Loading...
Loading...
Click here if you don’t see subscription options
James Martin, S.J.January 04, 2013
Frederick Buechner in 1955, photo courtesy of Mr. Buechner.

 

Two of my favorite spiritual memoirs are the magnificent works The Sacred Journey and Telling Secrets, by Frederick Buechner, an ordained Presbyterian minister who, since 1967 has lived in and written from Vermont.  Buechner's prose is supple, his mind fertile and his way of looking at religious and spiritual concepts always inviting and often very surprising.  So when I heard that our digital editor Tim Reidy was asked to write a profile of Buechner for the Princeton Alumni Weekly, I was delighted.  Tim's delightful essay, based on his interview with Mr. Buechner, is here.  My favorite passage:  "For Buechner, the process of writing about his life is sacred: 'My story is important not because it is mine, God knows, but because if I tell it anything like right, the chances are you will recognize that in many ways it is also yours. ... It is precisely through these stories in all their particularity, as I have long believed and often said, that God makes himself known to each of us more powerfully and personally.'"
 

Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.
Beth Cioffoletti
11 years 10 months ago
Good job, Tim. I really enjoyed reading that article, even though I haven't read anything by Buechner. He sounds like the real deal to me.
Andrew Alfray
11 years 5 months ago
My favorite works of Frederick Buechner is the The Sacred Journey I really enjoyed reading it.buy instagram comments
Vanessa Sandow
10 years 11 months ago
During his third year at Princeton, Frederick Buechner received the Irene Glascock Prize for poetry which was pretty amazing at that early age. He also began working on his first novel "A Long Day’s Dying, published in 1950. Bottom line is that Frederick Buechner has accomplished more than most of us and will always be a great man. Regards Vanessa the "Opzioni Binarie" girl

The latest from america

Bishop Carlos Enrique Herrera of Jinotega was forced to leave Nicaragua after accusing a local Sandinista mayor of sacrilege for disturbing a celebration of the Mass by blaring loud music outside the cathedral, according to Nicaraguan media.
David Agren - OSV NewsNovember 15, 2024
A Reflection for Wednesday of the Thirty-third Week in Ordinary Time, by Delaney Coyne
Delaney CoyneNovember 15, 2024
I am struggling to smile and nod and accept the message from well-intentioned people, whom I love, that everything will be fine, that I should trust in God, and not despair.
Molly CahillNovember 15, 2024
Pope Francis’ encyclicals have drawn from and lead to this truth: What the world needs is heart—not sentimentality, but integration, presence and fortitude to stay in the tensions of our current reality.
Jessica Kerber, A.C.I.November 15, 2024