The Coming Catholic Church: How the Faithful Are Shaping a New American Catholicism (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Religion journalist David Gibson delivers a controversial state of the union address for the Catholic Church. Although his writing style is journalistic, heavily infused with quotes from big-name sources in the Church, Gibson is not an objective reporter. He clearly believes that the current crisis is not about a lack of faith in God—but, rather, a breakdown of trust in the Church's leadership. Of course, an obvious source of this breakdown is the leadership's failures to stop, prevent, or even publicly acknowledge the fact that Church personnel were sexually abusing children and young people. But he also believes that the ensuing crisis of 2002 was a kind of "perfect storm" where powerful forces of tension that "have been bearing down on Catholicism for decades" converged into an inventible, stormy clash.

Gibson is most controversial when portraying a seemingly indifferent and arrogant Church leadership that is reticent to hold itself accountable to its constituents. Ultimately, he stands most closely beside the diverse and devout lay people of the Church—-seeing them as the instigators of vast and necessary reforms. Historically, change in the Catholic Church has come from the bottom up. But in earlier times that change was kick-started by its influential religious orders of monks and nuns as well as individual champions, such as Teresa of Avila and Hildegarde von Bingen. Nowadays, "with the numbers of nuns and brothers falling even faster than the priests," it is up to the laity to create the revolution from below, according to Gibson. He sees this laity leadership rising out of a movement that is in already in place in America, where the laity now read the Scriptures at Mass, distribute the Host to congregants, teach Catechism classes to the next generation and serve as chaplains in nursing homes and college campuses. While it's too soon after the storm to completely assess the damage or predict the course of the future--Gibson is certainly offering a conversation that this crisis-battered community needs to have. --Gail Hudson --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Booklist

Much has been written about the crisis over sexual abuse that has plagued the contemporary Catholic Church. It is Gibson's contention that this scandal and the subsequent reaction to it are rooted in a much larger and long-term crisis. That the church has been in a state of turmoil for decades is a reality that cannot be ignored. Coupled with this is the fact that American Catholics have always struggled with their dual identity as simultaneous members of both a secular democratic society and a hierarchical religious body. According to the author, the future of American Catholicism is not in jeopardy; rather, the crisis has prompted vigorous debate and afforded an opportunity for healthy change within the three traditional ranks of the church: the laity, the clergy, and the hierarchy. This book provides no pat answers; it merely poses the questions and outlines the possibilities that could usher in a new and more dynamic era in American Catholicism. Margaret Flanagan
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 384 pages
• Publisher: HarperOne; Rev Upd edition (June 29, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060587202
• ISBN-13: 978-0060587208
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #487,890 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

58 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Medicine for a Church in Need of Healing, September 5, 2003

By	Timothy Kearney (Hull, MA United States) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Coming Catholic Church: How the Faithful Are Shaping a New American Catholicism (Hardcover)

In the past two years it seems as if more books seem to have been published on Roman Catholicism than at any other time. The most recent books have focusing not as much on the Church, but ht clergy sexual abuse scandal that has plagued the Church and how the Church ought to respond. David Gibson's book The Coming Catholic Church belongs in this genre.

Gibson divides the book into three sections: one devoted to the laity, another devoted to priesthood, and a third section focuses on the episcopacy. Gibson seems very hopeful that the laity can and should play a significant role in reform. He does have some criticisms of the laity and while he does not blame the current scandal on lay people or take a simplistic view that if lay people had more of a say, none of this would have ever happened, he does warn against the danger of putting clergy members on too high a pedestal (something that will probably not happen anytime too soon). Gibson is both sympathetic and critical of the priesthood. He basically sees priests as good hearted people, but also caught in the traps of clericalism. While he supports a married clergy, he also sees the value of celibacy in some cases. He supports a broader membership in the clergy so that the Church will not only be relevant, but will also have enough priests to maintain the Sacramental life of the Church. Gibson is most critical of the bishops, and seems to believe they are hopelessly irrelevant and while he is hopeful of changes in the laity and priesthood, he seems less hopeful as far as the episcopacy is concerned. While he admires Pope John Paul II, he seems to present a thesis that the problem with the bishops is that there are too many John Paul II clones. For this reason he hopes that the Pope's eventual successor will have John Paul II's dedication and enthusiasm, but will also be open to reform.

