Fateful Passages The Life of Henry Somerville, Catholic Journalist.

Joseph Sinasac Toronto Novalis, 2003 pp. 160, Paperback, $16.95

In some ways, it is a wonder that a biography of Catholic journalist and writer Henry Somerville did not appear sooner on the Canadian book scene. It could be a reflection of the limited reader interest in smaller-scale Church journalism, but given Somerville's unique niche in Canadian Catholic history, it is something of a mystery why it took nearly 50 years for a biographer to come forward with the Somerville story.

Current Catholic Register editor Joseph Sinasac has filled the void with this effort on the life and work of his predecessor. The book is the third instalment of Novalis's "Out of the Ordinary" biographies of individuals who put their faith into action in concrete ways. The first two featured prominent Catholics Jim McSheffrey (by Maura Hanrahan) and Sister Geraldine MacNamara (by Eleanor Stebner).

Somerville was born in Leeds, England, and came to Canada at the request of Toronto Archbishop Neil McNeil to consider taking over the Catholic Register newspaper. He first became involved in 1915-1918, and served as editor-in-chief from 1933 until his death 20 years later at age 63. It was an interesting time to be a journalist, especially for those inspired by a religious fervour to bring about a more compassionate society.

Sinasac takes advantage of his current position at the Catholic Register by tapping into the newspaper and archdiocesan archives for his research. He brings alive the life and work of a near-forgotten journalist, whom he describes as one of the most influential lay Catholics in Ontario in the early-mid-20th century.

Along the way, Sinasac offers a concise history of the Church in Ontario, especially in its struggles to cope with the social and economic turmoil in the early decades of the last century. Pope Leo XIII's 1891 encyclical Rerum Novarum (On New Things) colours his work. The encyclical, offering the Church's pastoral view on the economic upheaval brought on in the wake of the Industrial Revolution, sought to correct the excesses of capitalism and free enterprise with an emphasis on the worker's right to a living wage and the care and protection of his family.

For Somerville, the encyclical provided an opportunity for the laity not only to take the social dimension of their faith seriously, but also to assist the hierarchy in making the Church a real force for social and material progress.

Throughout his career both in England and Canada, Somerville encouraged the formation of Catholic workers' guilds and study groups that would discuss the Church's social teaching and apply it to everyday realities. "He (Somerville) was one of a minority of intellectuals working for the Catholic Church who strove to educate the faithful about Catholic social doctrine, a part of the Church's teaching that to this day is sometimes referred to as the Church's best-kept secret. At a time when lay Catholics rarely held positions of leadership within the Church, he stood out."

Somerville's emphasis on social reaching occasionally put him at odds with some Church leaders concerned with the emergence of socialism as a secular remedy to a host of social and economic ills. And while Sinasac takes pains to suggest that his protagonist was no socialist in Catholic clothing, he paints Somerville as a constant critic of laissez-faire capitalism, and its tendency to stifle social reformers with a radical-atheist tag.

Somerville's deeper significance, says Sinasac, "lay in helping the Catholic Church in Canada reconcile itself with and influence left-wing political movements in Canada, notably within trade unions and the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF)" (see the article "The CCF and the Canadian Catholic Church" by Peter McGuigan in Catholic Insight, Jan. 2004, pp 34-37, 40).

In his role as a reporter, critic, and teacher, Somerville remained strictly orthodox on matters of faith and doctrine. He also tried to live a quiet faith at home. Somerville's home life was punctuated by serenity, devotion, prayer, and an appreciation of nature.

Whatever 'radicalism' might be found in Somerville was directed toward a more important role for the Catholic laity in the world. "Though not a theological reformer," says Sinasac, "Somerville believed the true Catholic did not simply go to church on Sunday. (His or her) task was to challenge society whenever it strayed from the principles of human rights, dignity and respect--to be prophetic figures, laying a straight path for the Lord in the secular wilderness of the twentieth century."

Sinasac is impressed that Somerville's faith remained steadfast despite his working for nearly half a century in a craft that often inspires cynicism. Whatever turmoil and suffering he witnessed and reported on, Somerville clung to a faith that "not only promised better things on earth, but with a little more effort, could deliver them."

Somerville "believed the Church's mission was as important in the modern world as it was in the first century.... (He) knew God was not an idea, but a real, all-loving being who could no more be rationalized out of existence than could the evil in the world that (he) fought so ardently."

Fateful Passages tells a dramatic story. Somerville's working class roots, his largely self-directed education, and his eagerness to use the Church's social teachings as a means to a better life for the faithful are the very stuff of a captivating biography, written as a labour of love.