David Gibson
It’s rare to find a book about the Catholic Church in America that doesn’t promote its author’s pet changes. “The Coming Catholic Church” is one of those rare books. Gibson identifies problems with Church leadership but does not draw the common conclusion that such failures mean that dogma and disciplines need to change. He does warn of the need for changes to avoid the dangers of clericalism and the lack of financial transparency seen in many dioceses.
Gibson occasionally misses the mark. For example, he underestimates the effects of younger priests and laity: the “John Paul II Catholics”. While covering the past glories of the American Catholic Church and chronicling its recent problems, he ignores the renewal that’s coming from that post-baby boom, post-Vatican II generation.