Customer Reviews

A People Adrift: The Crisis of the Roman Catholic Church in America

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

This is a surprisingly broad survey of the state of the Catholic Church in the United States which avoids focus on hot button moral or divisive doctrinal issues to instead examine nearly every major facet of Catholic corporate life. At first, I found this a little disappointing because I expected a dominant focus on matters of leadership and institutional structure. But upon getting deeper into the author's project, I was gratified by the breadth of perspective because it showed how widespread is the Catholic presence in American society, and in turn, how thoroughly Catholicism is affected and challenged by that society.

Steinfels begins with an account of the last years of Cardinal Bernardin in Chicago and his efforts to establish a dialogue between different wings of church opinion on fundamental issues defining the future of the church. The effort was called the "Common Ground Initiative." It was publicly criticized by several of Bernardin's cardinal colleagues on the basis that there could be no real dialogue, implying compromise, on church teaching in key areas identified by Bernardin. The topics are worth noting:
- changing roles of women
- organization and effectiveness of religious education
- Eucharistic liturgy as most Catholics experience it
- meaning of human sexuality and the gap between church teachings and the convictions of many faithful
- the image and morale of priests, and their declining numbers and ratio to laity
- the succession of laypeople to positions of leadership in Catholic institutions formerly occupied by vowed religious, and the provision of adequate Catholic formation for them
- the ways in which the church is present in political life and debate
- the capacity of the church to embrace minorities
- the survival of Catholic school systems, colleges, health care and social service institutions, and the articulation of a distinct and appropriate religious identity and mission for these institutions
- financial support
- manner of decision making and consultation in church governance
- responsibility of theology to authoritative church teachings
- place of collegiality and subsidiarity in the relations between Rome and the American episcopacy

Most of these topics are taken up by Steinfels in his subsequent chapters. Steinfels argues that Bernardin correctly saw that American Catholicism was increasingly subject to polarization by vocal minorities on the left and right and that it was important to bridge the real differences through dialogue while dispelling the notion that the extremes were in fact in the mainstream. Yet the very reaction to his effort demonstrated how increasingly suspicious various segments of the church were of one another, reading any area of deviance from one's own view as evidence of being in the wrong camp in general.

Steinfels offers four common interpretations of the aftermath of Vatican II ranging from far right to conservative to liberal to radical left. Steinfels claims to personally find himself somewhat on the liberal side of the analysis, though receptive to many concerns of the conservatives. In any event, he argues, that the Catholic hierarchy, especially in Rome, failed in its leadership to implement Vatican II leaving divisions (and suspicions) to fester. Much of the downside of the shake-up in the American church had settled by the mid-Seventies when Rome, under John Paul II, began to ratchet up its oversight and exacerbate tension on problems of authority within the church. Increasingly under John Paul II, the hierarchy has a conservative bent while Catholic leadership outside the church as such is dominated by liberal elements. Yet each side feels beleaguered by the other which feeds an undue emphasis on contentious aspects of church life or teaching at the expense of more fundamental and ultimately more fateful issues.

A judicious, deeply thoughtful, thoroughly informed, and lucidly written analysis of the crisis that threatens to send American Catholicism, the largest faith community in the United States, for all its present energy, diversity, and service to society, into a period of "irreversible decline." According to Steinfels, American Catholics have around ten or fifteen years to rescue what is most valuable and truth-disclosing in their tradition or watch it begin to diminish in its transformative power, its spiritual authenticity, and its cultural productiveness. Can the Catholic community recover itself, be honest with itself, and sustain a respectful conversation within itself--in time?

Steinfels, the former senior religion correspondent for "The New York Times," and a former editor of "Commonweal" magazine, relies on his broad experience as a journalist and interpreter of the contemporary experience of various religious communities, their traditions, practices, conflicts, and aspirations, to provide close attention to--and critical reflection on--specific practical and institutional matters crucial to the full survival of the Catholic faith. It is the type of attention and reflection that ought to ground serious "theological" work & keep it rooted in the lives, questions, & feelings of human beings struggling to make sense of their lives in today's world. The author pulls no punches as regards the scandals, embittered arguments, and failures of leadership that are tearing the American Catholic community apart. Nor does he offer cheap solace through soothing compromise or ecclesiastical happy-talk. But all those who care about the future of Catholicism in America, including those in a love/hate relationship with its present institutionalization, should read this sober, intelligent, and painfully honest book.

Steinfels belongs to an impressive group of American Catholic intellectuals, that includes his wife, Margaret O'Brien Steinfels, all of whom, in very different ways, have been trying to understand what is happening to U.S. Catholicism. Shouldn't somebody gather these people, urge them to let their common loves & concerns outweigh their various personal differences, and invite them to address all these issues now with an acknowledgment of being in an emergency situation?

