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Oct. 19, 2006
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Author takes readers inside
school of theology |
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Books shows struggles, triumphs
of five Sacred Heart seminarians |
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ST. FRANCIS — Few people experience life inside a seminary from first walking through the doors all the way to an ordination. A recently-published book, “The Collar” (Houghton-Mifflin) by Jonathan Englert, allows readers into the hallways, dorm rooms and classrooms of Sacred Heart School of Theology in Hales Corners. Englert profiles five seminarians during one academic year filled with questions, doubt, struggles, learning and for some, eventual triumph.
Englert, a journalist and author based in New York, spent several months during the 2002-2003 school year on the Sacred Heart campus.
“I was determined to write a book that went inside a seminary today,” said Englert, in a phone interview with your Catholic Herald.
The author tried to undertake the project at seminaries in two dioceses, but lost access in both. Then, Sacred Heart agreed to work with him.
“The rector understood what I wanted to do, and he understood that I wanted to tell the story in a way that hadn’t been told before. A fly on the wall sort of way. It’s a real credit to them that they meant ‘complete access,’” he said. “No one was ever hanging over my shoulder or telling me who to talk to or not to talk to. I stayed in the dorms, I went to classes, I ate there, I talked to everybody.”
Since the majority of seminarians at Sacred Heart are second career seminarians, some had been married, had children, grandchildren and careers. The seminarians profiled by Englert were in their 30s, 40s and 60s.
Celibacy is a recurring topic in the book, and one that each seminarian reflects upon. According to Englert, each seminarian was open to discussing it with him.
“If they’re not open about it, it’s a bad thing,” Englert explained. “If they’re reluctant to talk about it, it would raise a red flag. There’s a lot of emphasis on that. There’s also probably more emphasis on the idea of obedience. Celibacy is one aspect of becoming a priest today and an important one, but obedience — leaving a life where you called the shots, to leading a life where you don’t anymore. You call some, but not all. The demands of your time by parishioners and your obedience to the bishop, that all starts in the seminary. For some of them it’s a real struggle. You’re going to a world where self-sacrifice is crucial.”
While some of the seminarians were eventually ordained, some were not. Englert feels that reading this book would help those contemplating a call to priesthood.
“I think if you were contemplating seminary, ‘The Collar’ would be something you’d definitely want to read,” he said. “Because you’d get a sense of what the seminary is like. People think they have a vocation and try it out and they don’t. Someone could read “The Collar” and say ‘Maybe I shouldn’t be a priest.’ I think there would also be people who read it and think, ‘That’s where I should be.’”
Englert said the reaction to the book among those he profiled has been positive.
“They’ve read it now,” he said of the seminarians. “I think they were pretty happy with it. I’ve gotten some pretty good responses. The point of the book wasn’t to burn bridges; it wasn’t meant to ambush people. That’s not the kind of book it is. This is the long-form journalistic approach. You cultivate relationships that will provide you with a lot more material than you would with just a question and answer sort of journalism. I tried to get inside the heads of these guys. I’d take 20 pages of notes for one page in the book.”
Englert, who is Catholic, insisted that the book is objective, and that his own faith never obstructed the outcome.
“One of the motivating factors in writing this book was that I didn’t think the media did a good job of telling this story. With respect to the Catholic priesthood and seminary life, my experience was telling me before I wrote this book, the story wasn’t being told. So in a sense of objectivity, I think ‘The Collar’ is extremely objective because I took hours of notes and taped conversations, and I tried to capture every aspect I could of this experience.
“Catholicism gave me the edge of having empathy of vocation and spiritual struggle, and the vocabulary to address that and understand where the men are coming from and get it on the page.” |
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