This text has arrived at a very appropriate moment given the crisis in the US Catholic Church. How are we to understand the church in this moment, in the face of the betrayal of sexual and financial scandals? Who is the church? How does the way we identify the church and shape the response of the church in this time of catastrophe (and make no mistake this is a catastrophe)? In the midst of such pain and anger, Flanagan examines the identity of the church and asks and answers important questions about identity, composition, and aim of a faith community that presents itself through both sin and sanctity.

First, this book is neither diatribe nor screed against the church and the current crisis. Rather, it is a theologically sound, liturgically grounded exploration of the nature of the very contradiction that lies at the heart of ecclesial reality: how can the church be both holy and sinful? Flanagan answers by way of the ancient maxim legem credendi, lex statuat supplicandi (the law of praying establishes the law of believing). Another way to state this is that the public, communal prayer of the church both expresses who we are and forms us into that living reality, a reality that is both holy and sinful. This choice of approach is important given a cultural milieu that identifies the term “church” with church leadership and emphasizes the institution over and above the living community.

Flanagan establishes his arguments soundly within the liturgy of the church, an activity that both manifests and transforms ecclesial identity. The text is well organized and moves through an analysis of holiness and sin by way of liturgical expression, clearly noting the historical and theological understandings of these concepts and presenting them in light of the principles of Vatican II. He goes on to explore the nature of church as a liturgically established communal ecclesiology that must face the evil (defined as absence of God) in its midst, reconcile with the sinful reality of its actions, and in so doing grow in holiness characterized by eschatological hope. In other words, the church is both sin and sanctity at the same time. This is sin that must be recognized and named if mercy and reconciliation are to be possible. The essential communal nature of the church, liturgically expressed, reveals that we are asking that our sin be forgiven if we are to reconcile, if we are to have hope. This does not mean that those who caused such damage should not be held to account; the opposite in fact must occur, both for the sake of their victims and the wider church. Flanagan is presenting a path forward from darkness and an absence of love into a church of spirit and life.

This text, as Flanagan himself notes up front, is a theological exploration at thirty thousand feet. He is not trying to land the plane but rather provide necessary foundational theological arguments into the communal nature of the church so that they may be used in a further pastoral response. The text is well written, organized, and will make an excellent addition to upper-level undergraduate or graduate questions on ecclesiological and liturgical responses to the betrayal of leadership that the church faces today.