Author Description

In every age and generation, the words and presence of Jesus Christ have given people belief, hope and purpose to develop their full potential. However at the same time, faith in Jesus Christ has often been outlawed as it challenges the overwhelming secular impetus of financial achievements, domination and power over others. To answer this unfortunate occurrence, poets throughout the years have taken up the message and person of Jesus. Often, in the side-lining or the outlawing of Christ, the poets, too, have been side-lined. Outlawed. This book, developed from a series of talks and lectures at Loyola University, Chicago, follows the poets in their search for the true Christ, from the 8th century Dream of the Rood where Christ was a warrior hero climbing onto the Cross to defeat the rule of Satan, to poets like John Donne, George Herbert and Gerard Manley Hopkins, up to our own day, with modern Irish poets like Patrick Kavanagh, Pádraig J. Daly and James Harpur. The book presents a stimulating and intriguing anthology of poems that bring Christ to life in our own uncertain and challenging times.