Telling Truths in Church

Scandal, Flesh, and Christian Speech

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by Mark D. Jordan

Beacon Press

Due/Published June 2004, 128 pages, paper

ISBN 0807010553

New in paper (S04)

In the wake of the recent pedophilia scandals in the Catholic church, we have begun to see a questioning of the relations between hierarchical power, secrecy, and sexuality in institutional religion. In this climate, Jordan offers a look at truth-telling in church--what truths about same-sex love and sexuality need to be told, and the difficulty of telling any truths.

The meditations that make up Telling Truths in Church are thus both a response to the scandals and an attempt to think beyond them to a more comprehensive understanding of what they might mean--for Catholicism in particular, but more broadly for all the Christian churches. In five chapters, Jordan writes of speaking of secrets about sex and about same-sex love; the telling of truth to and about God; and acknowledging our feelings about God's flesh. He also considers forms for suppressing and for offering truths, and the way language may reveal or hide them.