Customer Reviews

The Permanent Diaconate: Its History and Place in the Sacrament of Orders

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

 

 

Not only was I disappointed that the book contained very little history of the diaconate except after Vatican II, but became weary of the mantra "inter-relational and contextual," especially when few specific solutions followed. A more detailed history is done of the history of the anointing of the sick in the book's later chapters. The author's discussion of the diaconate is often interrupted with heavy handed criticism of the church hierarchy, especially when he suggests that the bishops may not be the best persons to make decisions about the permanent diaconate in their dioceses because they are too busy handling sexual abuse cases, or too busy with the functions of the USCCB (p. 149). It's wearisome to hear the Voice of the Faithful and Call to Action movements called the sensus fidelium alongside the rejection by Catholics of Paul VI's teachings in Humanae Vitae, or that scant use should be made of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. The charts and diagrams in the book fail to illustrate the points the author makes in the text, partly because of their poor graphic design. The bibliography is scant. Putting up with all the editorial comments about the bishops and the author's own uncritical eccelesiology would have been worth learning more new information than I did. In the end,"inter-relational and contextual" became synonyms for complicated and confusing.