 Hello, Tane fans. Today we have our very special author and translator and friend, Father Robert Nixon, to talk to us about the great Thomas A. Kempis. And so thank you for being here, Father, all the way from Australia. How are you today? Thanks very much, Cotter. It's a great privilege to be here to talk to you about this great author, the Blessed or the Venerable Thomas A. Kempis. Why don't you begin with a quick prayer for us and our listeners and hopefully we can invoke a little bit of help of Thomas A. Kempis to enlighten our minds today? Indeed. Almighty God, we ask that your spirit be with us today, that we be guided by the wisdom and the humility and the inspiration of Blessed Thomas A. Kempis as we explore his life and what he has to offer us today. We ask this through the intercession of our Holy Father, Saint Benedict, and also through the intercession and guidance and spirit of the Blessed Thomas A. Kempis through Christ, our Lord. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Father. So to talk about Thomas A. Kempis, it seemed to me that we needed to first mention kind of the obvious, which is he's known as the author of Imitation of Christ. Now, in our next episode, we're going to dive deep into the work, Imitation of Christ. But I thought it was proper before we talk about his more specific biography, I wanted to mention that I've always heard that the Imitation of Christ is the second best-selling book of all time. I don't know who was counting all the books sold a long time ago, but it's in countless translations throughout the world. It's had countless editions. I mean, today, you can find many editions of it. We have three editions of ourselves at TAN, which we'll talk a little bit more about in the next episode. But in other words, other than the Holy Spirit, who's the author of the Bible, right? Thomas A. Kempis is the greatest-selling author of all time. That's an incredible claim to fame, but we don't. So everyone knows that the Imitation of Christ is such an important book and most Catholics either have read it or they know they should read it. It's quoted by so many saints and so many works, but we don't know enough about the man himself. And so that's why I think it's so important to know who the heck is this guy? Who is this blessed or venerable Thomas A. Kempis? Yeah, very interesting. And one of the things which he talks about in the Imitation of the Christ is Amare Nesi, love to be not known. So the fact that we don't know that much about him is probably part of his own intention. It's probably part of his plan. In fact, the early editions and the manuscripts of the Imitation of Christ normally don't have his name listed as the author. And he always sought to be unknown. He would love to write and then just to let his work be out there and not to have it credited to him. So he sought always this kind of anonymity. And I think that's carried out or reflected in the fact that most people don't know too much about him as a person. But he had a truly fascinating life. He was born towards the very end of the Middle Ages and came from a fairly humble family origin. His father was a blacksmith. His mother was like a small school mistress, a school teacher. And so he came from very humble stock but devoted himself from a young age to the faith. He had a great love of learning. He showed great aptitude and so was very keen to enter into the religious life. I think at that time a little bit of my research showed that there was a revival going on. And at that time the church had become highly regulated. It was very structured. It was kind of the height of the church in the Middle Ages. But there were some reformers who were trying to say let's get back to the devotional life and the humble life, a life of mortification and penance. And there was a particular guy, Groot. How do you say that? How do you say that guy's name? Well, it depends on what language it is. But De Groot. Yeah, that's him. And then he kind of led a revival. And so I guess Thomas appeared on the stage at this time. He did. And he participated in this revival. And so the work of imitation of Christ kind of springs forth from that. Reflects that very much. So this was, there was a movement known as the Brotherhood of Common Life. And this was something like, it was a kind of lay movement in which there was an attempt to bring the spiritual riches of the church to lay Catholics. And until this point, the spiritual life had largely been the exclusive domain of monks and nuns and of the clergy. And so at this time, this was, as I mentioned, towards the end of the Middle Ages, the emergence of the modern era, there was a number of factors which led to this reawakening of the faith life. And foremost amongst these was the increase in literacy amongst the middle classes. In fact, the emergence of a middle class itself. So prior to this, throughout most of the Middle Ages, literacy had been confined either to the clergy and religious or to the upper echelons. And the rest of society had simply been contented just to go along to Mass and to let the clergy prey on their behalf. But people were now able to access these scriptures and other publications. And this was