesty is a lot greater than his desire for comfort, sending his outlook careening headlong into depressing territory at times. He is like a man at war. But that's the reality of our world, if we can look past the affluent (Western, American) parapets that we live behind. I'll admit to being wounded more than once by this author, but he didn't leave me for dead. He dragged me through essential battles and into a perceptibly hopeful, though tempered, forecast of Christianity and the Church. And along the way, he fought wars that I didn't even know were raging (and took his time doing it). But my ignorance and impatience aren't really grounds for complaint since Spufford's audience is both spatially and temporally humongous.I didn't agree with all of his logic or conclusions, especially where they were tainted with chronological snobbery. Like all of us, Spufford starts with personal beliefs - wanting God to be a certain way - and works outward from there, inducing a conception of God in as tight an enclosure as he is comfortable holding him in. Moreover, he seems to take a dialectic approach to some controversies, but is more conservative in his arguments about things he is clearly passionate about. I wish we'd seen the former throughout. Nevertheless, get through these biases and watch him bring most of it around, closing his arguments as neatly as possible in this physical world which can never fully fathom its metaphysical integral.Yes, the world is a crappy place.Yes, you and I are part of the problem.Yes, the problem of pain creates questions and doubts about the goodness of God.No, the Church can't provide answers for all those doubts.No, the Church isn't here to save the world from being crappy.Yes, sometimes the Church is crappy too.Yes, sometimes the Church is crappier than other secular institutions.No, none of this negates the truth of Christianity.No, the Church hasn't outlived its usefulness.Yes, the Church will remain relevant, but the pendulum will swing.The Church is still a vehicle for grace and a constant reminder that Someone out there cares. Things just might get worse for the Church, but God does love an underdog.So blunder on. Read. Get through it if you can. If you read just the Preface, you'll be better off than 99% of the population. For this is a book to be read more than once in a lifetime, even if it's in fits and starts. There's so much here. Point and Counterpoint. Centuries old controversies. Modern day dilemmas. Essential dogma. Common sense. And occasional, stuttering brilliance.
I read the whole book and read some parts of it twice and even three times. Even so, I had a difficult time understanding this book and understanding what the author hoped to achieve by writing it. Chapter 5 was very interesting and creatively written.The author's stated purpose for the book is to communicate that Christianity isn't an altogether awful religion. I'm not convinced that he achieved that purpose. I am of the opinion that, had he let Chapter 5 stand by itself, and published that without the rest of the book content, he might have portrayed better that Jesus, at least, had something to offer. I am of the opinion that he wasn't successful at showing through the rest of the book that Christianity (either in general or in its Anglican form) has something "un-awful" to offer. In summary, for me the book, excepting Chapter 5, does not succeed in making much sense out of Christianity, emotionally or otherwise.
Passionate, sharp, frustrating, clever, irritating, enjoyable, satisfying, puzzling, funny, energetic, poignant and well-written-throughout. Spufford accomplishes his goal of smashing some of the popular caricatures of modern Christians and provides a three dimensional picture of how Christianity is actually lived and experienced (by a 21st century, sort of middle of the road British Anglican man). In terms of a description of what Christianity looks like from the inside, from one particular experience of it, the book is excellent. When Spufford generalizes from his own experience to what the "majority" or "all" Christians feel/know/believe he is often on shakier ground and his fellow Christians (like myself) may find some of what he describes a bit foreign.The first chapter which describes Spufford's goals , and the central chapter which retells the story of Jesus (titled "Yeshua"), are the strongest of the book. In both, Spufford's gifts as writer are most evident and in the Yeshua chapter he succeeds remarkably well in providing a fully fleshed Jesus, making the familiar slightly unfamiliar. Perhaps surprisingly, given Spufford's overall theological inclinations, sin (which Spufford identifies as the HPtFtU - the "Human Propensity to F*** things Up") is central to his experience of faith and what he sees at the heart of Christianity. And, part of the satisfaction of the book is Spufford's willingness to label failure as failure, human destructiveness as destructiveness. I do wonder though whether God ends up becoming more or less "the solution to the HPtFtU" rather than having any identity of his own. Who is God without us? The joy of knowing God, the possibility of healing, of transformation, seems somewhat absent and not nearly as fully realized as Spufford's descriptions of "human cussedness" (to use Frederick Buechner's phrase). The hope of sanctification, of restoration, is muted.There are other complaints (why does Spufford's Yeshua never pray? does the relationship between feelings and ideas always run in one direction? why the strict opposition between present concern and the eternal hopes? etc. etc.) - but, part of what makes some of my frustrations with this book so sharp is that its pleasures are so satisfying. The times I was saying, "yes! that's exactly right!" made the moments when I disagreed (sometimes sharply) or felt misunderstood (sometimes badly) a little more painful. But, Unapologetic accomplishes what it sets out to do, and does so with a tremendous amount of energy and imagination. After finishing the "Yeshua" chapter I immediately went back and read it again, it was that good.
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