QUEEN OF HEAVEN

by Rene Laurentin ‧ RELEASE DATE: Aug. 1, 1957

This is a remarkable little book. Subtitled, ""A Short Treatise on Marian Theology"", and divided into two parts, ""The Development of Marian Doctrine"" and ""The Development of Mary's Destiny"", it first traces the development of Marian doctrine in Scripture and in successive centuries of tradition up to the present, in concise and scholarly fashion, and then sets forth the essentials of the Roman Catholic teaching about Mary in an integrated temporal order beginning with the Annunciation, continuing with the Incarnation, the role of Mary in connection with Christ's redemptive death, her role in the Church from the death of Christ to her own Dormition and the Assumption, and ending with her place in connection with the Parousia. This book is a model of conciseness, clarity, order, scholarship, intellectual integrity and theological profundity in the presentation of Marian doctrine for a wide Catholic public, which the author describes as ""all who have some intellectual acquaintance with the realities of the Faith or ...a lived experience of them. "" The author prefers to use an historical approach and a logic of convergence rather than an approach based on the category of ""appropriateness"" and a logic of strict deduction in which successive Marian doctrines are assumed to be inferred from some original doctrine by application of this category. Intellectual severity and the total absence of emotional and verbal extravagance characterize the entire work. As a result, it can serve as a solid foundation for true devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Since so much Marian literature abounds in intellectual and emotional excesses, this book is recommended to all intelligent Catholics who would found their devotion to Mary on certain truth. Their conviction of the exalted position of the Blessed Virgin in the plan of Providence with regard to the Church will only be confirmed by its being treated in such a solid and balanced way as it is in this book.

Pub Date: Aug. 1, 1957

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Macmillan

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 1957

Categories: NONFICTION