Best Catholic Writing 2006

The admired Best Catholic Writing series continues with contributions from Peggy Noonan, Robert Ellsberg, Pope Benedict XVI, Thomas Lynch, John Allen, and twenty-two other essayists, poets, novelists, scholars, and journalists. The selections bring vivid Catholic personalities to life (Dorothy Day, Flannery O’Connor, Pope John Paul II), address ethical issues and spiritual problems (torture, medical treatment at the end of life, the problem of suffering), and ask provocative questions (Are young Catholics embracing orthodoxy? Does the Church condemn evolution? Was Shakespeare a secret Catholic?).

Notable essays in this year’s edition include Kevin Cullen’s profile of a former IRA terrorist now studying for the priesthood, Robert Lockwood’s argument with the conventional wisdom about the Crusades, Colm Toibin’s meditation on the public face of John Paul II, poetry by Mary Oliver and Seamus Heaney, and a Wall Street Journal portrait of nuns who finance their nursing homes by begging in the streets. The collection includes writing from the UK and Australia, as well as material first published on the Internet. 138667