Abstract
The title of this book is one that will attract many readers because of the abiding relevance of sex, love and family for the human family and the reality of conflicting views on the nature, content and connection between these realities. This fine collection of essays engages with the contemporary debate in a way that is both enlightening and challenging. The two editors have been engaged in teaching sex, marriage and family at Catholic universities for more than 30 years. As a consequence of this experience they are well aware of the new challenges and the new questions that confront the Catholic presentation of sex, love and marriage. This volume is a refreshing and honest response to these new challenges and questions.
Divided into three sections and 25 chapters, the volume contains the scholarly reflections of almost 30 [all lay] academics from a variety of institutions in the United States. The only non-American based contributor is Gemma Cruz from the Australian Catholic University.
The first section of the book, entitled Sex, contains some interesting articles including one by Jennifer Beste on the hookup culture amongst young people and especially college students. The dehumanizing effect of that culture on students is clearly identified and the possible contribution of Catholic theology as a counter voice is imaginatively proposed. This section also contains a thought provoking and well-constructed essay on the challenge of Trans/Gender Identity for Catholic Theology. Craig A. Ford proposes a virtue of alignment as a possible approach to a more creative, inclusive and healthy discussion on gender in order to avoid the stumbling block of gender essentialism. This approach would both help to depathologize transgender and genderqueer persons and see the journey to gender alignment ‘as a requirement for all persons of all genders.’ Like the virtue of courage, it is suggested, gender identity is something we acquire on the journey of life.
The second section, Love, has eight essays that approach the reality of love from a variety of perspectives, including; love and holiness; love and labour; the wisdom of the marriage liturgy and the reality of cohabitation prior to marriage. The last mentioned contribution by Kari-Shane Zimmerman, Cohabitation: Part of the Journey towards Marriage?, begins with the reality that the question is ‘no longer who cohabits but rather who does not cohabit.’ In an attempt to bring this reality into conversation with the Catholic theological tradition the author suggests a revisiting of the betrothal ceremony that existed prior to Trent. When celebrated within a community of faith and directed towards lifelong commitment this ceremony could, it is argued, reinvigorate the sacrament of marriage rather than undercut it.
The final section, Families, responds to the changing make up of contemporary families and the challenges and difficulties they encounter. These challenges include migration, the demands of work, the need for a spirituality for parenting and the ever-present parental desire to want the ‘best’ for ‘our’ children. David Cloutier’s essay, Wanting the ‘Best’ for ‘Our’ Kids: Parenting and Privilege, creatively engages with this reality. The article was written against the background of the scandal surrounding college admissions in the United States that saw parents resort to a range of unethical practices to secure places for their children in the ‘best’ colleges. Cloutier employs the virtue of solidarity [rather than competition] as a tool to construct a different approach, for Catholic families and wider society, to goods, like education, that are limited and access to which is influenced by class and race.
Gemma Tulud Cruz reflects on the reality of migration and its impact on the family. Over 16.5 million households in the United States alone are home to mixed-status families. Many of these live in fear of arrest, imprisonment and deportation. Global migration has impacted severely on family life and resulted in new family roles and practices; cyber parenting, transnational motherhood and language brokering by young children on behalf of their parents. The response to these new realities by church teaching is deemed by the author to be incomplete because it does ‘not fully take into account the complex character of kinship arising from global migration.’ She proposes a more expansive understanding of what a family is and a more generic, less binary approach to parenthood.
This is a solid collection of essays that will provide a rich resource for college teachers, students and parish study groups. Though working primarily from an American canvas the themes engaged with are universally relevant and urgent.