American Catholic:: The Saints and Sinners Who Built America's Most Powerful Church

This is the best book on American Catholicism I have ever read. It objectively looks at the good, bad and ugly in a way few have ever done. There's a lot of warts in this book, but there also is wonderful anecdotes about our shared Catholic faith and how it evolved into what it is today!This book told me as much about who I was, where I come from and where I am going as a Catholic as anything I've ever read. I could not put the book down and read it over and over again for the sheer joy of reading. I'm afraid I might have missed something.The story about Dennis Cardinal Dougherty, Philadelphia's long-time Archbishop, was worth the price of admission alone. The author's story about how Cardinal Doughtery dealt with racial prejudice was compelling as was the anecdotes about the Cardinal's ego, his need to curry favor with ROme and his eccentricities. And the book provides a marvelous look at William Cardinal O'Connell of Boston, alias "Gangplank Bill," for his wintering in warm tropical locales. You sometimes wonder when the next Martin Luther would evolve after reading some of this story.But this is just part of the story.The assessment this book brings to contemporary conservative Catholicism was eye-opening. Those who are liberal Catholics might gag at what the book describes as happening in Lincoln, NE, but the story is real and the results quantified and quite positive. The book has considerable advice for the future and talks glowingly of how some Bishops due what we in corporate America have done for years, evaluate priestly sermons, rate them and recommend ways to better reach congregants.Trust me, this book is not on Pope John Paul II's reading list. But is should be! The Pope could better minister to us and be a much better representative of Christ if he read it and understood who and what we are in America.

This book is an easy, truly engaging 'must read' for Catholics struggling with the the human side of the Church and for all scholars of American History. While Morris does not gloss over some very serious problems in the Church, he does create a sense of realism and hope for the future. I was amazed at how well he covered issues and explored the relationship of those isses to events past and present. Well worth the time spent on reading this book!

For those who want to understand the history of Roman Catholicism in America, this book is the answer. Written in an engaging style, "American Catholic" traces the history of the development of the church in the United States beginning with the beginnings of the Irish migration in the 1800's, continuing with the remarkable growth throughout the 20th century. The book is objective (as the title implies) and examines different aspects of catholicism, the church, its clergy and laity with clarity and depth. In addition to the historical approach, the third portion of the book examines the many social and political issues, including those that many would prefer to ignore. Yet the author does not appear to have any particular biases or hidden agenda. One may not agree with everything the author says, but his research was extensive and nicely organized into absorbing prose. I recommend this book highly for any student of American history.

My husband and I are educated, committed Catholics who know and understand the foibles of an instutition created by God and run by man. We congratulate Morris for putting into print what so many of us believe. A "must read" for all thinking Catholics.

Those who criticize the book for ignoring the Catholic Church before the nineteenth century are missing the point, Morris never set out to write a "complete" history -- you can't condemn a book for failing to be what it isn't trying to be. Likewise the review which suggests this is purely about the Irish and ignores Germans, Slavs, Hispanics, rural parishes, etc., is also off the mark. Morris adequately demonstrates that the Irish dominated both the church's hierarchy and culture even after they were in the minority in membership. His discussions of the conflicts over national parishes and non-Irish bishops do address those issues. He actually has quite a lot to say about Hispanics and the church since World War II and also about the rural church, especially in his discussion of the Lincoln, NE diocese. As a recent convert to Catholicism with a strong interest in American history, I found this to be a fascinating tour through the church in the last two centuries. The treatment of modern issues almost became too sociological for my taste, but it provided me with a good perspective to understand where my parish lies along the spectrum of modern Catholicism.