Catholicism as a monolithic structure is disappearing.  Once the man who differed with the party line stole quietly away.  Now he refuses to abandon his communion with God.  From a timid rebellion has grown a courageous confrontation.  This is not merely the roar of angry young men.  It is the fruit of a tortuous, a studious examination of the foundations of faith.  Faith has passed from the passive and complete acceptance of a body of truth to the honest search of commitment.

The world has become man-centered, meaning-centered and the individual measures the traditional truths in terms of personal value.  He refuses to accept irrelevant sermons, a sterile liturgy, a passé and speculative theology which explores publicly dry and distant formulas, a law which does not explain its own origins.  He demands a pastor who reaches him in honest dialogue.  He will not be bullied by an authoritarian demand for the observance of parish boundaries, nor by moralizing which ignores the truth and complex context of modern life.

The layman has witnessed a more humane Eucharistic fast, a more open view of mixed marriages, a more understanding discussion of the birth control problem and the dilemma of Catholic education.  He has recognized the human face of the Church which has been forced to change its expression or die.  This has given him the courage to hope and push for greater changes still.

This book is an account of a priest who has suffered in the leadership of a Church grown arrogant and inhumane.  It is the story of a suffering people witnessed in confession and private consultation.  It is the story of a suffering Church which often reflects a dishonest theology far more than a divine imperative.  This is a book born of the conviction that I can still be a Catholic, that I can still search for God and meaning in a Church which must exchange its authoritarian and regal robe for than of a suffering servant.  It is a book which hopes that the world can begin to appreciate our Catholic sincerity and than we, the members, can face a future life of freedom and joy within the Church. 

This is not the speculation of a professional theologian, although my education allows me to wear that hat.  It is the soul-searching plea of a Christian for an evaluation of what is Christian, and what is simply tired and imperious tradition.  I want to be a Christian, but I will not be terrorized into believing that the present structure of the Church is an adequate representation of the Christ of Gospel and history.  I merely tell you what Christianity means to me and ask you to reflect and discover if you share a part of my vision.  If you do, I want you to struggle with me to bring about its fulfillment.  If not, I ask you to tell me why, not to curse me with fleeting words of fear.

I will not give up my faith.  Nor will I accept the travesty, born of another age, which caricatures the Christian ideal.  Catholicism offers so much that is good and true that its faithful adherents cannot sit by passively and watch it settle into structured idealism.  It has so much to say, so much to offer, if only it can recognize the growing and positive drive for personalism in the world.  A religion which expects men to march in identical step and to chant a univocal doctrine ceases to draw the atomic man to the holy God.

Vatican II is only a spark, a beginning—but it marks the future with a ray of hope.  In the light of its encouragement I would like to describe my vision of the problem of an outdated Church and the direction in which we must move.  I do not write for the professional, but for the sincere man, simple or sophisticated, whose living search for meaning moves the professional theologian from his comfortable perch and forces him to examine his presuppositions.  I do not ask for a comfortable pew; far from it.  I ask for honest dialogue, an open hierarchy, a Church which does not have all the answers or expect all men to walk in the wooden cadence of frozen categories.  The recent Declaration on Religious Freedom leads me to believe that I do not hope in vain:

I write to tell the man who has been forced from the faith of his fathers: You can still believe and still be free.  You can only believe to the degree that you are free.  And so can I.