Synopses & Reviews
Why stay Catholic?
The answers will surprise and sustain you!
Scandals in the Catholic Church won’t go away. The same uninspiring sermons keep coming. Lay people are left wondering where “the beef” in Catholicism has gone. In light of all this, it’s no wonder that so many Catholics are asking, Why stay Catholic?
In Why Stay Catholic?, national best-selling author Michael Leach offers surprising, inspiring, and timely answers to this life-changing question, giving readers plenty of reasons to celebrate the Catholic faith here and now. In part one, he explores and explains great ideas Catholics never hear about, even from the pulpit; in part two, he introduces inspiring, often little-known Catholics who never make the news but can make a big difference in people’s faith; and in part three, Leach highlights great Catholic organizations that change the world.
Ultimately, Why Stay Catholic? is an invitation to “taste and see how good the Lord is.” Cradle Catholics, returning Catholics, ex-Catholics, and even non-Catholics will love this healing antidote to a faltering faith and a wounded Church.
“Why Stay Catholic? took courage to write, and Michael Leach shows a masterful understanding of the meaning of Church and the mystery of God’s purpose for all of us. . . . A remarkable achievement!”
–Joseph Girzone, author of the Joshua series
Why stay Catholic?
The answers will surprise and sustain you!
Scandals in the Catholic Church won’t go away. The same uninspiring sermons keep coming. Lay people are left wondering where “the beef” in Catholicism has gone. In light of all this, it’s no wonder that so many Catholics are asking, Why stay Catholic?
In Why Stay Catholic?, national best-selling author Michael Leach offers surprising, inspiring, and timely answers to this life-changing question, giving readers plenty of reasons to celebrate the Catholic faith here and now. In part one, he explores and explains great ideas Catholics never hear about, even from the pulpit; in part two, he introduces inspiring, often little-known Catholics who never make the news but can make a big difference in people’s faith; and in part three, Leach highlights great Catholic organizations that change the world.
Ultimately, Why Stay Catholic? is an invitation to “taste and see how good the Lord is.” Cradle Catholics, returning Catholics, ex-Catholics, and even non-Catholics will love this celebration of a faith that lives and lasts.
Review
What’s Right With the ChurchThomas Groome | APRIL 4, 2011 Why Stay Catholic?
Unexpected Answers to a Life-Changing Question
Michael Leach
Loyola Press. 224p $14.95I would never leave, even if they should try to kick me out. That may be as much Irish pigheadedness as genuine faith. But I have lots of friends and family who already have left or who often threaten to leave the Catholic Church. This breaks my heart. With some 30 million former Catholics in the United States alone, I meet lots of them along the way—on planes and trains, at family wakes and weddings. My first instinct always is to try to convince them, as Michael Leach advises, that instead of “throwing the baby out with the bathwater” they might reconsider and recognize that “The baby [Catholic faith] is precious, it’s real, it never grows old, can still give joy, peace, and assurance, and it’s not dependent on people.” Now I also have a great book for them to read. Why Stay Catholic? might well convince exiles to return and the wavering to remain.
In the spirit of James Joyce’s definition of catholic as “here comes everybody,” Leach makes a powerful argument for a big-tent Catholicism: “there is room in the church for everyone, or there is room for no one...for those who save their money for a pilgrimage to Medjugorje and for those who blow it at Vegas, for sinners, saints, and fools.” In that light, I thank God with renewed confidence for my own welcome.
The author—publisher emeritus and editor at large of Orbis Books—divides this fun book into three sections, around ideas, people and places that epitomize Catholicism. The ideas rise up afresh out of “the great deposit of faith”; but this “is not a limited checking account; it’s a trust fund that increases and multiplies.” His key conviction, repeated often throughout, is God’s unconditional love for every person. His central Scripture text is Rom 8:38-39, that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.
The “People” section has stories of some persons well known to all and others better known to Leach who incarnate the Catholic faith. Many of his heroes are mine as well: Thea Bowman, Miriam Therese Winter, Dorothy Day, Bishop Ray Lucker, Andrew Greeley and now the author’s spouse, Vickie (for battling illness with faith and courage). Under “Places,” where the word gets made flesh again, he reviews parishes (like Old St. Pat’s, Chicago), schools, hospitals, monasteries, Catholic Charities, Catholic Relief Services and the Los Angeles Religious Education Congress, among others.
