Angels Of Grace

Angels of Grace by Anselm Grün, published by Continuum in 2005, is a gentle work of Christian spirituality about angels, grace and the possibility that human life may contain rather more meaning than is immediately apparent while answering emails and wondering where you left the keys.

Anselm Grün, the German Benedictine monk and prolific spiritual writer, has spent much of his career taking large theological ideas and bringing them down to a scale at which ordinary people can actually do something with them.

Which is useful.

Theology has occasionally developed a tendency to require several hundred pages before everybody agrees what the first word means.

Grün generally prefers the shorter route.

In Angels of Grace, angels are approached not simply as decorative winged figures appearing on Christmas cards, but as images of spiritual qualities, encouragement and the ways grace may be recognised in everyday life.

This is not really a handbook for identifying celestial beings by feather arrangement.

There are no diagrams.

No flight characteristics.

No advice on what to do if a cherub appears unexpectedly in the kitchen.

Instead, Grün uses the language and imagery of angels as a way of reflecting on the inner life: comfort, hope, protection, courage, healing and the possibility of being accompanied through periods when life is not behaving according to plan.

Which, for most people, provides plenty of material.

The appeal of angels in Christian tradition is partly that they stand between the ordinary and the mysterious.

They are messengers.

They appear at significant moments.

They reassure terrified people.

They announce things.

And, unlike most modern messengers, they do not require you to create an account before delivering the information.

Grün’s writing tends to be calm, accessible and meditative rather than doctrinally combative.

This is spirituality intended for reflection rather than argument.

You can read a section slowly, put the book down and think about it.

There is no examination afterwards.

Probably.

Books like this are also reminders that the word grace carries rather more weight in Christian thought than its everyday use might suggest.

Grace is not simply elegance, good manners or managing to get through a doorway without hitting the frame.

It is gift.

Something received rather than earned.

Which is an uncomfortable idea for a culture rather fond of targets, performance reviews and proving that everything valuable has been deserved.

Angels fit neatly into that theme because their presence, in Christian imagination, is not something summoned by human achievement.

They arrive.

They accompany.

They remind.

And occasionally they tell somebody something extremely inconvenient.

The book should appeal to readers interested in Christian spirituality, Benedictine thought, contemplative writing, angels or devotional books that can be approached a little at a time.

It is particularly suitable for anyone who wants spiritual writing without the feeling that they have accidentally enrolled in a postgraduate theology course.

Published in 2005, it belongs to that modern tradition of accessible Christian reflection which tries to reconnect religious ideas with emotional and everyday experience.

In other words, faith is allowed out of the church building.

It can apparently accompany people into kitchens, offices, hospitals, relationships and all the other places where life actually occurs.

Condition: Good. A sound used copy with normal signs of age and handling. The cover has a crease, so this is not an immaculate collector’s copy, but it remains perfectly serviceable and presentable for reading.

The crease has not, as far as we can determine, affected the angelic content.

ISBN: 9780826476555.

A thoughtful and accessible collection of spiritual reflections on angels, grace and the quiet possibility that help, hope and meaning may appear in forms we do not always notice.

Sold by Crappy Old Books — where the cover may be creased, but grace apparently remains unaffected.

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