John Courtney Murray in a Cold War Context [Paperback]

This thought-provoking work examines American Catholic theologian John Courtney Murray, whose beliefs featured an enthusiastic endorsement of America and thorough condemnation of communism, in the context of the Cold War debates of the 1950s. This was a time when Catholics were still perceived with suspicion by the mainstream. The book contends that the rhetoric of the Cold War was more than merely an ingredient of John Courtney Murray's public theology-it was part of the very foundation of his thinking.John Courtney Murray in a Cold War Contextargues that Murray, and other American Catholics, recognized, through the Cold War milieu, an opportunity to reconcile their religious tradition with their own political affiliation.Thomas W. O'Brienis Assistant Professor of Catholic Social Thought in the Religious Studies Department at DePaul University. The author holds a Ph.D. in Moral Theology from the University of St. Michael's College (University of Toronto).

O'Brien skillfully explains the nineteenth-century papal rejection of the American proposal of church-state separation...[he] raises the question of how much the Cold War context of the 1950s with its pro-American, anti-Communist, context influenced Murray's ideas and, further more, whether such theories remain valid today. Kevin B. Fagan, California State University, San Luis Obispo, California,Journal of Church and State

His initial chapters on Americanism and Roman Catholic Anticommunism are superior to the matched chapters on Murray's own version of them. J. Leon Hooper, S.J., Woodstock Theological Center,Horizons: The Magazine of Presbyterian Women

O'Brien's worthwhile study of John Courtney Murray's impact upon his Church and nation posits&challenges&to the sometimes glib canonization of Murray's thought [that] merit serious consideration. James P. Flint, Benedictine University,Journal of Ecclesiastical History

Chapter 1 Acknowledgments
Chalc