Being Right: Conservative Catholics in America

"An in-depth look at these groups, both as they see themselves and as they appear to trained scholars...An important contribution to contemporary American religious studies." - David J. O'Brien, College of Holy Cross. "However much one may disagree with any or all of these movements, they are significant phenomena on the American scene. Weaver and Appleby perform a valuable service in providing a calm and well-grounded body of new information." - Philip Gleason, University of Notre Dame. Once the center of American Catholicism, conservative Catholics are now a diminished but highly visible minority within the church and American society. Whether they focus their criticisms on pro-choice rhetoric and artificial birth control, insufficient respect for papal authority and the abandonment of once-cherished devotional traditions, or the removal of religious symbols from public squares, the Catholics profiled in this book agree that the contemporary church is in crisis. This book describes the various steps conservative Catholics are taking to address the crisis. It surveys key developments in the three decades since the close of the Second Vatican Council in 1965, and describes the worldviews, convictions, and goals of conservative Catholics in the United States. In doing so the book seeks to understand what it means to be a Catholic in the modern world.