In this book, authors Andrew M. Greeley and Mary Greeley Durkin tell us: "Catholicism's best instincts, most powerful traditions and greatest wisdom incline it not only to tolerate variety but to celebrate it. In its best moments, the Church realizes that its role is one of discernment rather than of regulation." This manifesto is designed to stimulate thought about an institution which at present is confused over whether to emphasize the old or the new, the ancient or the modern, the tried-and-true or bold new avenues. The authors proclaim a "both-and" approach rather than an "either-or" dialectic.
For Greeley and Durkin, the Catholic religious experience is — first and foremost — sacramental. This means that "God is signified and encountered in the ordinary, the everyday, the natural." Hence, believers are detectives seeking in the precincts of the daily world "a sign of the goodness, a hint of an explanation . . . a touch of grace, a rumor of angels." If the Catholic Church continues to ignore and de-emphasize the sacramental, it runs the danger of "a bloodless, lifeless religion deprived of . . . all sense of awe and wonder and mystery."
Secondly, the Catholic imagination must be "analogical," able to see and celebrate the "correlative key" which links God's activity with secular events, persons and objects. Here the significance of the arts (poetry, novels, theater, music, architecture, film) must be given new attention by believers — especially by religious educators.
Third, the Catholic religious story should be appreciated for its comic elements. To explain, the authors discuss the humor in the Christmas story and exhort believers to unabashedly tell others about it. They warn readers that "the real enemy of the comic narrative is the imagination that denies the possibility of a happy ending, or more recently, denies the possibility of any ending at all."
Finally, Greeley and Durkin point out that the Catholic religious community is organic: "It is based on a dense network of local relationships that constitute the matrix of everyday life." They see the neighborhood parish as the locus of renewal for Catholicism.
Donning their prophetic garb, the authors call upon Catholic believers to (1) accept, "the sacramentality of sex [which] emphasizes both the goodness of passion and the importance of commitment," (2) see the value of saints, angels, demons and the like as signs of good and evil in the world, (3) put more time and creativity into worship "that sparks the religious imagination," and (4) rid the Church of bias against women by stressing the symbolism of Mary.
Greeley and Durkin have done the Catholic Church a service by writing this provocative, experiential, pragmatic and salutary book. They join Mott and Kennedy in mapping a clear and adventuresome route to renewal — a destination these authors believe is just beyond the horizon.