“Thinking Clearly: Catholic Philosophy for a Culture in Chaos.” By John-Mark Miravalle. Indiana: Our Sunday Visitor, 2024. 144 pages. Paperback: $24.95; Kindle: $9.40; E-book: $11.49.

When I first looked at the table of contents of John-Mark Miravalle’s latest book, “Thinking Clearly”, I flashed back nearly half a century to my freshman and sophomore years in Catholic college. Philosophy was part of the core curriculum and there it was in front of me again: Metaphysics, Epistemology, Logic, and Ethics. But I can say that even with those long-ago courses in my background, Miravalle’s book was still challenging, and often read like an introductory textbook in Philosophy which, in part, it is.

In his introduction, Miravalle, who is a philosophy professor, explained why he wrote this book, which he geared toward the average reader. In a culture that is becoming more and more secular, explaining the faith – in fact, defending it – is more challenging than ever. In order to have a real, productive discussion with someone about Catholicism, it’s crucial to begin with something that both parties agree on. For the Orthodox, he explains, that may mean beginning with the Church Fathers; a conversation with a Protestant would likely be more productive if it began with the Bible. But atheists and agnostics would not identify with either of these approaches. Enter philosophy. The object of using this as a starting point is, he says, “to be able to show how our faith, while it can’t be proven, is, at the very least, quite plausible from a rational point of view.”

The book is comprised of the four parts mentioned above, and those parts are further broken down into a total of twelve chapters. Each chapter is quite short and there is a very good reason for that. What Miravalle is tackling here is likely going to be intellectually challenging for most readers and needs to be approached in small doses in order to be understood. The book reads somewhat like a textbook in as much as there has to be, as each concept unfolds, a detailed explanation of the terms used in that particular branch of philosophy. Consequently, each segment begins with a list of definitions, highlighted in bold type, with examples of how each term is used in philosophical discussions.

I found that I did a lot of underlining and highlighting as I went along and that might be a good idea in general when approaching this book. Rereading chapters until one is fairly sure of what the author means is also a good idea, as each chapter builds on the one before. Like mathematics, with which it traditionally shares a connection, readers of philosophy can get quite lost if they proceed to a new concept before completely grasping the previous one.

At the end of each major section, Miravalle includes what he calls “Practice Scenarios”, or real-life situations where the reader can apply what he or she has (hopefully) learned. The object of the book, after all, is to have the necessary intellectual tools to defend Catholicism in a secular setting. In each example, the reader is presented with a situation in which someone has essentially dismissed the whole notion of the existence of God (and all the things that go with Him.) The challenge is to use what one has just learned to refute the other’s argument. While this is really a very good idea, left on one’s own, without the benefit of a philosophy professor or class discussion, this approach could fall short of its goal. I think the book would be more useful if Miravalle stuck to one or two scenarios, instead of the five to eight he presents in each segment, and then followed up each one with a detailed explanation of how to apply the philosophical tools he just discussed. In other words, keep teaching.

While this book may not be everyone’s cup of tea, for those interested in pursuing Catholicism from a philosophical point of view, it could be a challenge worth taking up.

Author bio:

John-Mark L. Miravalle is professor of Systematic and Moral theology at Mount St. Mary’s Seminary in Maryland. He received his doctorate in Sacred Theology from the Regina Apostolorum in Rome.

He is the author of three books, including “Why God? Why Jesus? Why the Catholic Church?”

He has publicly debated noted atheists on topics such as God’s existence, same-sex marriage, and theistic morality (debates available on YouTube). He and his wife Jessica have seven children.