This book examines the changed, and changing, face of Irish Catholicism and Irish Catholic identity at the beginning of the third millennium. There has never been any formal philosophical training in the Irish educational system that allows space for the type of intellectual engagement with issues of a religious nature that characterises a society like France, for example. So Irish and Catholic? is in some ways an attempt to fill a void and to launch a debate that is absolutely necessary if we are to come to terms with a vastly changed socio-religious landscape that could effectively be termed as ‘post-Catholic.'The essays are written by people who are both intimately associated with the Catholic Church in their role as priests and commentators, or who have an interest in the topic from a literary, theoretical or historical perspective. It is the different prisms and lenses through which the issue of Irish Catholic identity – or identities – is examined that makes this such a challenging and fascinating study. It avoids the danger of putting forward an apologia for the church or of embarking on an irrational attack on perceived abuses within the institution.

Louise Fuller ; John Littleton and Eammon Maher; Fuller, Louise; Littleton, John, Fr; Maher, Eamon

Louise Fuller, Littleton, John Fr, Eamon Maher

Columba Books

Currach Press

United Kingdom and Ireland, Ireland

Blackrock, Co. Dublin, 2006

March 15, 2007

US, 2007

256 p. ; 22 cm
Includes bibliographical references
Catholic identity in the Irish context / John Littleton -- Rise and fall of Roman Catholicism in Ireland / Patsy McGarry -- 'Kicking Bishop Brennan up the arse ...' : Catholicism, deconstruction and postmodernity in contemporary Irish culture / Eugene O'Brien -- New Ireland and the undoing of the Catholic legacy : looking back to the future / Louise Fuller -- 'God help us!' : the media and Irish Catholicism / Colum Kenny -- Representations of Catholicism in the twentieth-century Irish novel / Eamon Maher -- 'Mulcahy taught us God' : Catholicism and survival in the poetry of Brendan Kennelly / John McDonagh -- Bad cop, good cop: dualistic theology and Stephen's neurotic response to the hellfire sermons in Joyce's A portrait of the artist as a young man / Brian Cosgrove -- 'I have looked on God and found him lacking' : Catholicism and homosexuality in the plays of Frank McGuinness / Kenneth Nally -- 'I'd like to be this family please' : Tom Murphy and the de/construction of the Irish Catholic family home / Sara Keating -- Trinities of transition: Catholicism in the novels and plays of Dermot Bolger / Paula Murphy -- Cultural chameleons: religion in the Ryan of Inch papers / Grace Neville -- Return to Doolin : a reflection on a changing Irish and Catholic identity / Patrick Claffey -- Catholicism and civic identity in Ireland : mapping some changes in public policy / Kevin Williams -- Decoupling Catholic and national identity : secularisation theories in the Irish context / Timothy J. White

"This book examines the changed, and changing face of Irish Catholicism and Irish Catholic identity at the beginning of the third millennium. The essays are written by people who are both intimately associated with the Catholic Church in their role as priests and commentators, or who have an interest in the topic from a literary, theoretical or historical perspective."--BOOK JACKET

2024-11-05