" A People Adrift", Peter Steinfels's new book about the crisis in the Catholic Church in America is as comprehensive a study as you will find about the church today. For those of us non-Catholics who wonder why Catholics go through all the fuss and bother that they do, Steinfels helps us out. Most importantly, he gets us away from the screaming headlines of the newspapers and the segments on television and gives us a close-up look at the many layers of Catholicism, how they interact, what's wrong (and what's right) in the church today.

What struck me most about "A People Adrift" is how much lay leadership has become a part of the church. With declining numbers of priests Steinfels points to the increasing role of laity....a sure sign that at least in some respects the church is willing to accept change. But the author reserves his harshest criticism for the hunkering down of Rome with regard to women and celibacy. He suggests that without a liberalization on the part of the Vatican that the Catholic church in the U.S. will continue its decline. As an outsider in a progressive Protestant denomination, I very much agree with him.

Although the author is willing to make his own feelings known, he is careful to balance counter arguments. He offers possible solutions to questions about the Catholic perceptions of sex, celibacy, religious education, the roles of priests and bishops, the state of affairs of worship, etc....in short, Steinfels covers just about every tier and angle. And I smiled when he signaled his great respect for the late Cardinal Bernardin and his contempt for Cardinal Law.

While "A People Adrift" is a must-read for Catholics who are concerned about the future of their church, I think this book extends far beyond Catholicism. It is an important book to read for people of any faith, not just as a comparison to their own but as a revelation to those who want to understand the joy and the agony of what it is to be Catholic in America in 2003.

As someone new to Roman Catholicism after having wandered the byways of Protestantism for lo, these untold years, I find little to attract me to the kind of Catholicism represented in this book. For example, the book has little negative to say about the culture of dissent that has arisen in Catholicism especially after Humanae Vitae. On the issue of artificial birth control, the author acts as if the case is definitively made for it because the vast majority of Catholics reject official Church teaching, justifying, therefore, the protest that has arisen in response to the Church's official teaching.

Catholicism has always proceeded on the understanding that its teachings are not the product of majority rule, but rather result from a careful process of faithfully unfolding the developing meaning of Scripture and Tradition. That is how Pope Paul VI approached the question of artificial birth control; that is how Pope John Paul II has approached the same question; that is NOT how Peter Steinfels and the vast majority of those who favor it have approached it. Rather, the proponents of artificial birth control in the Catholic Church (and Peter Steinfels himself) argue along these lines: it cannot be disproved by Scripture; the Church has been wrong in the past (about money lending, about slavery, etc.); the faithful embrace it. What this line of reasoning fails to recognize is that if the same criteria had been applied to, say, Arianism in the fourth century, we would not today be Trinitarian Christians. St. Jerome, after all, wrote that the whole world groaned to find itself Arian. The truth is that Trinitarian Christianity was a minority position in the fourth and fifth centuries. Nor could it definitively be proved from Scripture. Did the Church cave in and become Arian? No! Brave theologians like St. Athanasius (who was severely persecuted for his stand), St. Basil, and the two St.Gregories, plus the Councils of Nicea and Chalcedon, kept at it until Arianism was defeated.

One need only look at the kind of disordered sexuality that reigns in, say, the American Episcopal Church, which long ago caved in on the birth control issue, to see what would likely be in store for the Catholic Church if it went down the same road. The author seems not unaware of this possibility, which is somewhat unusual for someone of his liberal persuasion, but doesn't really appear to want to think about it very deeply, and apparently hasn't thought very long and hard about the merits of conservatives' arguments on this issue.

In the area of Catholic feminism, he seems a little more aware of its inherent disruptiveness to Catholic understandings. This is welcome, coming from a liberal Catholic. And on the changing patterns of faith formation and institutionalized Catholicism, he is also quite judicious. And his discussion of the recent sex scandal is also one of the best I've read.

However, I think he's quite far off on his discussion of Catholic liturgy and music. Modern Catholic church music, although not perfect, is, contrary to Stenifels's assessment, generally very satisfactory. There are many brilliant Catholic hymnists--e.g., Bernadette Farrell, Bob Hurd, M. D. Ridge, and Marty Haugen--and contemporary Catholic hymnody is generally far superior to its Protestant counterparts. His disparagement of contemporary liturgies is also off-base, I believe.

