Peter Kreeft
Socrates Meets Jesus: History's Greatest Questioner Confronts the Claims of Christ
Kreeft uses Socratic logic to present a rational case for who Jesus is.
Everything by Kreeft is wonderful.
Furthermore, Kevin O'Brien from Theater of the Word has made a play of this book.
The Unaborted Socrates: A Dramatic Debate on the Issues Surrounding Abortion
Kreeft imagines a conversation moderated by Socrates.
C. S. Lewis
The Aboliition of Man
Here is a defense of the philosophical concept of a universal ethics. The title refers to the fact that the denial of such an ethics can only lead to a denial of the value of culture and of the human person. Well-argued.
Joseph Peiper
Leisure the Basis of Culture.
Thinking takes time, that's all. If you think hoeing a garden takes time, and political wrangling takes time, but thinking is something that just happens, you've probably never tried it. Now would be a good time.
The word culture comes from the same root as agriculture: it refers to something that grows when it is cared for attentively. Therefore, culture does not grow without a commitment to providing time for thought, and individuals don't contribute to culture unless they commit themselves to taking time for thought.
Hans Urs Von Balthazar
Dare We Hope: that all men be saved?
Great saints have placed themselves firmly on apparently opposite sides of this question: some unequivocally praying for the salvation of "All" while others describe the sight of innumerable souls falling into permanent and fiery despair.
I am not fully persuaded of one side or the other, but until I read von Balthazar, I did not realize that the Catholic tradition had anything similar to Jonathan Edwards unpleasant words on the topic of others' damnation.
Dietrich von Hildebrand
Humility: Wellspring of Virtue
I love everything I have ever seen by von Hildebrand. This was not originally a single work, but is a collection of his writings about humility. It came to my attention when I was faced with some very negative discussions of humility as self-hatred. Von Hildebrand remains always centered on truth and the beauty of salvation.
Man and Woman
I love vonHildebrand for his clarity about the difference between man and woman.
He was also the first, and as far as my reading takes me, the only philosopher whom I found to clarify the issue of self-love in relationship to Jesus' teaching about loving our our neighbor "as ourself." No, this does not imply an attitude contrary to the gospel teaching about being willing to lose one's life, to "hate it" in John 22:25, nor does it imply any kind of new age self-love.