part of the reason which led to this revival, or this renewal of interest amongst the Catholic laity in reading the scriptures and other spiritual writings. So the Brotherhood of Common Life, which Thomas the Kemp has joined at a young age, was basically a lay society, but of people who devoted themselves to the praying of the divine office, to reading of scripture, but not vowing themselves to necessarily to a lifetime commitment. But at some point, he realizes he might have a vocation, right? He did indeed. So he lived within this Brotherhood of Common Life for a number of years. And then at a certain point, he realized that God was calling him to a lifelong commitment. And so he entered the canons regular and lived out the rest of his days as a committed canon, which is a kind of life, which is somewhat similar to monastic life. Yeah, I was about to ask, like, how would you explain what that is to, you know, our listeners? What is a religious order? Basically, it is like a religious order. So combining elements of monastic life, but with elements of the pastoral ministry of priests. And I mean, there are still canons in existence today, quite a good number of them. So this was the type of life which Thomas the Kemp has chosen. Don't they refer to normatines as canons? Indeed, they are canons. Yeah. What does canon mean? It doesn't sound like father. I get father, but what does canon mean? So canon basically means a rule. So it's a religious person living according to a rule. So it's basically not quite a monk, because canons would be typically involved in parish work, which traditionally monks didn't do so much. So that's the essence of it. Okay. So he is in the diocese of Cologne. In Cologne, which was one of the big German centers. Right. Yeah. So he's a German guy, right? Well, basically, German, of course, the divisions between different nations were not quite exactly what they were today. So you could say he was German and also Dutch, because these countries were borderline. Of course, Dutch actually means German, Deutsch and so forth. So yeah, Dutch slash German. So he enters and I know that, well, he has a twin brother, right? Which is kind of cool. I got twins. I think twins are cool. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He has this twin brother who has actually gone ahead of him and has been in the canons for a number of years. So Thomas the campus was kind of following in the footsteps of his twin brother, twin, but older or very, very slightly older. So the first one to be born. And so he entered also into this. That's the thing with twins is like they have a nine month race and lose by five minutes. They do indeed. They do indeed. So Thomas the campus, he was always the junior to his older brother. And although he was often called upon to take leadership roles within the religious community, it was his own preference not to do this, to remain in the background. Now, in the background, in those days, very much like the Benedictines had done, he becomes a scribe, right? So tell us what he becomes a scribe. And one of his great loves was copying books out by hand. And this was just as printing was starting to come into existence. But he copied out the entire Bible, a big number of times, I think four times by hand. It's incredible. How long do you have any idea how long it would take to do that? Like to do one Bible? Yeah, yeah, years. It would take several, several years to do. So I mean, when I read that that he had copied the Bible multiple times, it said, you know, that told me no wonder he can cite scripture so easily, right? I mean, if I copied all of scripture four times, I could probably cite my Bible a little better than I do, you know, but the invitation of Christ is, I mean, every few lines is a quote to scripture. I mean, yeah, that when the Protestants that think the Catholics don't know their Bible, okay, maybe we don't today. I mean, just look at some of these guys. Indeed, every other line is scripture based. Yeah, yeah. And so this was a particular characteristic of the style of writing, I have to say, Conor, from the point of view of a translator, if you're working from an addition, which a Latin edition, which doesn't have the footnotes, it is actually one of the great challenges because you recognize, yeah, this is a quote from scripture. And then you think, Oh, where is it? And so they even use quote marks like when you're working with this Latin text, they didn't even use quote marks. So you just see a line. They don't use quotation marks. Man, that's crazy. And they assume that their readers will recognize these biblical references and know where they're coming from. I have to say the practice of constantly citing chapter and verse is very much a Protestant thing. In the traditional Catholic world and Catholic approach, you don't cite the chapter and verse. You just assume that people know where it comes from. That makes me feel better because I can't ever cite chapter and verse. Well, no, no, I cannot to do it myself either. But as a translator, I need to put in the footnote so people can identify it. Sometimes putting in all the footnotes actually takes longer than translating the text itself. Oh, man. Well, I