Transforming Post-Catholic Ireland is the first major book to explore the dynamic religious landscape of contemporary Ireland, north and south, and to analyse the island’s religious transition. It confirms that the Catholic Church’s long-standing ‘monopoly’ has well and truly disintegrated, replaced by a mixed, post-Catholic religious ‘market’ featuring new and growing expressions of Protestantism, as well as other religions. It describes how people of faith are developing ‘extra-institutional’ expressions of religion, keeping their faith alive outside or in addition to the institutional Catholic Church.
Drawing on island-wide surveys of clergy and laypeople, as well as more than 100 interviews, this book describes how people of faith are engaging with key issues such as increased diversity, reconciliation to overcome the island’s sectarian past, and ecumenism. It argues that extra-institutional religion is especially well-suited to address these and other issues due to its freedom and flexibility when compared to traditional religious institutions. It describes how those who practice extra-institutional religion have experienced personal transformation, and analyses the extent that they have contributed to wider religious, social, and political change. On an island where religion has caused much pain, from clerical sexual abuse scandals, to sectarian violence, to a frosty reception for some immigrants, those who practice their faith outside traditional religious institutions may hold the key to transforming post-Catholic Ireland into a more reconciled society.
Read the first chapter for free on the Oxford University Press webpage.
Comments about the Book:
‘In the island of Ireland secularization came late and came fast. Gladys Ganiel offers new ways into this transformation. One such is the concept of “extra-institutional” religion which exists ‘on the margins’. In the course of Ganiel’s empirically driven analyses we meet real people who do real things which matter to themselves and to others. The result is action-research at its very best.’
Professor Grace Davie, Professor Emeritus of Sociology of Religion, University of Exeter
‘The collapse of the Catholic Church in Ireland has been dramatic, but it has not simply left a secular space. Drawing on rich new data, Gladys Ganiel introduces us to the range of “extra-institutional” religion emerging from the wreckage. Her sharp analysis of what is happening, and her reflections on the significance of these new developments, will be of interest a wide range of readers.’
Professor Linda Woodhead, Professor of Sociology of Religion, Lancaster University
Reviews
Church Times feature article by Madeleine Davies
The Journal of the Irish Society for the Academic Study of Religions by Adrian Stringer
Journal of Contemporary Religion by Tom Inglis
Reviews in Religion & Theology by Vladimir Kmec
Irish Theological Quarterly Review by Brian Conway
Etudes Irlandaises (Irish Studies) Review by Catherine Maignant
‘Reading Religion’ (website of the American Academy of Religion) Review by Amy Heath-Carpentier
Interview on News Talk FM with Sean Moncrieff
Irish Times Review by Eamon Maher: Transforming Post-Catholic Ireland_ Religious Practice in Late Modernity review
Patrick Mitchel: Questions for the Churches from Transforming Post-Catholic Ireland