Catholic Identity

Michele Dillon investigates why pro-change Catholics continue to remain actively involved with the Church.

The Victorian Archbishop of Trebizond, George Errington (1804-1886) was one of the most prominent figures of nineteenth-century English Roman Catholicism. He was involved in the resurgence of the English Catholic Church, and would have achieved the highest offices himself had not a dispute between him and Cardinal Wiseman led to his fall from favour in the eyes of Propaganda Fide. He has come to be regarded as the leader of an 'Old Catholic' party as the struggle continued for dominance in the period of consolidation following the restoration of the hierarchy in 1850. An intimate of Newman, Errington maintained a large correspondence which covers almost every church controversy of his lifetime. His letters shed light on subjects which have long since been dormant and in some cases indicate that the popular interpretations of some affairs are not as clear-cut as has been argued by others. They also expose the various factions in the English Catholic Church at the time, and the slippery nature of the Roman administration. In this comprehensive work, Serenhedd James explores George Errington's motives and actions, and analyses the forces that were at play in the English Catholic Church of the nineteenth century. James highlights that matters of policy were clouded by issues of personality, and where politicking, as much as prayer, was an integral part of its way of life.

Faith-based Identity and Curriculum in Catholic Schools examines the relationship between faith-based education and whole curriculum at a time when neoliberal ideologies and market values are having a disproportionate influence on national education policies. Topics addressed include: current challenges and dilemmas faced by Catholic Education leadership; Catholic social teaching and its implications for whole curriculum; the opinions of teachers in Queensland Catholic schools regarding faith-based school identity with particular reference to whole curriculum; an associated comparison of these opinions teachers with those of their USA peers; school identity and Catholic social teaching in Ontario Catholic schools; an action research approach to the integration of Catholic social teaching in Queensland Catholic schools; longitudinal study of the views of pre-service teachers at a Catholic university regarding the purposes and characteristics of Catholic schools. Bringing together professionals and academics from across the world, Faith-based Identity and Curriculum in Catholic Schools will inspire Catholic and other faith-based educators to appreciate the importance and potential of the integration of faith-based perspectives such as countercultural Catholic social teaching across the school curriculum in an educationally appropriate manner.

Judith Pollmann uses the diaries and memoirs of sixteenth-century Catholics to explore how they understood and experienced the religious civil war that ripped the sixteenth-century Netherlands apart.

The Chinese Catholic Church traces its living roots back to the late sixteenth century and its historical roots back even further, to the Yuan dynasty. This book explores paintings and sculptures of the Virgin Mary and the communities that produced them over several centuries. It argues for the emergence of distinctly Chinese Catholic identities as artistic representations of the Virgin Mary, at different times and in different places, absorbed and in turn influenced representations of Chinese figures from Guanyin to the Empress Dowager. At other times indigenous styles have been diluted by Western influences—following the influx of European missionaries in the nineteenth century, for example, or with globalization in recent years. The book engages with history, theology and art, and draws on imagery and archival photographs that have been largely neglected. As a study of the social and cultural histories of communities that have survived over many centuries, this book offers a new view of Catholicism in China—one that sees its history as more than simply a cycle of persecution and resistance. Fr. Jeremy Clarke, SJ, is an Australian Province Jesuit teaching as an assistant professor in the History Department of Boston College. He is also a school visitor in the Australian Center for China in the World at the Australian National University, Canberra.

How coherent is the claim that Catholic education is both distinctive and inclusive? This question, so crucial, both for the adequate articulation of a raison d'être for Catholic schools all over the world and also for the promotion of their healthy functioning, has not hitherto been addressed critically. Here it receives penetrating analysis and constructive resolution in a comprehensive treatment that integrates theological, philosophical and educational perspectives. The argument draws on wide-ranging scholarship, offering new insights into the relevance for Catholic education of thinkers whose work has been relatively neglected. The advance in understanding of how distinctiveness relates to inclusiveness is underpinned by the author's lengthy experience of teaching and leadership in Catholic schools; it is further informed by his extended and continuing dialogue with Catholic educators at all levels and in many different countries.

Catholic Higher Education in the 1960s is a series of cases that describes and analyzes the transitions made by representative Catholic institutions in their attempts to update their governance structures and maintain their Catholic identity in the midst of the post-Vatican II era. This book will be of interest to historians of education and Catholic education; to administrators and faculty in Catholic schools and in other religious-based institutions that seek to understand the dynamic of balancing their religious identity with their attempts at “reading the signs of the times.”

Identity and Internationalization in Catholic Universities explores the relationship between Catholic identity, mission (with special emphasis on Jesuit and La Salle universities), and internationalization in Catholic universities of different types and located in different contexts: Latin America, Asia-Pacific and Europe.