can relate to that. Whenever I'm writing, I wrote a paper in grad school citations took longer. Okay. And the actual research, you know, so I can, I can, I can see that. I can see that. All right. So, so he is sitting there transcribing, copying Bibles, learning, learning scripture and not only the Bible, but he copied virtually the complete works of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux. That's right. I forgot about that. Which is quite astonishing. He's one of my favorite saints, Bernard of Clairvaux. I just, I just love that guy. I've been reading a biography on him that Tan publishes. Bernard is another guy we need to have another whole podcast on, but he's remarkable. So, you know, for, for a campus to have been influenced that deeply by Bernard makes a lot of sense to me, you know, it's because Bernard was, okay, so he's Bernard's around 1000 AD, right? I mean, so he's 400 years, I guess, before Thomas a campus. Yeah. Bernard, a doctor of the church, a doctor of the church. Yeah. And so, if so, I'm just saying the influence, the pedagogy there was significant on a campus. He was indeed and also Augustine. Did he copy of Guston's works, too? He did. He did. Oh, man. Okay. He's got the total package. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, the, the, the cannons live basically according to the rule of Saint Augustine. Yeah. Right. Okay. Okay. So, so he has had the perfect training to write a book like Imitation of Christ because he's got scripture. He's got the intellectual powerhouse of Augustine, but he has that spiritual side of Bernard of Clairvaux. I mean, that's like the perfect trifecta. He does. He does. And, and in addition to all of this, he has his own experience of life, which began as a layperson, a lay Catholic within the brotherhood of common life, trying to live a life of great fidelity, and then as a committed religious. So I think this is part of the key to the great appeal of the imitation of Christ, that it is accessible, but it is written from the perspective both of a lay person, a lay Catholic, and equally so from the perspective of a person who is committed to the religious life. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. We're going to dive more into the, to the imitation of Christ next episode here. So I guess in his biography, I'm at a point where I wanted to talk about this apparition he had. Is this a good time to do that? Of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Yes, it is. It is. And can I, can I read the passage? Yeah. That would be fantastic. All right. So this is, this is in the, your or some of the introductory material. This is a short life of venerable Thomas A. Kempis that's in the front of our work on humility and the elevation of the mind of God. And so I'll just read a little, I just, I just thought this was a great little story. Then a vision came to him, Thomas A. Kempis, one night in a dream. He was standing in the lecture room with an assembly of other scholars. His masters of studies, Florentius, was there also and the students were listening attentively as he read to them the words of scripture. Suddenly Thomas beheld a cloud coming down from heaven on which stood Holy Mary, the queen of heaven and earth. Though she was invisible to everyone else. Thomas saw her move around the room and embrace and kiss each of the students in turn with maternal love. He himself felt his devotion to her burn with renewed ardor. Joyfully he awaited for her to arrive at him, hoping and expecting to receive her gracious and kindly embrace. And this is where it gets interesting. But when the mother of God arrived at him, she did not embrace him at all, but instead reprimanded him bitterly. Quote, you expect to receive my embrace, you who neglect to pay me the honor you had once promised to me. Where have your customary devotions gone? Why have your prayers vanished? The homage which you formerly poured out to me with sighs and tears? Has your love for me grown cold and your ardor become dull? Why does your former piety vacillate thus? Depart from me for you are surely unworthy of my embrace since you have neglected such an easy thing as to offer a daily greeting to your beloved. So that's a dream, I guess, that he had. So maybe not an apparition, but at least in dream. But that's a harsh dream for a monk to have about the Blessed Mother scared him to death. And it was a turning point in his life, I guess. So just talk about that. Okay. So this vision of the Blessed Virgin Mary, I think really puts into perspective the importance of Marian devotion, not only to Thomas personally, but more broadly in relation to the Christian faith, that Mary appears and she renews in him this faith which had been waning a little bit. And not that he had ceased to be devoted to her, but somehow in the course of everything, this devotion had come to assume less prominence in his day to day life. And I think there is actually a much, there is a deeper meaning to this vision than the experience of Thomas the campus alone. Because at the stage, at the point in history at which Thomas lived, as you mentioned before, was one of renewal, of reformation. And this was actually more or less at