Collected here are articles and reviews that have appeared in print, as well as a presentation of my books. There are a few interviews and some sound material, notably my reading of the Gospels in Greek, a project that remains work in progress.
In a secular world, forgiveness seems absurd. Detached from the narrative that gives forgiveness meaning and allows it to inform shared experience, we revert to pre-Mosaic categories, that is, to the logic of Lamech - ‘If Cain is avenged sevenfold, truly Lamech seventy-sevenfold.
Continue reading In a time when much academic writing is rushed, polished off quickly to meet the requirements of research assessments, it is good to encounter a text of patient gestation, in which words are weighed and in which, above all, the Word who is the object, not only of enquiry but of desire, is heard.
Continue reading This book lists symptoms of unhealth in the manner of the Desert Fathers, who chartered the vagaries of corrupted passions and showed where, unchecked, they lead. The result is a phenomenology of abuse: a sobering, terrifying, helpful account.
Continue reading What is beautiful does not force itself upon us. It is incompatible with violence (an essay written in Norwegian).
Continue reading On Christmas Day the papers' first page ought to carry a sensational announcement in massive, bold typescript: 'God has become man!'
Continue reading What matters is to be where you are right now, to be as faithful as possible, doing what you have to do as credibly as possible. Then you find that the invisible things can bear fruit in an ample sphere whereas the visible things turn out to be a bit banal.
Continue reading To a large extent, public discourse is a shouting match, even within the Church, wouldn’t you say? I believe, then, in listening out for whispered words from without and from within, for I desire to notice them, whether I find myself alone or in company.
Continue reading A conversation about Norwegian Catholicism, tradition and continuity, the signs of the times, perseverance in faith, true freedom and fresh fish from the Fjord.
Continue reading Ours is a time of navel-gazing, based on the assumption that the the world revolves around us. It is a Copernican revolution of sorts, but not an especially luminous one.
Continue reading Our faith cannot be reduced to a model for a perfect society of justice and peace, to a catalogue of cogent answers to life’s hard questions: our faith is about life transformed in Christ, redeemed from the reign of sin, whose wages is death, life illumined by the hope of resurrection.
Continue reading A conversation with Eivor Oftestad and Aase Cathrine Myrtveit about how Nietzsche's intuition regarding the 'death of god' is seeping into Western consciousness, about the abuse crisis, about human dignity, and about the courage to be seen as ridiculous.
Continue reading A human being reaches maturity by finding a proper place, subjectively, among objective norms; sometimes perhaps by assuming positions that go against the grain of norms. But the cancellation of norms will not resolve the experience of a conflict of identity.
Continue reading Si pudiéramos tan sólo darnos cuenta de la libertad de que disponemos para elegir cuál es nuestra visión del mundo. Si fuéramos conscientes de que nadie tiene por qué ser el prisionero de una determinada cosmovisión o mentalidad, ni siquiera de nuestro propio pasado, por muy traumático y difícil que haya sido: Cultivar la memoria del bien constituye una especie de ascesis, un ejercicio imprescindible.
Continue reading Erik Varden har fortsatt en opplevelse av at Norge er både hjemland og utland, og akkurat det, sier han, er ikke så dumt når man har ansvar for noe så multikulturelt som katolske menigheter i Norge. Det har også noe med det å være kristen å gjøre: Vårt hjemland er i Himmelen.
Continue reading Trofasthet koster. Det finnes ingen snarvei til menneskelig og kristen modenhet, om vi er gifte eller enslige, prester, legfolk, munker eller nonner.
Continue reading Some might ask: Doesn’t a bishop have better things to do than to record the Gospels in Greek? I would answer, without a moment’s hesitation: No!
Continue reading Let us entrust ourselves to God’s freeing possession. Let us run the risk of freedom.
Continue reading In a memorable image, Diadochos speaks of baptismal grace as the divine artist’s monochrome sketch: it is for us in conscious collaboration with the Spirit to fill in the colours. And ‘when the full range of colours is added to the outline, the painter captures the likeness of the subject, even down to the smile’.
Continue reading Det offentlige er visst ikke i stand til, nå, å gjenkjenne gudstjeneste som noe kategorisk særegent, en form for adferd som fortjener særskilte tiltak, særskilt kreativitet. Vi har tapt en dimensjon av tilværelsen: Det transcendente er strøket fra offisielt ordforråd.
Continue reading Det frykteligste ord som er blitt ytret mot vår tid, er dette: Vi har mistet naiviteten.
Continue reading Language ordinarily labours to define opposites, not to at-one them. Only poetry, which graces speech with the polyvalence of music, stands a chance.
Continue reading We like to assume that what stands between us and freedom is an accident of sorts; that we were at some point, be it at the moment of our birth, gloriously free, but that something then happened which curtailed our liberty. We spend years of our lives, perhaps, on analysts’ couches trying to identify that moment of destiny, wishing to reclaim what we consider ours by nature and by right.
Continue reading After several weeks in lockdown, my eight-year old goddaughter in Italy told her mother: ‘Mummy, I no longer recognise myself!’ It was wisely said.
Continue reading Oggi ascoltare il soffio è divenuto difficile, perché ci sono tante impressioni, e si impongono quasi con violenza. Per questo serve avere dei sensi abbastanza affinati: ci vuole apertura; uno spazio di ascolto profondo, di attesa.
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