In my view, the two best reasons for staying Catholic, as the book stresses, are the twin principles of incarnation and sacramentality. Of course, Catholicism is incarnational in its focus on Jesus. Leach is convinced that the Jesus event and his paschal mystery is not about a God who needed to be appeased for our sins but one who came looking for us out of love. Catholicism is particularly incarnational, however, in that it encourages people to enflesh their faith, to realize it in their lives, far beyond the purely confessional. This is why he emphasizes people and places who concretize it. And even the ideas that he highlights all lead to practices of one kind or another; Catholic Christian faith must get done “on earth as in heaven.”
The other side of the incarnational coin is the sacramental nature of Catholic faith. Again, this emphasis reaches a climax in the seven great liturgical sacraments that we celebrate in church, but these arise from and flow back into the sacramentality of the ordinary and everyday of life. Because “God is everywhere,” God looks for us and we respond through our lives in the world. In the words of St. Augustine, “If you have an eye for it, the world itself is sacramental.” It is the sacramentality of Catholic faith that makes it so humane, so life-giving. “Catholicism seen through the eye of a needle is a religion of rules and regulations. Seen with the sacramental imagination, it is a unique take on life, a holy vision, a way of seeing the chosen part of things.”
These twin principles—the incarnational and sacramental—are what make Catholicism most worthwhile, why anyone can well stay, regardless of disappointments and complaints and the scandals that beset the church. Indeed, these very principles lend Catholic faith its rich spiritualities; “When it comes to spirituality, “the author writes, “the Catholic Church is a Garden of Eden.”
These principles also explain why we love to tell the stories of faith, old and new, and why Catholics can often have a little more fun. “Catholics like to get together and eat cholesterol and drink beer and have fun.” This book itself oozes with the incarnational and sacramental, providing many laughs and a few tears while reading it. I learned, for instance, that “Americans trust angels ten times more than they do their congressmen. That makes sense.”
Meanwhile, Leach pulls no punches when it comes to the church’s shortcomings; his book is anything but a whitewash. In fact, it is brutally honest. Yet it is also long on hope, perhaps the theological virtue most needed now. He is convinced, for example, that the great controversies that beset our time concerning ministry (e.g., optional celibacy, women’s ordination) will all be solved in good time, and people will wonder what all the fuss was about. Just like that!
Treat yourself and your friends, whether staunch, wavering, recovering or in exile, to this inspiring book. It forcefully makes the case for staying; it will also “bring the smile back to [your] Catholicism, the kind that comes from deep in your heart....”
Listen to an interview with Michael Leach.
Thomas Groome is professor of theology and religious education at Boston College’s School of Theology and Ministry, where he also is chair of the department of religious education and pastoral ministry. Thomas Groome
Review
“Why Stay Catholic? took courage to write, and Michael Leach shows a masterful understanding of the meaning of Church and the mystery of God’s purpose for all of us. . . . A remarkable achievement!”
–Joseph Girzone, author of the Joshua series
Review
Why Stay Catholic? Unexpected Answers to a Life-Changing QuestionMichael Leach. Loyola, $14.95 trade paper (224p) ISBN 978-0-8294-3537-5Catholic publishing eminence Leach asks, and answers, a good question that the nation’s second largest non-congregation – the church of ex-Catholics -- has also asked, but answered differently. Leach offers a how-do-I-love-thee list of reasons for his staying within the 68 million strong tent of American Catholic believers, even while remaining aware that the tent is less than perfect. His book focuses on, in short and digestible chapters, ideas, people, and places that exemplify Catholicism’s best. He ranges from theological-institutional (Catholics have powerful sacramental imaginations that allow them to glimpse God unexpectedly) to just plain fun (Catholics like to party; Jesus did, too). His “places” highlight the infrastructure of institutions that Catholics have built within society: charities, hospitals, schools, relief agencies – all an integral part of America’s social backbone. Leach also includes a portion of an essay he wrote imagining what he would do if he were pope. Would that he had been (it’s theoretically possible): this is a generous, loving, charming book – Catholicism at its best. (Mar.) Publishers Weekly
Synopsis
In Why Stay Catholic, national best-selling author Michael Leach offers surprising, inspiring, and timely answers to this life-changing question. While other authors wax nostalgic about the way things used to be in the Church Leach offers readers plenty of reasons to celebrate the Catholic faith here and now, and to believe that the Church can and will change. In part one, he shares and explains great ideas that Catholic never hear about, even from the pulpit; in part two, he introduces inspiring, often little-known Catholics who never make the news but can make a big difference in people's faith; and in part three, Leach highlights great Catholic organizations that change the world.
Synopsis
Why Stay Catholic? is a lively, timely book about the "good stuff" within the Catholic Church today.
Synopsis
First Place, Popular Presentation of the Catholic Faith category
Catholic Press Association book awards, 2012
“The book resonates with the practical, the joyous, the spirit-lifting, and the reality of what it means to live as a Catholic.”