the point in history at which the so-called reformation or the Protestantism as such was starting to emerge. And the general environment, both of church and the society in general, was reevaluating of reassessing the importance of a number of different things. And the fact that Thomas had this vision was like a wonderful reminder of the importance of the Blessed Virgin of Mary in the Christian life in general. I bet he got that from Bernard of Clairvaux. His work on Bernard of Clairvaux, because Bernard was one of early, not super early, but major proponents of Mary and devotion. In fact, I heard that Louis de Montford, another doctor of the church, was called Little Bernard because of the devotion to Mary. I'm just saying, maybe Thomas was influenced in knowing how important Mary and devotion was by his work on Bernard, but maybe not, but that's a thought I had. No, very much so, very much so. And this was a stage when Mary and devotion began to be questioned by the forerunners of Protestantism here. And so Thomas lived at that time. Right before the Reformation happens, but the hustle and bustle of the Protestant Reformation is beginning. Indeed. And I mean, Thomas de Kempis is actually very highly esteemed amongst Protestant readers as well. Yeah, that's another, when you read the people who he influenced, it's like John Wesley and Henry VIII. Okay, you got the founder of Methodism and the founder of Anglicanism. Right. And so, I mean, these guys really loved, you know, a campus. They did indeed. And I think his striving to bring the faith, the importance of spirituality, well, that's something which the Protestants often identify themselves with. It's not something which is in opposition to the Catholic faith either. So, yeah, so it's something which both Catholics and Protestants have in common. And we can identify Thomas de Kempis as a person, as an individual who appeals to both streams of Christianity, not insofar as that they're opposed, but insofar as Christianity by its nature. Or authentic Christianity is something which involves the devotional life of both the laity and the religious. Yeah, yeah. So, Marian devotion, scriptural understanding, clearly he's an intellectual he lives, you know, the little bit that I read about his life. I mean, he clearly lived a holy, holy life, right? So, he kind of meets every all the standards of sanctity. Why is he not Saint Thomas de Kempis? Oh, a very, a very interesting question you raised there. And one of the answers which is traditionally given, which is a kind of semi legendary answer, is that they found that his body had actually moved in his tomb. And from this, they concluded that, you know, he was, he was actually buried before he had really died. Yes, buried alive. And because of this fact that they that they can't say, oh, well, possibly he didn't die in a state of perfect grace. We can't be absolutely sure because who knows what thoughts would pass through a person's mind. All right. So, but for the record, for me, if you live an amazing life, and you're going to be canonized, and then they bury you alive by accident, and then you try to get out of your coffin, and they strip canonization away from you, that's like the worst. It's like pulling the rug out from somebody of all time worse pulling the rug out from you. Well, it is. The poor guy. And in fact, in fact, Connor, in all fairness, that story didn't really come into circulation until much, much later. Really? Because I even heard there was claw marks on the inside of the coffin. I don't know if that's true, but man, I mean, if they buried me alive, I'd try to get out. I mean, that doesn't mean I shouldn't be canonized. Yeah. Yeah. So in fact, in fact, that's that story. I'm not saying I should be canonized just for the record. Well, I wouldn't rule it out. Rule me neither. And in fact, of course, all, all people, all Christians are called to be saints because being a saint basically means being in heaven. Right. So, yeah. But no, that story is really apocryphal. Okay. It's a it's a it's a great story. But it's a great story. So why he wasn't canonized is, yeah. In fact, it's important to bear in mind that a person is canonized not because they write wonderful books, but for a range of well, for a complex range of other eventualities which which may or may not be there. And the fact that a person isn't declared a saint or isn't added to the canon of saints doesn't mean that they're not a saint in the sense that they're a person who is is very holy and so forth. So the fact that we don't call him saint Thomas the campus doesn't in any way detract from his undoubtable sanctity from the fact that he is a saint. