I have a question to pose to all you historians out there: tell me if you think this is a solid, academically objective, or even a logically consistent way to end a social history of American Catholicism
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Most modern historians write with an agenda. It seems to be media driven...in order to sell more books either to the public or to academia. They have to fit into the accepted viewpoint of academia. And since the majority of academia tends to be staunchly anti-catholic (as they consider the catholic church as being a stodgy, close-minded conservative institution), I suppose people like Dolan must write to that audience.
Although I do remember as an almost history major, that you must have at least three primary sources, question secondary sources, and always remember to think in the mindset of the time.
I do see the American church going through a big struggle and shift right now. For one, I see that young adult catholics are starting to reclaim their faith, seek their faith, whereas the baby boomer catholics tended to be more like Dolan there. I don't know what it means for the future of the American catholic church though.
Unfortunately, I have to write a response paper to the book for my independent study in United States Catholicism. So I have to think of something intelligent, and I also have to try to calm down a little bit and make a more reserved and nuanced judgment.
As I said, most of the book was fairly good. Sadly, though, these last two paragraphs just blew it for me and left a sour taste in my mouth. It left me feeling like his whole project was to rewrite history so as to have it inevitably lead to what he seems to think the future of the Church ought to be. And as a historian I hate when people do that. Blech.
One thing that I noticed, and one thing that might be a good idea for the paper, is to focus on how MISUNDERSTOOD he is about what the motivations are for Catholic teaching.
He quotes "sexophobia" as the reason for for the Culture of Life, and he couldn't be more wrong. Right there alone, he shows a clear bias and misunderstanding of the subject/topic he is addressing. If anything I would point out the obvious lack of objectivity he has in relating this little bit of history. Historians are supposed to accurately record history without their little idealogical opinions shading fact... to me, he is an extremely poor historian, especially if he does not take the time to research and try to understand what his subject's motivations and meaning is. It shows a clear ignorance of his topic.
I once heard that America is a nation of compromise in that democracy is the art of creating a compromise between extreme viewpoints. If this is true, I suppose it makes sense that American Catholics see their faith as something that they can come to terms by giving and taking rather than seeing it as something they must adhere to. Thus, that most Catholics (according to stats) have no problem with abortion/birth control, the church should change to better fit the times. I rarely hear this argument applied to how the church should accept what are stereotypically extreme conservative ideas based on such polling and how the church should alter its teachings based on how American Catholics "support" capital punishment and nuclear war against Mohammedans. Thomas Merton, in his journals, appears to voice concerns about how the Church was becoming too close for comfort with American pragmatism, and we'll have to see how this generation responds to the previous one, who seem to think they can have one foot on Jacob's ladder and one foot
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Although I do remember as an almost history major, that you must have at least three primary sources, question secondary sources, and always remember to think in the mindset of the time.
I do see the American church going through a big struggle and shift right now. For one, I see that young adult catholics are starting to reclaim their faith, seek their faith, whereas the baby boomer catholics tended to be more like Dolan there. I don't know what it means for the future of the American catholic church though.
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: o p
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As I said, most of the book was fairly good. Sadly, though, these last two paragraphs just blew it for me and left a sour taste in my mouth. It left me feeling like his whole project was to rewrite history so as to have it inevitably lead to what he seems to think the future of the Church ought to be. And as a historian I hate when people do that. Blech.
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i would say clearly dolan is embittered or threatened by an orthodoxy he fails to comprehend.
that's as charitable a spin as i can put on it.
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He quotes "sexophobia" as the reason for for the Culture of Life, and he couldn't be more wrong. Right there alone, he shows a clear bias and misunderstanding of the subject/topic he is addressing. If anything I would point out the obvious lack of objectivity he has in relating this little bit of history. Historians are supposed to accurately record history without their little idealogical opinions shading fact... to me, he is an extremely poor historian, especially if he does not take the time to research and try to understand what his subject's motivations and meaning is. It shows a clear ignorance of his topic.
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This is tripe. He is not a historian, he is someone relating history with a very heavy, very obvious bias.
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