THE MYSTERY OF LOVE

This slim volume of reflections from the Benedictine monk who led the Catholic Church in England and Wales for 23 years was first published privately in 1976. Its publication now, three years after the author's death, fulfills his wish that the book be made available in hardcover. In it, Hume's writings on such topics as mystery, humility and suffering are simply and often elegantly stated. At first blush, they might seem prosaic, but the cardinal has presented them as helps for prayer and meditation, not theological treatises. In that respect, they work well. His chapter on prayer, for example, begins with the classic Catholic catechism definition—"Prayer is the raising of the mind and heart to God"—and continues with a series of thoughts on various aspects of prayer, each of which could be pondered or prayed over separately. In the section on suffering, Hume writes of grief, observing, "Silence is the best response to another's grief, not the silence which is a pause in speech, awkward and unwanted, but one that unites heart to heart." His writing here is mercifully free of pious pontificating on the value of affliction, but nonetheless deals gently and thoughtfully with its reality. Although the cardinal's perspective is clearly Catholic, his references to his church do not obscure the universality of his message. (Sept.)