Customer Reviews

Swimming with Scapulars: True Confessions of a Young Catholic

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Swimming with Scapulars-True Confessions of a Young Catholic is not a perfect book, but it is a worthy book. A story that needed to be told amidst all the spectacular conversions of our times: a thirtysomething Catholic who never left the Church, but who has struggled in his relationship with God and Catholicism.

Swimming with Scapulars, despite its humorous title and cover, is not a funny book, but it has its hilarious moments-a sort of divine comedy at times. What does "swimming with scapulars" mean? My Catholic friends-to whom I rave about this book-get it right away: "Ha ha! You keep your scapular on in the water because you might drown!" (The promise Our Lady made to St. Simon Stock regarding the scapular involved eternal salvation-assistance.) Unfortunately, the author leads with this image-story in the opening pages. I don't say unfortunately because it gives away a punch-line, but because it dredges up (in the non-Catholic or no-frills Catholic mind) what is deemed to be superstition in Catholic tradition before we even get to know Matthew Lickona. He even appears to be a scrupulous, fearful believer; but hold on, Matthew explains all on page 81, even his own initial misgivings about the sacramental. Actually, that's what's needed with this gem of a book: holding on.

Swimming with Scapulars can easily be put down for the first thirty pages, but after that, fugghedaboutit. The random reminiscences up to this point-even a candid tale of an encounter with an abusive priest-don't seem to coagulate, but then the author hits his stride.

Swimming with Scapulars is not about an extraordinary life. The author's life is a little droll even, except for his interior life. What goes on in the mind, heart and conscience of a young, believing, practicing Catholic in this postmodern world? You will be given a no-holds, no-doubts, no-sins, no-triumphs barred "admit one." I might even go so far as to say that Lickona's interior dialogue-trust me, it's not boring!-is Augustinesque. We need more Catholics like Lickona: he's a 2000-year-old Catholic. That is, he's an inclusive Catholic: he ingests all 2000 years, he loves all 2000 years. Much like a World Youth Day celebration, this book will scream out to young Catholics of Lickona's ilk: You are not alone!

He pops in and out of his inscape to share marvelously-detailed accounts of his childhood, college years and now family life. The reader is given a spiritual geography of his hometown: Cortland, NY, and his new home: San Diego. Lickona names names. So daringly that one wonders if he has changed any of them. (I hope he has, because this book should go far and wide.) But the strength of Scapulars is the author's towering ability to know himself. The morally uninitiated could learn volumes in moral reasoning from these pages. It gives the morally initiated pause: Gosh! Do I care that much?

Swimming with Scapulars is a book about caring. Caring very much, about everything, but not in a tortured, morbid way. Lickona is someone you'd like to have frequent conversations with, because he cares. He gets chatty about sacred and secular literature, classic and contemporary films, so much so that this book-for its "current media" value
--will be dated in ten years. Scapulars is definitely time-capsule fodder.

Swimming with Scapulars commits the mortal sin of our age: it is an earnest book. Lickona has touched beauty and has neither the time nor the capacity for irony. This I believe, above all, would make him Catholic even if he wasn't. Lickona wants to share beauty with us, but, by his own admission, is a lousy, retiring evangelist-thank God he can write! Heaping iniquity on iniquity, Lickona frequently refers to his-gasp!-functional family, and quotes for us his parents' trusty maxims. His is a refreshing, marginalized confession: the "good boy" who wanted to be even better. Lest we think he's completely otherworldly, we are treated to his adventures with Wild Turkey and the porcelain god. He may not be just like everybody else, but he's close enough. Lickona's third transgression, this time against the pious, is his frank talk of sex. Can orthodox Catholic sex be sexy? Yes, if you're living the Creation and the Incarnation.

Swimming with Scapulars is an eloquent book. Who says we're a post-literate culture? Lickona's delightfully nuanced, colorful, at-times-almost-archaic-Back-East-speak brought a smile to my face.

Kudos to Loyola Press for taking on this project. Publishing for the diverse and fragmented young adult Catholic market must be a risky endeavor-surely the money lies elsewhere. But the elder Church also needs to hear the voices of the young Church--her present and future, the "children of winter" as this generation is often called--and the young Church needs to hear itself. Matthew Lickona is just one voice--opinionated at times--but he is a hope-inducing, elegant spokesperson.

(Swimming with Scapulars presumes little prior knowledge of Catholicism, and is thus accessible to all.)

This wonderful book brought me closer to my faith. Matthew Lickona writes a very personal and very contemporary set of reflections on his own struggles to live out in his moral life the commitments his faith demands of him.

Nothing I have read since Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man so captures the interior life of a practicing Catholic as this.

Lickona is not afraid to grow and change before our eyes during this book. It is as rigorous and self-examining as a good confession.

Sure it lacks a tight narrative structure and you'll tear through it a couple of days. Think of it as an epistle.

People who are close to a Catholic who they don't really understand would also benefit from reading this book. It might all make a little more sense after reading this.

Thanks, Matthew.

