Conscience and Calling: Ethical Reflections on Catholic Women's Church Vocations

by Anne E. Patrick

Overview

This volume probes the meaning and ethical implications of the powerful symbol of vocation from the vantage of contemporary Catholic women, with particular attention to the experiences of women religious. Intended as a follow-up to Liberating Conscience: Feminist Explorations in Catholic Moral Theology, the new book will benefit many readers, including Catholic leaders, laity, and religious, as well as persons interested in Christian ethics and American religious history more generally. The work treats twentieth-century history and more recent developments, including tensions between the Vatican and progressive Catholics, the development of lay ministries, and the movement to ordain women deacons, priests, and bishops.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781441175946
Publisher:	Bloomsbury Publishing
Publication date:	06/20/2013
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	224
File size:	297 KB

About the Author

Anne E. Patrick, SNJM is William H. Laird Professor of Religion and the Liberal Arts, emerita, at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, USA. She is a past president of the Catholic Theological Society of America and a founding vice-president of the International Network of Societies for Catholic Theology. Her writings on religious, ethical, and literary topics have appeared in many books and journals, and she is the author of Liberating Conscience: Feminist Explorations in Catholic Moral Theology and Women, Conscience, and the Creative Process.
Anne E. Patrick, SNJM is William H. Laird Professor of Religion and the Liberal Arts, emerita, at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota, USA. She is a past president of the Catholic Theological Society of America and a founding vice-president of the International Network of Societies for Catholic Theology. Her writings on religious, ethical, and literary topics have appeared in many books and journals, and she is the author of Liberating Conscience: Feminist Explorations in Catholic Moral Theology and Women, Conscience, and the Creative Process.

Table of Contents

Preface



Introduction

1. "His Dogs More Than Us": Virtue in Situations of Conflict Between Women Religious and Their Ecclesiastical Employers.



2. Women and Church Authority: A Map of Responses to Injustice



3. A Ministry of Justice: The 25-Year Pilgrimage of the National Assembly of Women Religious (NAWR/NARW)

4. "Framework for Love": Toward a Renewed Understanding of Vocation

5. Vocation in a Transformed Social Context

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY

INDEX

Editorial Reviews

A great, great many stories need to be told about both vowed and non-vowed women if we are to articulate Francis' 'theology of women'. Patrick's work offers several such stories and, I hope, will spark interest and courage in writing more; her work deserves good and careful readings across the Church.” —Studies in Christian Ethics

“Conscience and Calling is a beautifully written and powerful tribute to the courage and dedication of women religious. In a volume filled with penetrating insight into the present situation in the Catholic Church, Patrick describes how religious women have both worked and struggled with church authorities but have emerged with their consciences and vocations intact and renewed. This book opens up a history that needs to be known and celebrated while offering its readers a moral framework for understanding what it means for all of us to answer our callings.” —Susan A. Ross, Loyola University, Chicago, USA

From the Publisher

Anne Patrick's text explores the complexity of women's ecclesia vocations through the lens of moral theology using case studies, typological analysis, copious research, as well as reflection on decades of her own vocation in religious life. This wonderful book synthesizes a great deal of contemporary work on Catholic women's experience and women's holiness, while simultaneously putting forth a robust analysis of female notions of vocation in the church.

Natalia Imperatori-Lee

Patrick takes a fresh look at vocations which shows it as an outgrowth of love. She uses as her framework Margaret Farley's book Just Love in which one of the major discussions in that book connects justice with love. For Patrick, therefore, vocations that are based on love for the Church must be grounded in a justice-centered respect for the love that the person is expressing.

Catholic Library World Robert Huttmeyer

It is meticulously documented, written in an accessible style, and based in insightful analysis of difficult situations...Change happens slowly, but chronicling it in concrete words and connecting the dots between and among people, places, and ideas and actions is a real service. Patrick does that work well in this book, for which readers will that her for generations to come.

Mary E. Hunt