Perhaps I'm wrong, but I think this novel still ranks as the most sympathetic portrayal of the Catholic Church - and her teachings - that has ever been written (in this genre). It is also, I feel, the gold standard for post-apocalyptic science fiction.
Plot Synopsis:
"In the Utah desert, Brother Francis of the Albertian Order of Leibowitz has made a miraculous discovery: the relics of the martyr Isaac Leibowitz himself, including the blessed blueprint and the sacred shopping list. They may provide a bright ray of hope in a terrifying age of darkness, a time of ignorance and genetic monsters that are the unholy aftermath of the Flame Deluge. But as the spellbinding mystery at the core of this extraordinary novel unfolds, it is the search itself - for meaning, for truth, for love - that offers hope to a humanity teetering on the edge of an abyss." - from the Bantam Spectra edition.
For more information, you can also check out the relevant Wikipedia article here.
The Skinny:
Dad and I are a bit traddy as Catholics go. Don't get me wrong -- we don't join with the heretics who repudiate the teachings of Vatican II. But we do expect a certain solemnity that is often missing from the standard mass at our current parish. We like the smells and bells and pageantry - and miss them when they are not present - not because we are particularly legalistic (we're not) but because we genuinely feel that's what the Holy Eucharist deserves.
Why do I mention our worship preferences? Because I believe they at least partially explain the affection we feel for Miller's masterpiece, which is largely set within a Catholic monastery and portrays the traditional Church with uncanny accuracy. When Dad thinks about Brother Francis' audience with the pope after the canonization ceremony for Saint Leibowitz, he literally sighs happily in appreciation of the characters' reverence for the relics of the aforementioned saint. When I think of Dom Zerchi's attempts to protect the Eucharist at the end of the novel, I react the same way. If I were in our church at the moment of a nearby nuclear blast, would I immediately run to the tabernacle to grab the Hosts? I hope so.
Miller takes the Catholicism of his main characters seriously, and not just in a ceremonial sense. He also allows his monks to express the timeless wisdom of the Magisterium on such matters as the fallen nature of Man, euthanasia, infanticide, and the proper use of scientific inquiry -- and it is this that allows A Canticle for Leibowitz to transcend its Cold War origins and become a genuine classic relevant to any age. Our own world, for example, is full of Thon Taddeos who believe that science - and science only - will rescue us from our suffering; there are people out there today who would benefit if only they would listen to Miller's warning that "neither infinite power nor infinite wisdom could bestow godhood upon men. For that there would have to be infinite love as well." And Dom Zerchi's take on euthanasia? That passage is so astonishing that it deserves to be directly quoted:
"I had a cat once, when I was a boy," the abbott murmured slowly. "He was a big grey tomcat with shoulders like a small bulldog and a head and neck to match, and that sort of slouchy insolence that makes some of them look like the Devil's own. He was pure cat. Do you know cats?"
"A little."
"Cat lovers don't know cats. You can't love all cats if you know cats, and the ones you can love if you know them are the ones the cat lovers don't even like. Zeke was that kind of cat."
"This has a moral, of course?" She was watching him suspiciously.
"Only that I killed him."
"Stop. Whatever you're about to say, stop."
"A truck hit him, crushed his back legs. He dragged himself under the house. Once in a while he'd make a noise like a cat fight and thrash around a little, but mostly he just lay quietly and waited. 'He ought to be destroyed,' they kept telling me... So finally I said I'd do it myself, if it had to be done. I got a gun and a shovel and took him out to the edge of the woods. I stretched him out on the ground while I dug a hole. Then I shot him through the head. It was a small bore rifle. Zeke thrashed a couple of times, then got up and started dragging himself toward some bushes. I shot him again. It knocked him flat, so I thought he was dead, and put him in the hole. After a couple of shovels of dirt, Zeke got up and pulled himself out of the hole and started for the bushes again. I was crying louder than the cat... He wanted to get to those bushes and just lie there and wait. I wished to God that I had only let him get to those bushes, and die the way a cat would if you just let it alone - with dignity. I never felt right about it. Zeke was only a cat, but -"
"Shut up!" she whispered.
"- but even the ancient pagans noticed that Nature imposes nothing on you that Nature doesn't prepare you to bear. If that is true even of a cat, then is it not more perfectly true of a creature with a rational intellect and will - whatever you may believe of Heaven?"
Then, later on, Miller suggests the second half of Zerchi's Catholic argument: God does not ask you to bear anything that He has not born Himself. Whatever you are suffering, you are not alone, because the Christian God knows suffering too. Indeed, he voluntarily experienced it in order to accomplish our salvation. And Miller further notes that the avoidance of pain and the elevation of worldly security as a good above all others is the root of many evils. This is a truth accessible even to a non-Christian, I think. Why, after all, do people become addicted to drugs? In my observation, most addicts are addicts because they are trying to dull some sort of emotional pain. And what drives the illiberal radical left? The messianic belief that things like poverty can be wiped out once and for all if only we had the political will to fight for such an earthly utopia.
Bottom line? This novel is quite grim, but it is also a fantastic antidote for our modern secular hubris.
Characterization: 10.0
I love every single character in this novel. Each one is very carefully rendered; nobody feels flat or unrealistic.
Plot/Pacing: 10.0
Miller's is not an action-heavy plot, but I guarantee you won't want to put the book down until you've finished reading it.
Concepts/Themes: 9.5
Miller has a very pessimistic viewpoint when it comes to the Cold War-era nuclear arms race - a viewpoint that, ultimately, was not fulfilled - but I'm not going to ding him too hard on that because in his time, everyone believed the conflict between the U.S. and the Soviet Union would one day destroy the world. And at any rate, the political dimension is far overshadowed by the philosophical and spiritual dimensions of his story, the depth and relevance of which are discussed in detail above.
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