Simone Weil, the great mystic and philosopher for our age, shows where
anyone can find God.
Why is it that Simone Weil, with her short, troubled life and
confounding insights into faith and doubt, continues to speak to today's
spiritual seekers? Was it her social radicalism, which led her to
renounce privilege? Her ambivalence toward institutional religion? Her
combination of philosophical rigor with the ardor of a mystic?
Albert Camus called Simone Weil "the only great spirit of our time."
André Gide found her "the most truly spiritual writer of this century."
Her intense life and profound writings have influenced people as diverse
as T. S. Eliot, Charles De Gaulle, Pope Paul VI, and Adrienne Rich.
The body of work she left--most of it published posthumously--is the
fruit of an anguished but ultimately luminous spiritual journey.
After her untimely death at age thirty-four, Simone Weil quickly
achieved legendary status among a whole generation of thinkers. Her
radical idealism offered a corrective to consumer culture. But more
importantly, she pointed the way, especially for those outside
institutional religion, to encounter the love of God - in love to
neighbor, love of beauty, and even in suffering.