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I think that's a it's it's a I don't know. I kind of wish he was. But if we can call him venerable or blessed, you know, because the tradition does that makes me feel a little better. It's a nice consolation price, you know, but anyway, so, you know, you know, we're going to talk more about his kind of how we apply his teachings to our daily life in a subsequent episode here. But any last thoughts on his life on what he means to you personally, you know, anything else biographical that you want to add to this discussion before we move on to the next episode? Well, I would say that he his life exemplifies one of obedience of fidelity. He is a kind of quiet achiever. And so many Catholics are called, you know, we're called to fidelity in the ordinariness of our daily life in the quiet dedication to service in the uncomplaining patient acceptance of our challenges, big and small, and above all, by our unwavering devotion to love of God in both the big and the small things of our earthly journey. It's beautiful. It's beautiful life is his entering into the his order, being a scribe, his Marian devotion, his time in this unique, you know, point in history where the Reformation is coming out. So, but tell us a little bit more about what his other work. So we talked about imitation of Christ, but we're going to talk about some other works, you know, in subsequent episodes, but there's even more that we won't get to. So talk about the breadth of his work other than just transcribing Bibles and the works of other saints. Yeah. So Thomas was a very productive author. He wrote a great deal of works in a huge range of genres. And although the imitation of Christ is regarded as his masterpiece, which it indeed is, his collected works take up, depending upon which edition, between three and eight entire volumes. And that might not sound like a big number, but these are like volumes of well over 1,000 pages each and 1,000 pages of very small. So in terms of... Do you have these volumes? We do. We do. It's at your mon... Tell them about that. Sorry, I interrupted. I mean, that's it. It's pretty cool how you have access to these ancient, you know, volumes. Yeah. So these volumes, we have access to them. I have access to them. Everyone really has access to them because of their general digital availability. So in terms of length, it would be fair to say that the imitation of Christ is like 5% of the total output of Thomas the Kempis. Yeah. So that's incredible. I mean, I made a little last night when you were giving a talk at Belmont Abbey and I was introducing you. I made a little joke about finding a lost work of Thomas the Kempis. To me, it's sort of like George Lucas finding out that he made another episode of Star Wars and never released it. I mean, it's like this incredible masterpiece. And yeah, a Kempis and the different level than George Lucas. But I'm saying to find that something that you love so much, there's a whole lot more of it. It's a very exciting experience. It is a very exciting experience. And all of these books were written in the Latin language. And the reason they were written in Latin was because this was the common language, not only of the church, but of writing, of literacy, of everything. Probably a universal language that comes through all the faculars. It was. So to put it in this sense, Latin was to people of the Middle Ages and of the post Middle Ages, of the early modern period, what English is to the world today. It was kind of the default mode of expression. And the works of Thomas the Kempis cover a diversity of different things. So we've got works of spiritual instruction and guidance of which the imitation of Christ is one amongst many. We have also biographical writings, lives of saints and so forth. In particular, lives of people associated with the brotherhood of common life, of which Thomas Kempis was a member. We have also scriptural conversations, commentaries. We have collections of homilies, of prayers. We have also his correspondence with letters to and from various other people. So the collected works of Thomas the Kempis, some of them have been translated into English. Some of them remain untranslated. Some of them the untranslated ones I've worked to make available in English, including humility and the elevation of the mind to God. Well, tell us just a little bit about what that is. So the particular one, humility is talking about the virtue of humility and its importance in bringing the Catholic to a greater state of self-understanding, of openness, of obedience, and so forth. The elevation of the mind to God is talking about the ability to leave behind the things which hold us back, which restrain us and to bring the mind into more perfect unity with the higher things, with God, with eternity, with the kingdom of heaven. That's a real common theme in his writings. I'm finding that he understood education and it was great, but he also knew that it could be a trap for pride. And essentially, he wanted people to detach from the intellectual life for this, not to, he appreciated the intellectual life, but he knew that it could be dangerous and it was not the end of the spiritual life. So he seems to talk a lot about that. He talks about the dangers of the intellectual life and both imitation of Christ and our book now, Humility and the Elevation of the Mind to God. So he was aware of this in perhaps a way that other scholastic theologians might not have been. Yeah. Well, he was aware of it. And one of the things Connery's people say that a person who a priest who gives a homily is very often addressing it, well, to themselves first and foremost. And Thomas the campus was, he was a very intelligent