Mr. Lickona is the paradigm of the growing but almost always ignored population of young men and women in the United States who harbor a deep devotion to the orthodox Roman Catholic Faith and all that she teaches. I consider myself a member of this "sub-set", being a year younger than the author, faithful to attendance at Holy Mass, and a staunch supporter of the Magesterium's teachings (all of them).

"Swimming With Scapulars" should be made required reading for every person who treats obedient followers of Rome with suspicion, contempt, or condemnation when informed that, indeed, young Catholics are out there who live according to even the least popular dictates of our Faith.


While St. Thomas Aquinas or C.S. Lewis would be far better "legitimate" apologists, replete with all magnificent theological thought that the faithful treasure as part of our spiritual heritage, Lickona is a living, breathing, "REAL" American human being. He is more educated, theologically speaking, than the average Catholic of any age, much less a 30-something [his alma mater is a small, traditional Catholic college actually named for Aquinas].

However, his academic background in the faith does not make him any less down-to-earth. If anything, he seems to make a real effort to take the tenets of Catholicism and put them to practice in everyday life. This memoir is really about that; the Little Flower is likely beaming on him, so good an example is he setting for believers and detractors alike with his own personal "Little Way".

Our society needs more witnesses to Rome such as the author to take up the pen and compose what I call the "layman's apologetics" -- it transmits the glorious Truth of Roman Catholicism in a simple yet deeply meaningful way. And to
Mr. Lickona -- ad multos annos!

Now usually I am the last person to read any book that isn't at least halfway-decent, literary fiction. Walker Percy? Graham Greene? Yes. "Christian Inspiration?" I don't think so. But I stumbled across the author's McSweeney's-esque website, and later, the book's hip brown and blue binding wore me down. I read it in one sitting last Saturday. Lickona really lays it all out in the open. This is the story of his constant struggle to live according to his Catholic faith, including those teachings that to the modern eye are the faith's ostensibly most difficult dictates. And for the most part he pulls it off, and--squishy as it sounds--his story is inspiring. Lickona's an average thirty-something, and this is an intellectual look at his faith and all that it entails; at no point does the author preach to the reader. In fact, Lickona's own moments of doubt underscore his understanding of the toil faith requires.

As to the few negative comments in the review below, I'll have to respectfully disagree. I found nothing in the book disrespectful of anyone, and Lickona comes across not as a shrinking recluse ready to build a compound in the hills, but rather as a fully engaged member of society who leads an integrated life, rather than the seemingly more common secular/spiritual dual life. Nor does he simply "write any one off."

Overall, the book was well worth the time spent reading it; let's hope it's only the first of many more.

Books comprised of personal reflections and anecdotes are not my usual reading fare, but I picked up Swimming with Scapulars on the recommendation of a friend and finished it cover to cover between dinner and bedtime. I found that I recognized in this book many of the same questions and doubts, trials and joys that I experience daily. I also found that I enjoyed looking at them through the eyes of the writer, Matthew Lickona.

Matthew Lickona is a man, still young enough to be called young, who is trying to sort out what it means to be a faithful Catholic in a world full of frustrations, temptations and consolations. He is a husband, a father, a son and a brother. Lickona is also a writer, and he's a good one. His writing is straightforward and honest, with a strong bent toward introspection and careful self-examination. Oftentimes much introspection leads to taking oneself far too seriously, but Lickona manages to avoid this pitfall. That he takes his beliefs and the practice of his faith seriously is clear, but Lickona recognizes and communicates his own flaws and foibles with a self-deprecating humor that is sincere without being oppressive. More impressively, Lickona manages to make all of the self-examination and introspection interesting; I found myself truly enjoying learning about the inner workings of an unusual mind.

This book is not a collection of the ponderous musings of a joyless zealot, but the engaging, sometimes disturbing and often amusing thoughts of someone who loves both Jesus and bourbon; the Sacraments and rock and roll. Lickona is someone for whom pop culture is a hobby and the Catholic faith a way of life. He is a good man who would like very much to be a better one.

I heartily recommend this book.

I am enthralled by this book. The author's a thirty-something dad and remarkable storyteller. He's a smart journalist, but he doesn't wear his erudition on his sleeve. Instead it's caught up in the stories -- of his adolescence, his dealing with a homosexual come-on, his marriage, his bumpy transition to fatherhood, his work, his efforts to control his temper, his discovery of a friend's stash of porn. There's nothing of the pietistic harangue here, nothing syrupy or over-spiritualized, no theological tsk-tsking of an over-clericalized androgynous layperson. Instead, we encounter a real feet-on-the ground, normal-male, living-in-the-word, lay spirituality. This book is so unusal that it's startling. My only caveat, and this is small: If you're the kind of person who's put off by slightly off-color language, you might take occasional offense.

There is nothing more out-of-the-mainstream than leading, or trying to lead, an authentic Catholic life. Beyond the cliches and time-worn jabs lies a spiritual richness that not many choose to make their path.

