Talk:Richard McBrien

Book banned?
I'm removing the stuff about his book being banned. His work Catholicism is still used by undergraduates at Catholic Universities. Probably it wasn't banned, but it was given some kind of status as not explicating official Catholic teaching, but instead being a work of speculative theology. Also, Catholics banning books is something that just isn't done anymore.


 * —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.238.215.138 (talk • contribs) 15:09, 7 September 2006

Category Dissident Roman Catholic theologians
See Category talk:Dissident Roman Catholic theologians for a proposal to remove Fr. McBrien from that category. -- Cat Whisperer 17:08, 7 August 2006 (UTC)

Dissent
I thought it was appropriate to add the words "by some" into the phrase "and is considered to be a dissenter from church teachings." It now reads "and is considered by some to be a dissenter from church teachings." I thought it was a small (but needed) change, considering that Fr McBrien is surely not considered a dissenter by all (or even necessarily a majority). With the definition of whether or not he is dissenting being relatively subjective, I think it is in keeping with the encyclopaedic nature of wiki to add the words.

David-Ryan (talk) 13:02, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

206.169.39.87 (talk) 00:06, 25 September 2009 (UTC)frere charles writes: today September 24, 2009 I found it again necessary to remove the far right wing slanders against this great American Roman Catholic theologian and professor. It seems unfortunately this will remain an on-going process, as these errors had orginally been removed, according to the comments left in this discussion. Our good priest deserves our respect, affection, admiration and gratitude, not the lies place dupon these pages by readers of such right wing journals as First Things (cited as 'reliable' source material for the slanders).

I agree that it is counter-productive to have inflammatory adjectives like "ultra-liberal" placed on anyone; however, I doubt anyone can possibly deny that Fr. McBrien is a controversial figure, love him or hate him. If we're trying to give a well-rounded bio of the man, it would actually be unfair to casual observers to pretend that there has been zero controversy around him; after all, wouldn't you be a bit mad if someone tried to erase the entire entry on the Catholic clergy sex abuse scandal to pretend it never happened? Therefore, I restored the controversial events in Fr. McBrien's life; I did not insert my personal opinions on the matter, I merely put it out there for people to do their own research and form their own opinions. If they think he is a great man, as you do, then more power to them; if not, then it's their opinion. Those sources that you don't like obviously offer their personal commentaries (they are reviews, after all!), but they are still accurately reporting the controversy itself, although their commentary is certainly skewed. Anyways, most of those sources are news articles, only a few are personal blogs and such; if you don't like them, I guess you or someone else should find better sources, but please don't try to pretend the controversies never happened. God bless! Ripper11 (talk) 14:53, 27 September 2009 (UTC)

Currently, the entry contains the following regarding the Encyclopedia of Catholicism: "According to the Jesuit weekly America, editorial decisions he made while putting it together were 'highly questionable.' Giving McBrien the benefit of the doubt as to his intent, the review reports that the 'errors and inaccuracies' in the book are not only 'unforgivable' due to their significance, but are also 'so numerous that they make the volume unreliable.'" The reference was to an entry on Catholicculture.org (http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?id=6710&CFID=5489804&CFTOKEN=57135581), which in turn attributed the comments to a review in the journal, America. I was very surprised that this journal would have included such a negative review, so I looked it up. The entry in question, which was not fully cited on the Catholicculture.org piece, is as follows. Hunt, George W. "Of Many Things." America 173.1 (July 1, 1995): 2. I looked up the review, and, as I expected, it was glowing with praise for the volume. The critical passages cited by Catholicculture.org were not contained within the review; they either came from another source or, more likely were fabricated (a quick google search revealed nothing other than the original Catholicculture.org entry). Accordingly, I am removing the citation from the Wiki article. Bpeters1 (talk) 02:27, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Also, adding two other excerpts from the review in First Things to give the present excerpt some context. Bpeters1 (talk) 02:45, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Congregation of Holy Cross
I was 90% certain McBrien was a Holy Cross priest, not a priests in the diocese of Hartford. Can anyone verify this? — Preceding unsigned comment added by ThomistGuy (talk • contribs) 00:13, 17 August 2011 (UTC)


 * Yeah he was diocese of Hartford. Odd of course because he was at Notre Dame which is CSC. Jjazz76 (talk) 03:31, 24 July 2023 (UTC)

I personally know Fr. McBrien - he is not a CSC, but a diocesan priest. Bpeters1 (talk) 02:19, 21 November 2011 (UTC)

Sources for Criticism of Popes
I came across this article from google and I noticed that there are citations needed for the section "criticism of popes." I believe that all of the uncited quotes came from the same article in catholiculture (http://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/view.cfm?recnum=6710).

Here is the source for each of the quotes individually:

"Some of my liberal friends just say he’s a disaster and can see nothing good that he’s done" Source: Bob Keeler, "Pope John Paul II: His Legacy," Newsday, April 3, 2005

"thousands upon thousands of Catholics in Europe and the United States would roll their eyes and retreat to the margins of the Church" Source: Daniel Williams and Alan Cooperman, "Conclave Begins with Day of Ritual," Washington Post, April 19, 2005.

"watching 115 men in liturgical dress. There isn’t a woman among them" Source: "Special Report," April 18, 2005, ABC News Transcripts (available on Lexis-Nexis) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 173.233.163.79 (talk) 02:57, 19 February 2012 (UTC)