Catching up with Jesus

Catholic New Times, Dec 18, 2005

Catching up with Jesus by Diarmuid O'Murchu, New York, Crossroads, 2005, 2004 pp.

Diarmuid O'Murchu travels the world, an Irish story teller trying to make the Jesus story relevant as we accept the new cosmology. This is his latest attempt, the sequel to Quantum Theology (CNZ, Nov. 6, 2005). The book is mainly a story, the Jesus story narrated by an imaginary Jesus of our time. The book, designed for those who have moved beyond "the first level of naivete" (Ricoeur), for adult learners 'Who can trust intuition and have their horizons of understanding continually stretched." It would be worthwhile simply for the first chapter, "Bringing Jesus Out of Captivity," in which O'Murchu lists 12 "chains" that keep Jesus problematic for modems, like "2000 years of incarnational reductionism, divine supremacy, academic rationality, absolute dogmas, male exclusiveness and insipid religiosity." All will be appreciated by CNT readers.