SPRING 2013 - Ignatius Press

new SPRING books
Sisters in Crisis Revisited
From Unraveling to
Reform and Renewal
Ann Carey
Fifty years ago, nearly 2000 religious sisters
worked in Catholic schools, hospitals and other
institutions throughout the United States. American
Catholics honored these women of faith who founded
and built these flourishing works of mercy.
Then came the ideological shifts and moral
upheavals of the 1960s, and ever since most women’s
orders in the United States have been in a state
of crisis. Now the sisters are aging, with fewer and
fewer younger women to take their place. Perhaps
related to this demographic shift is the continuing
doctrinal confusion that has come under the scrutiny
of the Vatican.
Using the archival records of the Leadership
Conference of Women Religious and other prominent
groups of sisters, journalist and author Ann
Carey shows how feminist activists unraveled
American women’s religious communities from
their leadership positions in national organizations
and large congregations. She also explains the
recent and necessary interventions by the Vatican.
After examining the many forces that have contributed
to the crisis, Carey reports on a promising
sign of renewal in American religious life: the
growing number of young women attracted to
older communities that have retained their identity
and newly formed, yet traditional, congregations.
“A detailed documentation of
the almost unbelievable deconstruction
of communities of women religious in the
United States. We may earnestly hope that Ann
Carey’s careful account of what happened and
how will aid in finding the profoundly needed
cure for this devastating disease.”
Helen Hull Hitchcock, Women for Faith & Family
Ann Carey is a prize-winning journalist whose
articles have appeared in Our Sunday Visitor, National
Catholic Register, Crisis, Catholic World Report, and
National Review Online. She lectures in journalism at
Saint Mary’s College, Notre Dame, Indiana.
SIC-P . . . Sewn Softcover, 500 pp, $24.95
Available May 15
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6
American Church
The Remarkable Rise, Meteoric Fall, and
Uncertain Future of Catholicism in America
Russell Shaw
Has the Americanization of American
Catholics—their cultural assimilation, that
is—been a blessing or a curse for the Church in the
United States Or has it been a bit of both
In American Church Russell Shaw takes a searching
look at that question and reaches a disturbing
conclusion. Cultural assimilation, which was championed
by churchmen like the great Cardinal James
Gibbons of Baltimore around the turn of the last century,
has undoubtedly conferred many benefits on
Catholics. Their absorption into the secular culture
of America, however, now threatens the Catholic
identity of millions of faithful and of their institutions,
such as schools, universities, and hospitals.
Shaw does not offer this conclusion as an unsupported
generalization. American Church is a richly
documented analysis of a process extending over two
centuries. Colorful characters and dramatic incidents
abound, including the 19th-century intellectual feud
between Orestes Brownson and the Transcendentalist
convert to Catholicism Isaac Hecker, Pope Leo XIII’s
condemnation of Americanism, the anti-Catholicism
that greeted the presidential campaigns of
Al Smith and John F. Kennedy, and the numerous
intra-Church conflicts that have divided American
Catholics since Vatican II.
In concluding his study, Shaw offers a number
of thought-provoking suggestions about what the
Church in America needs to do now in the face of
ongoing decline.
“If you want to understand the Church in the
United States and the challenges she now faces,
American Church should be on the short list of
books you need to read.”
Charles J. Chaput, Archbishop of Philadelphia
“A piercing and essential meditation on the
past, present, and future of Catholicism in these
United States. It should be required reading for
all—secular, devout, and otherwise.”
Mary Eberstadt, author, Adam and Eve after the Pill
GLEG-P . . . Sewn Softcover, 240 pp, $16.95
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