Book Review Continued

Submitted by Thomas F. Malone

Bruce, Tricia C., 2011. Faithful Revolution—How Voice of the Faithful is Changing the Church. Oxford, 215 pp.

A long and winding road will have to be traversed in order to transform an emerging vision into reality. Faithful Revolution provides an excellent introduction to a road map for that journey.

Bruce's book is divided into three parts:

An introductory chapter frames the issue of examining social movements and introduces the concept of intrainstitutional social movements that target a specific bounded institution and draw participants from the institution's membership.

Successive chapters then discuss:

• The origin and evolution of VOTF,

• The mixed reception of church authorities to its emergence as a movement,

• Local contacts and negotiations,

• Its intrinsic Catholic identity and its relationship to Vatican II,

• The meaning of being Catholic,

• The salience of culture in intrainstitutional social movements,

• The complexities of pursuing simultaneously VOTF's main goals of supporting survivors of abuse, priests of integrity, and  advocating structural change in the church, and

• Insights on social movements, and religion, and

• Finally, a concluding chapter explores the impact of VOTF on the Church.

In her book, Bruce looks for evidence of change in the Catholic Church and in the meaning of being Catholic and talks of how whether or not church leaders liked it, VOTF has emerged as a public voice for Catholics.

She discusses how VOTF gave Catholics a space to voice outrage at the contemporary scandal and hope for the post-Vatican II Church, how VOTF participants were among the most upwardly mobile Catholics in the US, how VOTF changed the values and meaning that individuals associated with being Catholic.

She also talks of how VOTF reawakened interest in Vatican II, shifted the meaning of Catholic identity and influenced the culture of the Church.

The ordained leadership and lay adherents will continue to debate maintaining religious distinction, legitimacy, and salience while harboring diversity and dissent.

In sum, the next few decades hold promise of being a “defining moment” for an institution that has demonstrated a remarkable resiliency for two thousand years!