Sacred Silence: Denial and the Crisis in the Church [Hardcover]

Donald B. Cozzens (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 2002

Bearer of the Word and champion of the oppressed, the Church nevertheless displays a puzzling propensity to denial and silence when faced with realities that threaten her centuries-old structure. In Sacred Silence, Donald Cozzens probes the conscious and unconscious dynamics that sustain the Church’s culture of silence and points the Church in the direction of candor and honest dialogue.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"I believe Cozzens will be recognized in retrospect as one of the forerunners of Vatican III." -- Patrick Henry, Executive Director, Institute for Ecumenical and Cultural Research, St. John’s University, Collegeville, MN

... a wise, well-informed, insightful, truth-telling observer of the Catholic priesthood, seminary life, and broader pastoral activities of church. -- Rev. Richard P. McBrien, Crowley-O'Brien Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame

This book is the next step in a debate which the Catholic community urgently needs. -- Dean R. Hoge, Life Cycle Institute, The Catholic University of America

About the Author

Donald Cozzens is visiting associate professor of religious studies at John Carroll University in University Heights, Ohio. He is the author of The Changing Face of the Priesthood (The Liturgical Press, 2000) and Sacred Silence: Denial and the Crisis in the Church (The Liturgical Press, Fall, 2002).

Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Liturgical Pr (November 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 081462779X
• ISBN-13: 978-0814627792
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.3 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #165,986 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Finally, a genuine hero from the ranks of the clergy, November 29, 2002

By 

Ronald Trojcak (london, ontario) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sacred Silence: Denial and the Crisis in the Church (Hardcover)

I am a Roman Catholic priest, ordained 40 years, and I am more grateful than I can say, for Donald Cozzen's latest book. It is the most plain-spoken, insightful, exhaustive, profound, and above all, honest book on the Church and its current parlous state, than any of the many I've read. I hesitate to call it courageous, though it surely is that. For this book followed his earlier book on the priesthood, and he was pilloried by many for that. But, fatuously, I'm afraid, I would like to think that anyone, cleric or lay, would have been, if not able, at least willing to say what Cozzens has said here. Unhappily, this is far from the truth. Now, if a bishop would be willing.......

23 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Frank Discussion of a Wintry Season for Catholics, August 31, 2003

By 

Robert William DeMarco "santangelo" (Seattle, Washington United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sacred Silence: Denial and the Crisis in the Church (Hardcover)

Beautifully written, this book is remarkable for its candor, its clarity, and its precision. Something terribly sad and completely unnecessary has fallen over the life of the Catholic community in the United States. It shows itself in many different ways. But its most characteristic feature is inhibited speech and an empty silence where a prayerful, well informed, discerning, and passionate conversation should be going on. For all concerned about the future of the Catholic Church this deeply thoughtful and humane book will explain the attitudes, decisions, and practices that are threatening it. If opening a way for God's Spirit to move freely in the desires and imaginations of human beings is part of what is meant by "prophecy," Donald Cozzens is a clear-eyed, soft-spoken prophet for Catholicism's present situation.

37 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Long Over-Due, November 18, 2002

By 

The Rev. Dr. Daniel J. G. G. Block - See all my reviews

This review is from: Sacred Silence: Denial and the Crisis in the Church (Hardcover)

Father Cozzens writes with brutal honesty about the religious denomination that he loves and faithfully serves. Without flinching, he describes the dysfunctional system that has resulted in denial, avoidance, minimization, anger and a self-destructive religious culture.

Sadly, Father Cozzens' concerns are applicable to other religious denominations as well. All of the problems that he describes as existing among Latin Rite Roman Catholics exist, also, within the so-called Protestant denominations.

Father Cozzens' remedy is as appropriate for the rest of the Church catholic as it is for the Roman Catholic church. If the Church is to be saved from its own bureaucracy and episcopacy, the time has come for honest, direct, open, challenging, and painful dialogue. If the laity are to escape the heavy hand of the clergy, so that they too may minister, then the time has come to end clerical privilege.

Father Cozzens prescribes a painful remedy for that which currently ails Christ's Church. Nevertheless, it is a remedy.