Lower Than the Angels - by Diarmaid MacCulloch (Hardcover)

About the Book

"First published in hardcover in Great Britain by Allen Lane, part of the Penguin Random House group of companies, Penguin Random House Ltd., London, in 2024."

Book Synopsis

"A magisterial new history."--The New York Times

"Endlessly fascinating."--Slate

A groundbreaking history of sexual emotion, sexual activity, gender relations, marriage and the family--and how Christianity has interacted with this panorama of human concerns

Few matters produce more public interest and public anxiety than sex and religion. Much of the political contention and division in societies across the world centres on sexual topics, and one-third of the global population is Christian in background or outlook. The issue goes to the heart of present-day religion.

This book seeks to calm fears and encourage understanding through telling a three-thousand-year-long tale of Christians encountering sex, gender, and the family. The message of Lower than the Angels is simple, necessary and timely: to pay attention to the complexity and contradictions in the history of Christianity. The reader can decide from the story told here whether there is a single Christian theology of sex, or many contending voices in a symphony that is not at all complete. Oxford's Emeritus Professor of the History of the Church introduces an epic of ordinary and extraordinary Christians trying to make sense of themselves and of humanity's deepest desires, fears and hopes.

Review Quotes

"[A] magisterial new history... well balanced by MacCulloch's dry wit and flair for narrative sweep. Recapping the millenniums-long debate over the unholiness of wedlock, MacCulloch...whose talent for breadth is matched by his impressive command of the details...addresses a global Christianity increasingly rived by fierce disagreements over sex and gender."--The New York Times

"Both sincere and playful... [MacCulloch] aims to unsettle those who think there has always been a "consistent view on sex in a seamless and infallible text known as the Bible"... He provides moving stories of how believers can let their guard down and move through the world with humility... Such grace, when given, can illuminate the question of how to traverse difference instead of merely quashing it."--The Atlantic

"Endlessly fascinating... [MacCulloch] has a command of historical detail that would be intimidating if his writing weren't so genial and witty."--Slate

"A superb history of Christianity's 2,000-year relationship with our animal instincts ... Masterly ... MacCulloch deals candidly with the clumsy and often cruel way in which churches in the post-second world war period dragged their feet on contraception, gay and lesbian rights and the ordination of women."--The Guardian

"Across three thousand years we have the pleasure of MacCulloch's erudite company as he explains how Christian thinkers have met the problem of desire.... It is an epic tale, and MacCulloch is an undaunted guide. Who else could explain so knowledgeably (and so affably), say, eleventh-century Gregorian reform as well as the contemporary gay subculture of "gin, lace and backbiting" in Anglo-Catholicism?" --New York Review of Books

"A rich, panoramic view of the changing understanding of sex, gender, celibacy, and marriage through Christian history... MacCulloch is wonderfully even-handed and reliable as a guide, even when the topics explored are controversial... Timely, enjoyable, and thoroughly worthwhile."--Library Journal, starred review

"Clear... sprightly... [an] extraordinary, definitive text, a study of attitudes towards sexuality and religion that encompasses three millennia." --Booklist, starred review

"Both scholarly rigorous and amiably open to the variations of human experience, this enthralls."--Publishers Weekly, starred review

"Well written and thoroughly researched, this comprehensive volume unveils a fascinating history."--Kirkus Reviews

"A comprehensive and richly entertaining history of the ways in which, for 3,000 years, the church has tied itself in knots over sex... MacCulloch is the best kind of scholar."--The Observer (UK)

"Compelling and encyclopedic... MacCulloch is an ideal guide in tracing this story. He writes, as always, with such liveliness and energy."--The Telegraph (UK)

"Magisterial ... In Lower than the Angels, Diarmaid MacCulloch offers a history of sex and Christianity that is both confronting and reassuring in its detail and complexity, taking biblical scholarship and theological development seriously at the same time as insisting on the historian's independence. A thrilling read."--Financial Times

About the Author

Diarmaid MacCulloch is a fellow of both St Cross College and Campion Hall, Oxford, and emeritus professor of the history of the church at Oxford University. His books include Thomas Cranmer: A Life, which won the Whitbread Biography Prize, the James Tait Black Prize, and the Duff Cooper Prize and Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years, a New York Times bestseller that won the Cundill Prize in History. He has presented many highly celebrated documentaries for television and radio, and was knighted in 2012 for his services to scholarship. He is an ordained deacon of the Church of England. He lives in Oxford, England.