I am a few days late getting the news to you, but on the Feast of St. Francis, Dr. Geoffrey Karabin’s book, Pandemic Reflections: Saint Francis and the Lepers Catch Up with COVID, was released! It is a great collection that explores the connections between St. Francis’s encounter with the leper and our recent pandemic. The back cover blurb reads:

St Francis of Assisi, one of the most acclaimed and enduring of saints, is particularly significant when reflecting upon the COVID pandemic. Francis lived, and ministered, amid a leprosy pandemic. How he lived in relation to that pandemic makes him a source of insight to as well as a potential critic of contemporary responses to COVID. In turn, one can use COVID to question Francis. Did he exhibit a harmful form of religious devotion, perhaps fanaticism, by exposing himself and others to a lethal pathogen? This edited collection examines a highly visible and impactful religious figure with the intent of bringing him into conversation with one of the defining issues of the early 21st Century.

I was very happy to contribute a chapter that explored the ways the pandemic unfolded in Africa–which revealed a lack of justice and mercy from the global community–as a contrast to Francis’s encounter with the leper. If you order it from the publisher’s website, you can use the code FRANCIS33 to receive 33% off. Enjoy!

I’m so happy to announce that I am working with Liturgical Press on a book that explores the beliefs, practices and ministerial possibilities for engaging Catholics who attend Mass infrequently. The working title is Cultural Catholics: Who They Are, How to Respond and will use the most recent wave of the American Catholic Laity survey. In analyzing the self-reported attitudes and behaviors of over 1500 Catholics, this book allows us to compare the 53 percent of American Catholics who attend Mass “a few times a year” or less often with more regular Mass attenders, offering ministerial insights for reaching out to Catholics who are less engaged with parish life.

This book will explore how cultural Catholics understand and enact their Catholic identity, their political and civic beliefs, their experiences in parish life and thoughts on Church leadership. It is geared primarily for parish, campus and diocesan leaders who want to cast a wider net in their accompaniment and ministerial offerings and will likely be a useful read for a variety of ecclesial leaders.

The American Catholic Laity Study team is happy to share that we have a contract for our book with NYU Press. This is the sixth book in the series of surveys that William D’Antonio started in the late eighties. This round we are also incorporating interviews with about 60 Catholic leaders (e.g., bishops, employees at the USCCB, public influencers, leaders of lay apostolates, etc.). Drs. William D’Antonio, Michele Dillon, and Mary Gautier oversaw the survey aspect of the research and Drs. James Cavendish, Paul Perl and I are taking the lead in the interviews. We’re quite far along in the writing process and will have a manuscript–tentatively titled Catholicism’s Crossroads: The Present and Future of America’s Largest Church–to NYU Press by January… probably sooner. The six main themes of the book are Church, authority, race, citizenship, sex and family, and future.

We’re unearthing some great insights for both scholars and Catholic leaders… really for religious leaders broadly as many of the challenges Catholicism faces are not unique to Catholicism. Stay tuned for updates!

Spring is here and along with the blossoms comes the Spring issue of The Way. Here you’ll find my latest contribution, “Franciscan Roots of American Catholic Social Justice Ministry.” It shows the way American social ministry was informed–wittingly or not–by key elements from the Franciscan Tradition: transformation, Christ, community, mercy, compassion, and gift. I hope it gives you some thoughts and inspiration for bringing some healing to our world!

Happy Easter!