All in all, there are many commendable aspects to this book. Indeed, it is certainly the best book I have ever read by a liberal Catholic. It is also probably about the best book one can expect from a liberal Catholic journalist. Given its presuppositions, it is on the whole judicious, well reasoned, and uncommonly irenic. One can almost actually see oneself sitting down with persons of Steinfels's persuasion and actually working toward a Common Ground Initiative, which seems to be the overall thrust of the book: that in order to break the present impasse that plagues the Catholic Church, namely, gridlock between liberals and conservatives, the only way forward is for them to somehow find a resolution to their disagreements. Otherwise, Catholics will, indeed, be A People Adrift. I don't know that this will work, but I don't think it's been tried much. So, two cheers for Steinfels. **1/2.

As the crisis in the Catholic Church unfolded in all its ugly details, a number of books were published with the intent of giving perspective about what has been happening in the Church. Three books that continue to educate and enlighten are George Weigel's THE COURAGE TO BE CATHOLIC which approaches the issue from a more traditional approach. David Gibson's THE COMING CATHOLIC CHURCH looks at the church from the point of view of a journalist and Catholic convert. Peter Steinfels' A PEOPLE ADRIFT has been dubbed "the liberal" book, perhaps because of Steinfels' association with the magazine COMMONWEAL.

One of the strengths of the Catholic Church is that it combines both faith and reason. Just look at how many great thinkers have been in the Catholic tradition and how many of the brilliant minds have been people of deep faith too: Saints Thomas Aquinas, Augustine, Bonaventure, and Anselm are just a few great minds. A rigorous intellect is seen as a gift from God and a gift to be used. Church documents are constantly calling us to "read the signs of the times" and apply the faith accordingly. To do this, we need to listen to a variety of authentic perspectives, knowing that no one person has all of the truth or the exact answer, while trusting to that the Spirit is alive in the Church, the Church being both the leadership and magisterial authority and the people of God, not one or the other, but both. Peter Steinfels and George Weigel seem to embrace faith and reason as well as the importance of reading the signs of the times and both give us a perspective of doing so in A PEOPLE ADRIFT and THE COURAGE TO BE CATHOLIC.

The strength of A PEOPLE ADRIFT is Steinfels' ability to define the problem and give an accurate portrayal of Catholics in The United States, both those who see themselves as practicing and connected to the Church and those who may be what some call "culturally Catholic." While some may see this book as a thinly disguised book that calls for a relaxation of Church teaching on sexual matters, a call for women's ordination and an end to the celibate priesthood and a weakening of ecclesial authority, a careful reading will prove otherwise. What Steinfels does is paints a picture of Catholic life today and shows not so much the variety of people as much as the variety as to what the Church believes and how the lived experience can be somewhat different. He discusses a number of opposing points of view among Catholics on matters of supreme importance and more trivial areas. Readers may not always like what is said, but Steinfels isn't so much stating a point of view as he is stating the problem and what has to be addressed for the future.

For me, the broad scope of the book is impressive and the background information in the book is fascinating. I also believe the book does a good job at stating Catholic beliefs about issues such as abortion and homosexuality and how the reasons behind Catholic teaching in these areas differs from others who may share the point of view. He also does a good job at summing up the opposing arguments on these issues and how they are inconsistent. This is not a book that everyone will agree with, and it's not perfect. It does point out the seriousness of eth problems facing the Church and the danger and irreparable harm that will result of the issues are not addressed. Also, since perspective is important, the books by Gibson and Weigel on these issues should not be ignored either.

Steinfels has been covering religion in America as a journalist for a long time, and the balanced viewpoint that this has given him, along with his personal faith (which appears to be deep and well educated), makes him an authoritative speaker when it comes to the recent troubles of the Roman Catholic church in America. His love for the church is clear. His understanding of the human/political dimension in such issues as sexuality, the priesthood, liturgy, catechesis, and leadership is also clear. The synthesis he offers is a breath of fresh air that inserts itself between the cynicism offered by the media and the overly confident, and possibly power-focused, assertions by the Roman Catholic hierarchy.

He occasionally ignores the powerful lessons to be learned from our Protestant brothers and sisters. His hypotheses may not be comfortable for deeply right-leaning Americans. But he bases his ideas on scripture, psychology and the lived experience of Catholics.

I am a former member of a parish that was suppressed by the Boston Archdiocese. I am grieving. But Peter Steinfels explains many of our problems in the American Church. Against all my expectations, he gives me hope.

