by Wayne Allen

The End of the Modern World, by Romano Guardini; with an Introduction by Frederick Wilhelmsen.

The appearance of this new and expanded edition of Romano Guardini’s book is both timely and helpful. Guardini (1885-1968) writes partially in the spirit of a theologian and partly with the critical eye of the philosopher. And he rightly sees no inherent hostility between the two, which itself is a modern prejudice, and one often held by both camps. Indeed, too many members of each camp have embraced modernity without flinching and abandoned their true calling. Guardini rightly treats modernity as less of an “age” and more as an idea, or distillation of ideas, that shapes and misshapes man according to the ascendant mundane preoccupations that are prevalent at the time. We have become accustomed to thinking unquestionably that modernity is as good as mother’s milk; that it is by definition a good, and that any force (reaction) or idea (conservatism) that impedes modernity is no different than poisoning mother’s milk. Guardini is not a sentimentalist, calling for some return to Eden. But he is more than mindful that modernity’s fascination with its own advent deserves more questioning than it has received thus far. He is one in this interrogation with Christopher Lasch (The True and Only Heaven, Progress and Its Critics), and demonstrates some of the poetic insight of a T.S. Eliot. [Read more...]