John Shelby Spong, Bruce D Chilton, Sr Jeannine Gramick, and William V. D'Antonio ~

A seeringly honest spiritual autobiography, with rare insights into the inner workings of the Roman Catholic Church's decision making processes. Paul Murray, a gay priest, invites his readers into his journey, his paradoxes and his tensions. This book defiantly asserts that the problem facing the Catholic Church today is not the presence of homosexual clergy in its ranks, it is the reality of a threatened, repressed and compromised ecclesiastical hierarchy. Anyone reading this book will come to the same conclusion. ~ John Shelby Spong, Author, Jesus for the Non-Religious

This memoir is the compelling story of an honest, sensitive priest, and the tragic tale of a hierarchy that has lost its way in its desire to control the Church rather than nurture it. Father Murray entered the Roman Catholic Church and trained for its ministry during an epoch when the reforms of the Second Vatican Council were fresh in memory-- and vigorous in their influence. His conversion came with an intellectual intensity reminiscent of Thomas Merton's. But beginning with John Paul II and continuing now with Benedict XVI, popes have taken powers to themselves that the Council declared belonged to the people of God as a whole. One result is the Vatican's incoherent attitude towards human sexuality, which is alternatively lax when it concerns those who do not challenge the teaching of the Church, and reactionary when it involves those who honestly ask whether sexual expression can be transformed by Christ's grace together with human relations as a whole. No book sets out more clearly and urgently the tragedy and the prospects of the current crisis of Catholicism. ~ Bruce Chilton, Bernard Iddings Bell Professor of Religion. Bard College

Paul Murray, a priest of the Washington DC Archdiocese, has written a very personal and moving account of his life from early adolescence to his current position as a member of the faculty of Bard College. Paul’s story is about the struggle between growing awareness of his homosexuality and his strong sense of religious faith which he seeks to bring to fruition via the priesthood, early on through the Episcopal Church and then as he converts to Roman Catholicism. The book is both a confession of faith and another chapter in our growing awareness of homosexuality in the priesthood. Paul makes clear the distinction between being a homosexual and being a gay priest. In regard to the latter, Paul reveals a bit about the active gay life of priests; in the process, the reader comes to understand that as with heterosexuals life is very much about the search for social interaction and friendship, as it is about sexual attraction and love. This book is an important addition to the growing body of literature about homosexuality and being gay in the Roman Catholic priesthood. It reveals the often untenable situation faced by priests like Paul, as they struggle to survive in a hierarchic system that professes no tolerance for homosexuals. In Paul’s case, his is the story of a personal manifesto of faith, spiritual resilience, and a lifetime commitment to the priesthood in the face of the personal and institutional costs brought on by the Catholic hierarchy’s inability and/or unwillingness to address the experience of human sexuality whether in or outside of the priesthood. ~ William V. D'Antonio, Sociologist and co-author, American Catholics Today: New Realities of their Faith and their Church 2007.

This is an absorbing story of one man’s struggle of clashing with the current political, religious, and sexual mainstreams as he journeys toward self-identity and personal freedom as a gay priest. We glimpse a clerical world, at successive ecclesiastical junctures, redolent of opposition to individual autonomy. Told in eloquent prose, this memoir is a bold indictment of proclaiming any “truth” that is unknown by the heart. ~ Sister Jeannine Gramick, SL, National Coalition of American Nuns, Executive Co-Director

This is a very unusual autobiography being as it is the story and faith reasonings of an openly gay catholic priest. The subject matter is controversial - especially in light of all the press about gay priests in the catholic church, and on the homosexual debate within the anglican church as well. What is most important in this book though is that Paul Murray reasons through his homosexuality and makes valid points that it is denying the truth of oneself that most often causes problems. Certainly this is a book that should be read by people engaging in the debate who have not had direct personal contact with those who are called to serve and yet are homosexual. It is a searingly honest account of one mans journey and the dichotomy of his needs. ~ Melanie Carroll, for The Good BookStall website