The book is accurate and well researched something that is probably due to his talent as a journalist. A bit of editing could help, for some parts are a bit repetitious. He has many opinions, but is able to back up his opinions with fact. His voice offers a different perspective, which is probably why I found this book quite significant. Gibson is a journalist, not a theologian, member of the clergy, or religious life. Many of the most recent books about the scandal are written by Church insiders, both liberal and conservative, who often times have an agenda. Gibson has a point of view, but this comes from his love of his Church, and purely from that love. Gibson also offers his point of view from the eyes of a Catholic, but not a life long Catholic. As a convert, Gibson seems to be able to see what is essentially Catholic and offer a fresh and balanced point of view. In my opinion, this is what Gibson attempts to do, and in many ways did it satisfactorily.

21 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars TV Reporting Can't Handle a Church, July 27, 2004

By	Michael Mulville - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

Don Hewitt (of 60 Minutes) famously tells his reporters to 'tell me a story.' Storytelling may be appropriate for a TV report, but when you take on a complex topic in a book-length analysis, stories can get in the way. The reason is simple: the likely audience for this kind of a book already has their own story. The likely reader of this book already has his own history with the Catholic Church. There is no need to tell stories with human interest, because any story a reporter might tell will pale in comparison with the richness of the reader's own experience.

Telling a story can get in the way of analysis. In one arc, Gibson tells the story of Wilton Gregory, the bishop who headed the post-scandal Episcopal conference. As Gibson presents it, Gregory's story is almost a fall from grace. Gibson presents Bishop Gregory as the insider who sensitively sees the need for the hierarchy to confront itself. However, in this story, the hierarchy is the villain. Instead of Gregory redeeming the hierarchy, the hierarchy uses Gregory to further protect and isolate itself. This makes a compelling story (even assuming it's true) but what's missing is analysis.

There are, in the bishop's dilemma, two important values to protect, but which are currently at odds. The first value is the pressure to hold predatory priests accountable. The second value is to protect innocent and honest priests from unfair accusation. Not being a member of the clergy, Gibson is plainly unaware of why that second value is so important. It isn't always personal vanity. Because of the business he's in, a priest's personal reputation is vital. Unfortunately, a reputation is the easiest thing for an enemy to destroy, simply by offering accusations that leave a stain. It doesn't matter whether such accusations stand up to proof; the accusation alone does the damage. It's also clear that Gibson doesn't appreciate how often a priest's reputation comes under attack. Plenty of people would gladly start/spread every rumor about a priest. (Ask any priest.) Most people would be surprised at how often, and how vicious, these attacks actually occur. About this, Gibson says little.

The bishops, we all agree, went too far in protecting their priests' reputations. Of the two values (accountability and protection), many bishops chose wrong. Therefore, what's truly needed in this book is a thorough discussion of how to draw that line. It isn't easy. You can't believe every accusation, but you can't dismiss them all, either. You can smugly say that the bishops drew the line poorly, but that's not enough. You have to further explain how to draw the line properly. That takes analysis, and sober reflection.

That's what this book is lacking. This book is basically a story, not an analysis. In this story, the laity are heroes who will one day triumph over the tyrannical bishops and nefarious Vatican curia. That may be a story, but it isn't analysis.

25 of 30 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars American Dreams, June 6, 2006

By	Christian Book Reviews "www.christianbookrevi... (Philadelphia, PA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Coming Catholic Church: How the Faithful Are Shaping a New American Catholicism (Hardcover)

It seems the one constant in American Christianity is its parochialism. Whether it be those on the right who equate the faith once delivered to the saints with conservative American domestic and foreign policy or those on the left who believe the Church will be saved by becoming more of a liberal democracy, the attempt to have American cultural, political, and religious ideals hijack the Church for its ends goes along undaunted.