Long standing New York Times journalist Peter Steinfels has produced in "A People Adrift" a very nuanced view of modern American Catholicism. As the title implies, Steinfels may be fairly placed in the liberal wing of the church, but his thoughtful analyses of various problems in the church and proposals for reform are as likely to disappoint radicals as they are to anger conservatives. Take his discussion of the sex scandal. While of course condemning the behavior involved, Steinfels casts a critical eye on his own profession, wondering whether the frenzy over the revelations was in part manufactured by the media's blurring of the time periods involved, lumping all of the crimes under the general category of pedophilia, and ignoring that this wasn't really new news but had been reported on 10 years earlier. But the church doesn't escape Steinfels' microscope either, as he details the public relations, legal and moral catastrophe the matter quickly became.

As a woman, I found Steinfels' views on women in the church particularly interesting. Although he neatly dismantles all the theological arguments for limiting the priesthood to women, he wonders if the problem isn't as much that decision-making and managerial power goes along with ordination. One wonders why the senior staff in many bishops' offices are all priests in what are often administrative jobs--especially given the priest shortage. He also proposes a dual solution, admitting women as deacons and into positions of authority. Perhaps then the power to say mass would be limited to just that, and seen as limited to men as a matter of tradition. Although this stance is unlikely to appeal to radicals in the church it represents a middle ground less fraught with theological problems.

Steinfels' first chapter contains an excellent statistical summary of where the church stands today, and it is immediately obvious the real success stories in terms of growth over the last four decades is in education and health care--not coincidentally areas which have transitioned to lay leadership. But he also examines the challenges of this change--exactly what does it mean to be a Catholic college where a substantial percentage of your students aren't Catholic, clerical professors are few and far between and your president is a lay person? Are Catholic hospitals unique in any way other than that they do not offer contraceptive and abortion services?

Carefully researched and informed by a decade of reporting, this book is well worth your time whatever political camp you find yourself in.

This is, without question, the most brilliant and profound book I have read on the crisis in the contemporary Roman Catholic Church. It is as vital and meaningful today as it was when it was published. And things are indeed worse today for the Roman Catholic Church than they were in 2003. Problems described in detail by Steinfels have not been addressed; there is a greater clergy abuse scandal now than there was earlier in the century; and the divide between Catholics and arch-conservative Catholics is as great as ever. I strongly recommend this book to Catholics who are genuinely concerned about the fate of their church; I recommend it to those who want to understand the baffling problems they see around themselves not only in Catholicism but in other Christian sects as well. And I recommend the book to anyone who is concerned with the problems of religion in contemporary America. ------ I will not try to list or describe the many topics addressed by Steinfels. Other reviews here can provide this sort of information. Let me say rather than Steinfels does not simply address social problems. He addresses the problems of Catholic theology as well. And he is unfailingly insightful and his writing is eloquent and compelling. ----- A personal note: after 12 years of struggle, I have left the Roman Catholic Church. My conscience gave me no choice but to do this on moral grounds. But I deeply respect the decisions of millions of Catholics to remain in the church in spite of its many problems today. And I respect a learned Catholic like Steinfels who has put considerable effort into this intelligent, patient, and thoughtful book. ---- I ask readers to ignore some of the negative reviews on this site. Unless you have struggled with the battles within the Catholic Church you cannot be aware of how acrimonious arch-conservative Catholics can be to anyone who seeks to constructively criticize Catholicism. Again, I wholeheartedly recommend this book.

There are many, especially those in conservative circles, who would dismiss the book as just another example of "Catholic-bashing." After all, the author is a writer for THE NEW YORK TIMES and was previously editor of COMMONWEAL. However, critics anxious to dismiss the book as just so much silliness would be foolish and short-sighted.

Peter Steinfels examines many of the major issues confronting the Catholic Church today with and depth, clarity and thoughtfulness rarely found in an era where thoughts are measured in ten-second sound bites and Hardball volleys from talking heads. A PEOPLE ADRIFT: THE CRISIS OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH IN AMERICA addresses the current scandals and long term issues facing the Church today. It explores the nature of the Church in society and the clash of the institution with secular influences.

The author also presents a number of "solutions" to the current crisis and it is in many of these recommendations that there will be a wide divergence of opinions and perhaps continued acrimonious debate. Ultimately however, this debate is important in that major issues will be explored and the concerns of Catholics will be given appropriate articulation and consideration. Whether or not one agrees with the author, it is important for all to understand these issues so that one can properly understand Church teaching on such matters. The issues will remain out there and it is important to deal with them.

Unlike the "Catholic Lite" reviewer, I actually read this book, which is an eloquent, deeply thoughtful, objective, and cautiously hopeful analysis of the Catholic Church in America at the beginning of the 21st Century, a Church Mr. Steinfels obviously loves and has spent much of his life in service to. If you share his passionate love of Catholicism and are looking for a hopeful way to proceed, whether you consider yourself "conservative" or "liberal" or somewhere in between, this book is a "must read."