Introduction to Catholic Imaginations

It’s hard to believe the first Catholic Imagination Conference occurred almost a decade ago. For us, as for many Catholic writers, our first visit to the now-biennial CIC felt like two things at once, a discovery and a homecoming. Where we thought we had been alone, we met hundreds of fellow writers who were looking for ways to embody the Catholic understanding of God and human beings in art–and who, like us, thought they had been at it by themselves. Many of us felt like Chesterton’s sailor, who “braces” himself up to discover New South Wales, only to find, “with a gush of happy tears, that it was really old South Wales.” 

 

After showing us that we were not alone, the CIC helped us to form the community that artists need. Established writers shared space with emerging ones. They actively and generously mentored us. The Bill and Joan Hank Center for the Catholic Intellectual Heritage at Loyola University Chicago has been especially dedicated to developing younger writers: first, by including panels and workshops specifically for junior presenters; and subsequently, by inaugurating the Graduate Summer Institute on the Catholic Imagination (GSI). The first students of this summer institute gathered in Summer 2022 for ten days of writing, workshopping, and discussion, and conversations naturally continued well beyond the summer. Four GSI participants presented a roundtable discussion on “The Difference Creation Makes: Catholic Art and Creative Imagination,” at the 2022 De Nicola Ethics and Culture Conference at the University of Notre Dame. And now, the participants have continued their summertime work and present the fruits in this collection. It has been an honor to work with such a talented group of young Catholic writers and artists. 

 

If you learn anything from editing a magazine of young Catholic creative work, it is that we’re a big Church. Like the life of Grace itself, the Catholic imagination informs, vitalizes, and perfects an individual’s distinctive personal imagination; if it is authentic, it never suppresses an author’s individuality. In his contribution to this volume, co-editor Nathan Williams writes about the “cloud of witnesses” described in the Letter to the Hebrews: the cloud, which represents God’s presence throughout Scripture, remains a cloud, but it is now made up of individual believers. As we come to share in God’s life and see as He sees, we become the cloud which sustains our brothers and sisters. Even as we do that, we become more fully ourselves, more distinctly individual. For a believer who is an artist, that distinctive individuality-in-God shows up in her writing, poetry, or painting. What we call the Catholic imagination means participation in God’s imagination; by giving one’s imagination over to God, it becomes most fully the individual’s own. 

 

The sheer diversity of excellent, deeply individual work makes this volume what it is. Inside, you’ll find a sonnet crown that grapples with praise and loss; a story about a woman flipping through her friend’s phone and wondering whether she knows her friend—or herself—at all; an exploration of Adam’s naming of the animals through the Restoration poet Anne Finch; a reflection on the Christian call to compassion in the works of theologian Karl Rahner and singer-songwriter Bob Dylan; and more fiction, drama, and essayistic explorations into the world that God made. You’ll also find visual art by young Catholic artists. Rachel Nozicka, a contributor who gave us invaluable editorial help with this project, made an important point about the Catholic understanding of art:

 

“The Graduate Summer Institute helped me realize the intricate and delicate balance between words and illustration. The term “illustration” usually suggests description, explanation, or decoration, but an older definition renders it as a setting apart or honoring of something. All of the members of our group have immersed themselves in the Word of God, not decorating it or explaining it, but rather honoring it through their care, attentiveness, and craft.”

 

These words hold true for all the contributions, literary as well as visual. There is a great variety here, and a fair amount of strangeness, because strangeness arises when a person seeks to honor the world that God has made. We hope that, as you explore them, you’ll see in them the promise of a new generation of writers sharing in the Catholic imagination in all its diversity and love.