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Reviewed by Robert John Popoff for Readers' Favorite
Debra Maria Flint and Paul Murphy-Sanderson deserve credit for addressing a painful and long-neglected subject within Roman Catholicism in their book, The Sins of Mandatory Celibacy. Anyone who reads Murphy-Sanderson's testimony will sense that this was not an easy book to write. It gives voice to suffering the institutional Church has spent decades ignoring, and it is unflinching in confronting clerical abuse and the culture of silence that has too often protected power rather than the victim. The authors' willingness to engage such emotionally devastating material should not be understated. Where the book is at its most powerful, it exposes institutional failure plainly and lets the testimony carry its own moral weight; Murphy-Sanderson's account is harrowing, restrained, and ultimately the heart of the book.
The historical and theological chapters are less consistent. The argument is sincere and often thoughtful, but at times it asks Scripture and tradition to support firmer conclusions than the texts themselves can bear. At times, the book’s polemic arguments draw firm conclusions where the historical evidence may allow for other interpretations. These are the moments where careful readers, including those broadly sympathetic to the book's aims, may reasonably part ways with the authors. Even so, the book's central achievement is not its argument but its refusal of silence; it brings a difficult conversation into the open and asks hard questions with honesty and heart. Murphy-Sanderson's story lingers well beyond the final page, and whatever conclusions readers reach, they will come away moved, challenged, and unable to regard the subject quite as they did before. Debra Maria Flint and Paul Murphy-Sanderson have written something brave and necessary, and readers willing to sit with its difficult truths will be glad they did.
