Get Religion — and a Joy for Life — with the Hillbilly Thomists

W hen we lived in the same city, Dominican priest Father Thomas Joseph White would consistently, lovingly give me a hard time for always being found in the back of a church or lecture hall. I always presumed that’s because he longed to be introverting too, but of course before long he would be back on the altar or lectern. So it didn’t surprise me when, backstage at the Grand Ole Opry, he began telling me that, though he was going along for the Hillbilly Thomists’ summer “Old Highway Tour,” he really enjoys the writing more. When not playing banjo in Nashville, Father White, as it happens, is the rector of the Angelicum in Rome; the school’s most famous alum is Pope John Paul II. His latest book is an authoritative study of the Holy Trinity, no small mystery. So again, it’s not a surprising response from an intellectual. But when he said “The guys like the touring,” I couldn’t help but counter, “But you think it’s really cool you are playing the Opry tonight.” He smiled. Of course.

Father White was one of the original Hillbilly Thomists, a band which came about as he would bring his banjo out at the Dominican House of Studies over the years, just for fun, and for events. Slowly, friars who had professional music backgrounds joined and they got serious. They even hit the Billboard charts.

Later that night, as he began a solo, I turned to an archbishop from the near East and mentioned that we were listening to the rector of the storied Angelicum. At first he thought I was pulling his leg. That’s some of the fun of the Hillbilly Thomists. At first it may seem unlikely: friars, of a religious order more than 800 years old, dedicated to contemplation, study, and preaching, singing about bourbon, bluegrass, and the Bible.

But that’s also the beauty of it. The bluegrass Americana tradition the Hillbilly Thomists have taken up is a great mix of good fun and opportunities to catechize, much of which is infused with the writings, or at least spirit, of the famous Dominican scholar Saint Thomas Aquinas in their flavor of the genre.

Among other things, the band witnesses to the importance of having a well-balanced life. Creative leisure is essential, in whatever ways possible, according to our talents and circumstances.

In introducing the bourbon song, Father Timothy Danaher, O.P. (O.P. signifies Ordo Praedicatorum, or “Order of Preachers”) relayed the substance of a debate he heard fellow friars having about being on a stranded island. Do you bring bourbon, bluegrass, or the Bible? They concluded that you can memorize the Bible and bluegrass, but not bourbon. Thereby they perpetuate stereotypes about Catholics, but only in fun and loyalty to the tradition.

From “Bourbon, Bluegrass, and the Bible”: “Baptized at a hundred and five. Not a life well lived, but a life well died.” It’s a mix of the mundane, ridiculous, and eternal.

As Father Justin Mary Bolger wrote, reflecting on some of the songs of their self-titled first album: “The world can be brutal, and sometimes singing the blues is the fitting response. But there’s another strain of American music, namely, bluegrass and Gospel, that sings through hard times, but with hope — hope for redemption in Christ.” He added: “In these musical traditions, the suffering we experience when we walk out of church is viewed not as an ambush but as our way of the Cross. . . . And by turning this drama into a song the yoke gets lighter, the mood more playful, the path ahead even brighter. We can sing through suffering.”

Backstage at the Opry, Father Justin says: “As Americans, bluegrass Americana is our ancestry.” And “before it had anything to do with a consumer product, it was simply a local exploration of the feelings associated with ordinary suffering or blessings or love or mortality or religion,” another of the friars explained backstage for the Katie McGrady Show on the Catholic Channel on Sirius XM Channel 129. And so it makes a lot of sense to them that they would be able to take this approach. The Hillbilly Thomists experiment is also quite naturally an overflow of their lives together, Father Justin says: “We love being with each other, singing together, worshiping the Lord together. And this is really an overflow and a fruit of all that.”

The band is a little window into the friars’ lives, which involves singing the psalms four times a day and being patient with one another and, hopefully, exuding some joy, Father Joseph Hagan says, also backstage.

One weekend night in early 2018, a non–Hillbilly Thomist Dominican may have smuggled me an off-the-record picture of country singer and songwriter Ricky Skaggs jamming with the band at the Dominican House. One video they would eventually release included Skaggs accompanying a rendition of “Bring Me a Rose, St. Therese,” referring to a tradition that Saint Thérèse of Lisieux often confirms that one’s prayers to her were heard by sending a rose.

The name of the band was taken from the southern novelist Flannery O’Connor, who explained that, judging from her writing, people think she is a “hillbilly nihilist, whereas . . . I’m a hillbilly Thomist.” The band’s website adds, “Flannery O’Connor said that her fiction was concerned with the ways grace is at work among people who do not have access to the sacraments.”

A Thomist follows the writings of the aforementioned Thomas Aquinas and “believes that the invisible grace of God can be at work in visible things, just as the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, in the person of Christ,” the band’s website also explains.

One of my favorites from their third album, Holy Ghost Power, is “The Power and the Glory”: “So don’t get lost / At any old cost./ Don’t take no byway. / Just stay on that highway. / Just keep moving forward / In the Spirit of the Lord. / You’ll be fine / On down the line.” It’s a good message for anytime, but for certain this time of year — full of busyness and yet a somewhat universal desire to reevaluate things and get somewhere better, be someone better. The Hillbilly Thomists help, they really do — with fun and wisdom. (Bourbon-liking not required.)

This column is based on one available through Andrews McMeel Universal‘s Newspaper Enterprise Association.