Talk:List of Catholic writers

Inherently Faulty List
This list is faulty on the face. It professes to list authors who are "Catholic," which apparently is meant to stand for "Roman Catholic." The only problem is that some authors on this list could not have possibly been RC, because the RCC did not exist at the same time as they did. There was certainly a "Catholic" church, i.e., the Western Church, but "Roman"? Hardly. Chaucer, for instance, did not live in a time wherein there could be said to exist a Roman Catholic Church. This article needs some serious attention. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 138.163.106.71 (talk) 14:49, 24 April 2009 (UTC)

Regarding deletion
This list will probably not get deleted. I still have that much faith in this place. However it does need to be pared down alot. It should be limited to authors where their religion is clearly important to their work. For example writers like Graham Greene or G. K. Chesterton would make sense. Any old writer from a Catholic family in Catalonia or Poland does not.--T. Anthony 03:17, 18 November 2005 (UTC)


 * I'm working on paring it down. However I didn't get as strict as I did with List of Catholic artists because there are people important to Catholic literature who aren't all that devout in Catholicism. For example Santayana I think does fit a list like this even though he was either agnostic or atheist.--T. Anthony 04:01, 20 November 2005 (UTC)


 * For whatever reason I didn't feel like doing the verifying work on the French and Spanish sections. I'll leave that to others. Most everything else should be defensible. For example I replaced most of the borderline Czech writers that were listed with priests and people imprisoned by Communism for their religious zeal.--T. Anthony 12:42, 20 November 2005 (UTC)

Pruning list to only include authors who profess Catholicism in writings
There are still some leftovers. Antidote 23:46, 28 November 2005 (UTC)


 * Probably a good idea.--T. Anthony 02:46, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Suggestions
Wikipedia talk:Featured lists it was suggested this needs more references. Any thoughts?--T. Anthony 12:07, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Pope Pius II
My guess would be that Pius II, currently listed in the "Italian language" section, wrote in Latin rather than Italian. He was a great classicist and a learned man, and he wrote as laureate for the Emperor in German-speaking Vienna - the universal learned language, Latin, would have been the obvious language for him to write in. This guess is confirmed by [], which describes him as a "Latin poet". So he shouldn't be in the Italian language section. But shouldn't there be a "Latin language" section for all those who wrote in Latin during the Middle Ages - e.g. Thomas of Celano, who wrote the Dies Irae - or even those who wrote Christian poetry in Latin in the late Roman Empire, e.g. Prudentius? User: ildottore

Theologians
Do the leading Catholic theologians belong here? We have long had non-fiction, philosophical writers like Maritain listed here, and also devotional and apologetic writers (e.g. John Salza), so the page clearly isn't limited to Catholic writers of fiction (poetry, novels, short stories, and plays). It seems non-fiction writing will meet the criteria of 'authorship'. On this logic, I think you have to admit de Lubac, von Bathasar, Garrigou-Lagrange etc. - they wrote a lot of important and influential books which are clearly about Catholicism. Thus I have added their names. Unless the page is to be limited to writers of fiction and poetry only, they have to be included.

Proposal for re-organization per language only
I think that the combination of organization per degree of Catholicism of a country and per language is contradictory. Some languages are spoken in countries with high degrees of Catholicism and low degrees. E.g. Dutch in Belgium (very catholic) and the Netherlands (somewhat catholic).Andries 16:34, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

Why is German traditionally Non-Catholic?
Germany is listed as a traditionally Non-Catholic society. But Germany has always been about equally divided between Catholicism + Protestantism. So I would support to remove the artifical division into Catholic + non-Catholic societies - this is leading nowhere.


 * You're right that Germans are mixed. I had the overall arrangement because I thought it might explain their writing or cultural situation, but you're right it didn't work. I've ended it.--T. Anthony (talk) 12:04, 13 July 2008 (UTC)

