On Saturday, Feb. 15, the Wheels Museum hosted a reading and Q&A session with New Mexico author L.E. Austen. The talk centered on Austen’s 2024 book, “The Holy Doves.”
“The Holy Doves” is an exploration of gender and politics within modern organized religion. As Austen explained, it reimagines the true creator of humans as Inanna, the female counterpart of Jehovah and the feminine side of God.
In the book, Inanna was the one who chose to give humans curiosity and free will. However, when human society went awry, Jehovah wanted to rid the world of humans, but Inanna chose to go behind his back to save the species with a new Messiah.
The primary story of the novel revolves around Joseph Pirelli and Bria Tanaka, the secret descendants of the first Messiah, aka the Holy Doves. They are pulled into a world of secrets and conflict between two rival Catholic Brotherhoods — the Opus Christos, who seek to kill the Holy Doves, and the Guardians, who seek to protect them.
Austen said the story was a work in progress for almost 25 years that she finished during the COVID-19 lockdown. But some of the first story inspiration came from Austen’s time with the Trappist monks, a secluded Catholic order.
“One day, I was in Vespers, I think, with the monks, and I'm looking at them, and I'm looking at the face of a friend of mine who was a very, very devout Catholic, and their faces were glowing,” Austen relayed. “They were glowing. And I said to myself, ‘Why can't I feel like that? Why do I question all of this?’ And all of a sudden, this story just came into my brain.”
The book features strong feminist themes, particularly investigating the role and history of women within the church.
"The women in the book are among the strongest, and underneath create something much better than is above the surface. It is very feminist — you have to take a group that’s value has been somewhat ignored and bring it up to equality," Austin said.
One quote Austen shared from the book reads, “Where did Christ come from? From God and a woman, man has had nothing to do with him.”
She further added that the book has a timeliness and universality, even beyond the workings of the Catholic Church.
Austen said she’s been asked before by readers: “Is this about church, or is this about politics?”
“The answer is yeah,” Austen said. “This is the same kind of behavior from the powerful, be it in the church or in government. This is not a new thing that has happened.”
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Austen explains that “The Holy Doves” is an important story now more than ever, given the actions of the powerful on a global scale.
“We're in a real crust,” Austen said. “This is what's going on right now, not only here, but in Gaza, in Ukraine, everywhere — it's reliving this over and over, and we have to stand up and do something about it, and that may be just our internalization of realizing what's right and wrong and pushing toward love of each other.”
She hopes the book serves as a jumping off point for people to reflect deeply on their beliefs and spirituality and relationship with higher power, she said.
“You can't have someone else tell you what that relationship is supposed to be,” Austen said. “It has to be something you develop within yourself, and so that is the whole focus of the book — to make you question who you are and how you relate and how you feel and what you need to do.”
Addison Fulton is the culture editor for the Daily Lobo. She can be reached at culture@dailylobo.com or on X @dailylobo