Third Place, Spirituality (paperback) category
Catholic Press Association book awards, 2012
“This is a beautifully written book which draws one to meditate deeply on one’s own loyalty to the Catholic tradition. This is truly a book for our age.”
Third Place, General Interest category
ACP Excellence in Publishing Awards, 2012
The uplifting book Why Stay Catholic? by Michael Leach is an uplifting book about what's right in the Catholic Church today, and why tomorrow offers such hope and promise.
Scandals in the Catholic Church won't go away. The uninspiring sermons keep coming, and lay people who don't feel fulfilled find themselves asking Catholic questions, and looking for Catholic answers. This leads them to the greater question, Why Stay Catholic?
In Why Stay Catholic?, national best-selling author Michael Leach offers surprising, inspiring, and timely answers to this life-changing Catholic question. Leach joyfully offers readers plenty of reasons to celebrate being Catholic, reasons to celebrate the Catholic faith here and now, and reasons to believe that the Catholic Church can and will change.
This book is not theology lite, it is spirituality with spine. It is about the beauty at the heart of Catholicism. While many authors wax nostalgic about the way things used to be in the Church, Why Stay Catholic signs with one unique voice, backed up by a chorus of original voices of all ages and from all times.
Why Stay Catholic? answers the question Why Be Catholic? and is about the things that last because they are spiritual. As such, the book is really an invitation to "taste and see how good the Lord is." Cradle Catholics, recovering Catholics, ex-Catholics, and even non-Catholics will love this healing antidote to a faltering faith and a wounded Church.
About the Author
Michael Leach is editor-at-large and publisher emeritus of Orbis Books. Dubbed “the dean of Catholic book publishing” by U.S. Catholic, he recently received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Catholic Book Publishers Association. He is the author of many books, including the national best seller I Like Being Catholic. Michael lives in Connecticut.
Table of Contents
Contents
Preface xi
Part 1: Ideas
1 The Sacramental Imagination 3
2 God Is Everywhere 9
3 God Finds Us When We Least Expect Him 15
4 Nothing Can Separate Us from the Love of God—Nothing! 23
5 God’s Will for Us Is More Wonderful Than Anything We Can Imagine 27
6 The Mystics, or There’s a Way of Knowing That Has Nothing to Do With the Brain 35
7 The Mystical Body of Christ 41
8 The Communion of Saints 47
9 There’s Still Something about Mary 55
10 It’s the Stories, Stupid! 59
11 Jesus Died for Our Sins and Rose from the Dead—Really! 65
12 The Church Can Change—Really! 73
13 You Can Disagree with the Church and Still Be a Good Catholic 79
14 The Bethlehem Principle (There Is Room in the Church for Everyone or There Is Room for No One) 85
15 A Dizzying Array of Images for the Church 89
16 A Mass of Energy 95
17 A Garden of Spiritual Paths 101
18 Fruits of the Spirit 107
19 The Seamless Garment of Life 113
20 The Church’s Best-Kept Secret 119
21 Everyone Has a Guardian Angel 125
22 Benedicamus Domino! or, Catholics Like to Party 129
23 God Is Found among the Pots and Pans 135
24 The Papacy, or It’s a Tough Job but Somebody’s Got To Do It 141
25 The Best Is Yet To Come 147
Part 2: People
26 The Singer and the Song: Miriam Therese Winter 153
27 Poet Laureate of Catholicism: Mitch Finley 159
28 She Who Overcame: Thea Bowman 167
29 Friend of Those Who Have No Friend: Pat Reardon 173
30 The Muslims’ Neighbor: Bob McCahill 179
31 Upon This Rock I Will Build My Church: Tom Kaminski 185
32 Wounded Healer: Therese Borchard 191
33 God’s Hands: John Smyth 199
34 God’s Voice: Walter Burghardt 207
35 Godmother: Dorothy Day 215
36 The Bishop: Ray Lucker 223
37 Model of Forgiveness: Antoinette Bosco 231
38 A Catholic Family Value: Marybeth Christie Redmond 239
39 The Color of Gratitude: Vickie Leach 247
40 In Gratitude: Andrew Greeley 255
Part 3: Places
41 Old St. Patrick’s Parish 269
42 The Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani 275
43 Catholic Charities 283
44 Catholic Schools 289
45 Catholic Hospitals 297
46 The Catholic Church Extension Society 305
47 Catholic Relief Services 313
48 Catholic Books and Bookstores 323
49 The Los Angeles Religious Education Congress 331
50 Vatican III 337
Thank You’s 345
About the Author 347