Kerouac
There has been a dispute over the Kerouac entry. I believe my edit is plainly factually accurate. For example, David Wills in the carefully sourced journal Beatdom says that although Kerouac was not orthodox "He continued to maintain his belief in Catholicism throughout his life.". Matt Theado in Understanding Jack Kerouac quotes Ann Charters saying, he was "born a Catholic, raised a Catholic and died a Catholic. His interest in Buddhism was a discovery of different religious images for his fundamentally constant religious feelings..." His Buddhism was conflated with or syncretized with his Catholicism. He never abandoned his Catholic faith. Consistent with this, Kerouac himself said the Buddhism had "almost" as much influence as his Catholicism. His approach to Buddhism is similar to Thomas Merton, with whom he had much in common but who was more orthodox. He did, however, by 1960 abandon Buddhism (William French Kerouac p. 15), as many authors note. Kerouac himself said that he "quit Buddhism". This was precipitated in large part by his nervous breakdown: "...I realized all my (years of studying) Buddhism had been words, comforting words, indeed, but when I saw those masses of devils racing for me." (Tom Clark Jack Kerouac p. 192.) Mamalujo (talk) 01:05, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
 * You appear to be cherry picking what you like from the sources and discarding what you don't like. You changed a fairly neutral, non-POV pushing entry, to a biased, POV pushing entry on a biographical figure. That is  not accurate.  You claim his works are "deeply imbued with Catholicism", and that he "experimented with Buddhism and waned in Catholic practice but never left the faith".  You also claim that he was "disillusioned with Buddhism after a nervous breakdown", a POV associating Buddhism with mental illness as if to promote one religion over another.  This is not neutral at all. Viriditas (talk) 02:56, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Update: I've removed the disputed portion and stuck to just the facts. Please leave this as it is now. Viriditas (talk) 02:58, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I've cited above two reliable sources that say he never left the faith, you've cited none to contradict this. Saying he "returned" to Catholicism falsely implies he left the faith. I'll make the appropriate edits. Mamalujo (talk) 03:37, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
 * You have made an error, and you appear to have blindly reverted without even looking at my edit. That is really poor editing on your part.  Looking at my edit, it said the following:
 * "Jack Kerouac - Beat author of On the Road; son of French Canadian immigrants; born and reared a Catholic"
 * Nothing about "returning" to Catholicism. Please leave this neutral version until we come to an agreement.  I do not agree with your POV pushing in regards to Buddhism. Viriditas (talk) 03:50, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

I am about to report you both for edit warring. Yes, Mamalujo's version is of questionable neutrality - and it amounts to undue weight here on a list where each author needs no more than one line. But there is absolutely no reason to delete the reference to his dabbling with Buddhism entirely - which amounts to bias of another sort. The long established version is perfectly NPOV. I warn you both not to violate WP:3RR in letter or spirit - you may be subject to administrative sanction for it.μηδείς (talk) 04:00, 24 November 2010 (UTC)
 * I support the long established version, which is why I originally restored it. I removed the mention of Buddhism after Mamalujo would not stop changing it.  Out of respect to Third opinion, restore the version you think appropriate. Viriditas (talk) 04:11, 24 November 2010 (UTC)

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Oscar Wilde 'homosexual lifestyle'
The entry re Oscar Wilde currently contains this section. 'embraced a homosexual lifestyle later on, but converted to Catholicism on his deathbed'. This seems an unnecessarily contentious way of framing his life and queerness. 'Homosexual lifestyle' is outdated language that is also sometimes used as a dog whistle and/or in common homophobic discourse, and is also not clear in what it means. A sexuality is a way of experiencing desire and romance, not a 'lifestyle', and there is no one 'homosexual' way of living your life. Finally, his gayness/homosexuality is not necessarily relevant to his Catholicism; this is a page about Catholic authors, not a page about heterosexual Catholic authors.

Using 'but' in this passage implies that being gay is incompatible with being Catholic, and that in receiving baptism he was necessarily turning his back on his queerness. This may be the case, but we simply cannot know or guess at this. Further, some Catholics certainly do believe that queerness is incompatible with Catholicism, but other Catholics do not, including various associations of gay Catholics.

It is not appropriate for this page to take a stance on this; implying that his gayness and his Catholicism are opposed, as this passage currently does, is taking a stance. We should either rephrase to acknowledge that he was a gay man who also converted to Catholicism, or simply remove reference to his sexuality. In my editorial opinion, it would be nice to keep a reference to his gayness, as this is a large part of how he is known, and it may be positive and informative for contemporary gay Catholics to be reminded of the existence of historic gay Catholics, but I also understand if the scope of this page limits the inclusion of that fact here; there should perhaps be some consideration of what biographical details are and are not included on this page however, to ensure standardisation and neutrality. 2A01:4B00:BD13:2A00:76B5:9DE3:44ED:2068 (talk) 20:23, 22 August 2023 (UTC)