On Saturday, May 4, Catholic Fiction lost one of its brightest lights. Kaye Park Hinckley was a prolific author of eleven books in the Southern Gothic tradition, a contributor to several anthologies, the winner of countless awards, and a woman of deep faith. She was an avid proponent of Catholic arts and letters, a guide and mentor to her fellow writers, and most of all, deeply committed to her family and her God. We at Chrism Press are honored to have had the opportunity to publish what turned out to be her last novel, Shooting at Heaven’s Gate, which she called in her own words, “A Theology of the Cross novel in which genuine goodness, bona fide evil, and suffering truly live side by side.” We have no doubt that Kaye herself has found her way to heaven’s gate, and that she no longer suffers the cross of the evils of this world.
Kaye wrote, ” In this writer’s imagination, there is a link between the divinity of God (the supernatural world) with the natural world. The task becomes that of interlocking the two. Representations are created, and specific truths about God’s presence in our world appear in the writer’s mind. She translates it in her settings, characters, and dilemmas. And what she translates is a tenet called grace, both Sanctifying Grace and Actual Grace. Sanctifying Grace, inherited from the God who made us, lives in the soul and stays in the soul. By contrast, Actual grace doesn’t live in the soul; rather, throughout a lifetime, it acts in the soul as divine pushes from God toward His goodness. But those pushes require cooperation. The translating writer understands that a person must accept grace on his own free will; and grace, like love, is sometimes prickly.”
Thank you for pushing us all toward grace, Kaye. May perpetual light shine upon you. You will be sorely missed.