It was very rejuvenating for my 'walk' then to stumble across Matthew Lickona's book. I first saw the full page ad for it in the local magazine called "The Reader", which often veers heavily leftward in its stories, ads, and personals. I wrote it off as another "I'm a Catholic and it's kinda stupid what we have to do..." memoir. That way an author can be hip and Catholic also.

But this book was perfectly what I needed to read. I am coming back to the church that I largely ignored my whole life, and I am in love. Reading Matthews journey took me to places in my own life when I struggled with my faith and what it would take to live it.

I wish my life had been lived as spiritually as Matthew's, because he took the narrower road. He is intelligent, witty, and poignant in his storytelling. He makes you think, but also reassures you that you're not the only one who has a difficult time sorting the wheat from the chaff in faith and life.

Thanks, Matt. God bless you and yours.

P.S. I'm the organist at St. John the Evangelist in University Heights, stop by - I'd love to meet you!

Lickona proves that living the Catholic Faith is rewarding, beautiful, teaming with life, and transforming! He shows a joy that reaches beyond the faults of others. He describes the highs and struggles of a life determined to follow and obey the truths of Catholicism. If you are curious of what I would assume are similar struggles in the life of a person desiring to live the fulness of Catholicism, then you have to read this book. Lickona really proves many of the stereotypes of Catholicism wrong. In an age of contraception, he shows that having children really brings life; he recognizes that procreation and unity of spouses are the goods of the spousal embrace. After reading this book, it seems Lickona is proposing a way of life that fulfills the deeper longings of man's heart. This way of life is attractive and gives meaning and at the same time this way of life is mystical. This book provides a good example that many are not called to conquer great feats, but rather victory in small feats with great courage. I am waiting for another work of Lickona to hit the shelves!

Cradle Catholic husband and father Matthew Lickona honestly and disarmingly explores a full array of issues through his own spiritual lens. He weighs in on the Church scandals, family planning debates, how to treat people falling through the welfare net, how best to witness his faith, the place of sacramentals (hence the titular scapulars) in a modern Catholic's life, the variations in Mass celebration "styles" from church to church, the definition of Catholic literature, trying to live family life by Christ's lights, why this Catholic doesn't feel like singing in church, hating the sin but loving the sinner, and much more. When so many Catholics (and other Christians) tend to be "squishy" (in Lickona's vernacular), Lickona strives to live a rigorous life in close walk with the principles his religion espouses. He succeeds in adeptly and intellectually underpinning his convictions with his life experiences, never avoiding his struggles and uncertainties. All this he accomplishes with flair, class and the right touch of comedy. "Swimming with Scapulars" contributes notably to the conversation about what it means to be Catholic in this time when even some bishops and priests seem confused.

There is a genre of Catholic literature known as the "convert story." in which past thoughts and experiences of the convert are interesting insofar as they lead to the decision to become a Catholic. Sometimes they are interesting in themselves, and sometimes because it is a marvel how far from Catholic ideas and Christian virtue a person can have been, and still have found a road home to the Church. I could write one of the latter sort myself. There is also a genre of disgruntled ex-Catholic stories. But what about the thoughts and experiences of someone who has always been Catholic and decided as he grew up, to stay Catholic? Swimming with Scapulars is a "non-convert story," in which Matthew Likona shares his thoughts and experiences of Catholicism from his earliest memories until the present time when he is the father of several young children. The author is very present in his book, so that one is aware that the writer is quite a young man, but it is not callow. The author exposes himself as someone who at times has to make an effort not to judge others, and takes the risk, for instance, of sharing his ambivalent feelings about a lesbian couple at mass. It is honest and open, but doesn't drag out into public what should not be there. The story is humorous at times, but does not reach heavyhandedly for humor. All of these qualities are demonstrated as the author lets us know that he was chaste before his marriage and that he and his wife do not practice artificial contraception, but that it hasn't been, and isn't, easy. For those Catholics who have read too many paeans to the marital benefits of natural family planning, his frankness about his struggles with it will be a bit of refreshing realism. For those who can't imagine life without artificial contraception, his happiness in his marriage and his joie de vivre may come as a surprise. Swimming with Scapulars is also, to a degree possibly greater than the author himself realizes, the story of growing up in a truly loving family. Mr Likona almost casually tells the story of his encounter in his teens with a priest who hugged him and kissed him on the lips several times during a pick up basketball game. When he got home, his father asked him how it went. Instead of the usual account of embarrassment, shame, and fear of not being believed, we read that the author said to his father " too much hugging and kissing." His father replied, "You mean, like, on the lips?" His father instantly believed him and wrote to the bishop. The mutual trust demonstrated here clearly saved the author from any ill consequences from this experience and prevented its being repeated. In this book we see someone who had really good parents trying now to be such a parent, and despite his self doubts, I think probably succeeding. Even those of us who feel a bittersweet pang because we didn't have or weren't able to be, such parents, can rejoice in this. And finally let me make it clear: Swimming with Scapulars refutes the common notion that goodness is boring.