person. He very could have easily have become puffed up with his own intellectual gifts and everything and gone on to be one of these, you know, celebrity scholars and everything. So when he talks about the dangers of intellectual pride and so forth, he's talking, well, he's talking to himself because he recognises this is something, this is a path which he could go down himself. And he's also talking to his, to his many students and friends and, you know, he realises the real peril of becoming puffed up with one's own intellectual capacities at the expense of humility, obedience and true love of God. Yeah. Yeah. And we're going to talk about this because there's some powerful lines in this book that we now publish with you. The other work that we have coming out at some point in the future is a book on solitude and silence. And so tell us just a little bit about what that is, because I haven't seen any of that yet. Yeah. Tell us a little bit about it. So silence and solitude were things which Thomas esteemed very highly. And he once said, I have found happiness and peace nowhere else, but in quiet, solitary corners and in books. In books. Yeah. So silence and solitude in Thomas A. Kemper's own time were things which most people found were really, really hard to come by. And they didn't have cell phones and iPads and you know, I mean, so you think that they didn't have any distraction, you know, you would think so. You would think so. But I guess in a lot of ways, the very late middle ages, the early modern period had a lot in common with the situation in people in which people find themselves now. They were makes me feel better actually. Yeah. They were they were times when when when the when people found that they were pulled in in multiple different directions at the same time. People in religious life then as now found that they had more jobs. Then they did, you know, the idea of one person having one job, one role. Then as in now was an ideal but was, you know, was not the reality of life for most people. So silence and solitude is a work which reminds us that in order to be truly present to God, in order to be truly present to our own hearts, we need to allow these spaces, these these opportunities for reflection, for meditation, for prayer and that we're not going to have these unless we're able to turn off the distractions, to turn off the many things, to return ourselves to the one thing necessary. It's beautiful. Beautiful. And I wrote a book while back called Still Amits the Storm. And it's very much about anxiety in the modern world. But I kind of give three part recipe to tackle anxiety. One, living in the present moment. Two, silence, embracing silence, getting away from the noise. And then three stillness, not having to move in all this nervous energy. But, you know, my little writing of that was very much influenced by my reading of imitation of Christ, which we'll we're going to go to in just a minute here. But it's in our modern world. I'm excited about this book on silence and solitude because I believe, well, I know that we have a pandemic of anxiety and stress in our in our society. And it's largely because of all the noise and all the fast movement that we have to, you know, we have to go buy something, we have to be consumers, we have to watch something, we have to have radio in the car, like it's just chaos. So I hope that a campus's work on silence and solitude, you know, appears to our customers as it's an anecdote to their anxiety, which good Catholics suffer from as bad as anyone else, because we're living, we're inundated with all of this noise and fast paced lifestyle. So I'm excited about seeing that manuscript whenever we get that. So in closing, why don't you tell us a little bit, you know, just a takeaway. What do you think Thomas A. Kempis and his writing and his and his him as a man, him as a saint in heaven, we presume, you know, that that can intercede for us. What's the takeaway for us in today's in our world today and our busy lives? What should we if take away one or two main things from him? What are those things for us to, you know, improve our daily life and our relationship with God? So what Thomas A. Kempis offers the modern reader, offers each one of us self-knowledge, honesty, recognizing our own struggles. He offers us also that we can approach God, we can aspire to this magnificent vocation of sanctity, of union with God amidst the ordinariness, the everydayness of our daily lives. Whatever we're doing in life, whether it's exceptional, whether it's humdrum, God is right there beside us in all of this. God asks of us fidelity and fidelity is a thing which is both very ordinary, very everyday, but at the same time, very heroic, very demanding, very rewarding. Thomas A. Kempis tells us that God asks of us nothing more than what we can honestly do and in return for this, he promises us something beyond all we've ever imagined or hoped for. Beautiful. Well, that's a great overview of this incredible man. Thank you, Father, for that wonderful insight. And next time we're going to jump in and talk in a little bit more detail about the imitation of Christ. So thank you for that and we'll be back. Thank you, Conan.