First Society

The First Society: The Sacrament of Marriage and the Restoration of the Social Order by Scott Hahn, 182 pages

The First Society is many things, all of them excellent.  It is an exploration of Catholic teaching on marriage, society, grace, and the sacraments.  It is also an examination of contemporary society and the much-heralded "death of liberalism".  Most of all, it is an exhortation to the Catholic faithful to live the truth faithfully and proclaim it boldly.  As Hahn explains, the family is the original and fundamental community and thus the basis for every other kind of community.  While philosophy tells us that we are social creatures, the Church deepens this by revealing that we are made for communion, because we are made in the image and likeness of a God who is Himself a communion of Persons.  The desacralization of marriage, then, sabotages the very basis of civil society even as it alienates the individual from the only possible sources of true happiness.  If, as Hahn asserts, the secular world has spent the last several centuries desperately trying - and failing - to find a replacement for the Catholic Church, it follows that it is the social as well as the evangelical duty of Catholics to offer precisely that which makes their faith distinctive.

As always, Hahn somehow manages to combine a popular approach with theological depth, producing a book which is accessible enough for neophytes without boring the more learned.  Most remarkable, in this case, is the integrity of the book, not only its evident sincerity but its convincing demonstration of the coherence of the Church's teaching.