Bare Bones

Abstract

HEN A MAN catches the mind of the American public, people wonder how he does it. Bishop Sheen has done just that on his television program. As a consequence of his phenomenal success, he has been ;nterviewed numerous times in recent months regarding the manner of his preaching. The thing that amazes people is the fact that he speaks neither from a script, nor from memory; he confronts his audience of millions with nothing but a skeleton outline in mind. There are authorities who say this is not the best way to proceed. It is far from our intention to take sides in the question and try to decide whether extempore preaching is better than preaching from memory. We do find it interesting, however, that many of the greatest pulpit orators in the history of the Church preached in the extemporaneous way. The patron of ecclesiastical orators, St. John Chrysostom, preached this way. We do not know how our own St. Dominic planned his sermons, but we can say, with great probability, that St. Thomas Aquinas preached extemporaneously. St. Vincent Ferrer did so, too, as we shall see. Just prior to our own day, the great English Dominican preacher, Father Bede Jarrett, was opposed to set written compositions. He felt they killed spontaneity of expression. Here is the outline of a sermon preached on February 24, 1907: