Andrew M. Greeley (1928–2013)

This is a fascinating diary from the the final days in 2004 of Pope Saint John Paul II to the election Benedict XVI as successor. Fa. Greeley has a reformist bent and calls out for a democratic papal election process as well as greater equality for women in the Catholic Church, including ordination as priests. His insider view of the convocation in Rome seasoned with his progressive criticisms made for entertaining reading.

THE PRIESTLY SINS, by Andrew Greeley.

I bought this 2004 book at a library sale for half a buck. Worth every penny, and maybe a little more. I'd never read anything by Andrew Greeley, although I knew about him. A Catholic priest who was often at the center of controversy, Greeley wrote dozens of books, including several novels like this one, as well as a series of mysteries starring Bishop Blackie Ryan (a la the Father Dowling mysteries, I suspect), and many others. I was sad to find that show more Greeley died in 2013, because I would have liked to have contacted him and talked about writers and books. Would have asked him if he was a fan of Ralph McInerny's Dowling books, or if he'd read the same author's now nearly forgotten potboiler, THE PRIEST - a book I read and enjoyed back in the 70s. Or, certainly, J.F. Powers's work, especially his darkly comic classic, MORTE D'URBAN.

In any case, THE PRIESTLY SINS was a most entertaining and near-gripping sort of story, with a most likeable and very human protagonist in Father Herman Hugh Hoffmann, whose life story we pretty much get here. Hugh grew up in a loving Volga Deutsche, or Russian German, family in the Prairie State - obviously Illinois, Greeley's own stomping ground. We learn of his youthful affair with a red-haired Irish Girl, Kathleen, and then of his strong vocation and commitment to the priesthood. The crux of the story is how Hugh becomes a whistle-blower on a fellow priest who is a serial and sadistic pedophile; how the Archdiocese turns on Hugh, ostracizes him and tries - natch - to brush it all under the rug. It's a great story, Greeley is a fine writer and a masterful storyteller.

The story was marred only by a kitschy twist of Hugh 'seeing' a long-dead great grandmother here and there at various times, an attempt to lend the tale a supernatural or ghost-story effect, I suppose. I just found it annoying and dumb, and tried to overlook it. Otherwise a very good book, one that brought to mind Canadian author Linden MacIntyre's Nova Scotia trilogy with its middle book, THE BISHOP'S MAN (which I think is a better book than Greeley's). But if you want an entertaining and thought-provoking book about the Catholic Church's sex abuse scandals, here's a good one. Highly recommended. show less

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This is the last of seven books by Greeley set in and around Irish Chicago in the late twentieth century; the only other one I had read was the first in the series, Virgin and Martyr, which I thoroughly enjoyed many years ago. This was also thoroughly enjoyable, the story of Lorcan Flynn, a mostly respectable businessman who becomes motivated to dig into mysterious events of his youth - how he lost his first love, and the death of her relatives in an show more unsolved explosion thirty-five years earlier -and starts to uncover answers that are difficult to live with. As was usually the case with Greeley, his protagonists are flawed but have their own kind of integrity (apart from a couple of cartoony villains), and underpinning a lot of is lies an optimistic view of an imperfect church. Not deep literature but a fun read. show less

Not bad. I don't expect much from Greeley--no more than I expect from most contemporary mystery novels. This one surpassed my expectations while also delivering the required (for me, at this time) escape from "heavy" writing!

Although the ending (almost always the problem) was a bit facile with a complete turn-about for one of the characters I still enjoyed it. Greeley did a bit of sermonizing, but that did not bother me. I always enjoy trying to put a pin (as it were) on the place where I show more think my sister and nephew-in-law would throw the book across the room. The first one that stood out for me this time was when someone nearly died in an accident, but said (roughly), "I just took communion, so I knew I'd go straight to heaven." Of course, to be fair, they would not throw the book anywhere since they would never pick it up in the first place!!

A fun read, and I would recommend it. show less