David Gibson adds to this heritage in The Coming Catholic Church - his view of how the sex scandals plaguing the Catholic priesthood has altered the playing field in the Catholic Church and is reshaping American Catholicism. Indeed, Gibson goes as far as to infer that the entire ecclesial model the Catholic Church has used for over a millennium is being rendered obsolete overnight by happenings in the United States and, to paraphrase an adage, "What is good for American Catholics is good for the Catholic Church."

The book is divided into three sections on the laity, the priesthood, and the hierarchy. The overall presentation is one of an enraged laity demanding the institution be made more democratic, the bishops resisting these demands, and the some well-meaning priests caught in the middle. Beginning with the understandable sense of betrayal and outrage felt by American Catholics as the widespread nature of the scandals and the American bishops' complicity in covering up misconduct by their clergy became known, Gibson uses this as a springboard for describing how the state of the American Catholic belief and practice - that can at best be described by the moniker "Cafeteria Catholic" - is set to revolutionize affairs in the Church.

While Gibson does a solid job detailing the anger of many Catholics in America about the scandal, he then makes the unwarranted assumption that this will lead to a wholesale change in the Church. There is no evidence supporting a mass desire for change in Catholic doctrine among the faithful. The anger is over sexual misconduct and the irresponsibility of the bishops in not removing known sexual predators from the ranks of priests. While those calling for the ordiantion of women and other changes in Catholic doctrine are trying to add their causes to the cries for change, subsequent events demonstrate that such an expansion of the cause to things not related to the problem will not find much of an audience beyond those already committed to that cause.

Oddly enough, Gibson early in the book reminds Americans of the universality of the Catholic Church. Yet he fails to heed his own warnings that they not expect the Church to represent an American viewpoint. Apparently forgetting this point, he spends much of the remainder of the book defending the thesis that the problems of the American Church demand changes in the worldwide structure of Catholicism.

While certainly not a radical, Gibson does fall into the category of the pleasantly liberal Catholic who wishes the Church was more democratic and modern. Like many liberal Catholics, he ties the scandal to calls for reform that would amount to the Church repudiating traditional Catholic doctrine. Yet these "reforms" would do little more than turn the Catholic Church into another faceless liberal Protestant sect. As recent history can attest, these changes have led to disintegration and not renewal whenever they have been employed.

Also left unmentioned in Gibson's thesis is that the fact that almost all of these cases involved predators who committed homosexual acts. The thought that the scandal might be a problem involving homosexuality would no doubt fall on deaf ears with good liberals like Gibson, but, given recent developments, this is obviously well understood at the Vatican.

Gibson also fails to take into account those places where the Church in America is most healthy. While religious orders that have liberalized are grey and dying, those that have taken a traditional path are healthy and growing. Dioceses that adopted the more liberalizing tendencies in the past few decades are having the most trouble while those that are most conservative are among the healthiest. In addition, new converts are coming from Evangelical Protestantism and are invigorating the Church. The post-Vatican II American Catholicism that relies on some vaguely defined "Spirit of Vatican II" that appears nowhere in the Vatican II documents is largely a baby-boomer phenomenon that is destined to die with them.

Gibson closes his book looking towards the future and pinning his dreams on the hope that the successor of Pope John Paul II would finish the job begun at Vatican II, thwart the efforts of those backward traditionalists, and usher in the Church that any Western progressive thinker could respect. How ironic it was that when the great Polish pope did pass on to blessed memory, it was Cardinal Ratzinger - who comes off in the book as the staunchest of all conservative forces - that received the nod as Pope Benedict XVI.

With The Coming Catholic Church, Gibson does a fine job describing the perilous predicament within which the Catholic Church due to both the actions of sexual predators among its priests and the inaction of bishops in removing these monsters from service in the Church. However, by attempting to piggyback a whole list of unrelated issues to the crisis without any supporting evidence, Gibson's efforts come off as motivated more by a desire for his church's social respectability than its adherence to the truth.