RELIGIOUS LIFE IN AMERICA
A New Day Dawning

Contemporary religious life is just now emerging from a period following the Second Vatican Council that has been both blessed and burdensome. Its members continue to face some formidable and complex challenges if their congregations are to survive and flourish in the new millennium. The work that lies ahead will require open minds, a willingness to surrender divisive ideological points of view, and a great deal of sacrifice. This book invites those interested in the future of religious life in America to take another look at the signs of the times and to derive hope from some of the positive elements to be found there: the growing number of men and women religious interested in committing themselves to an explicit life of prayer in welcoming communities dedicated to the proclamation of God’s Word and to works of reconciliation and peace aimed at transforming the world in which we live by engaging that world so as to evangelize it. Their challenge? To reclaim the values that lie at the heart of their way of living the Gospel and to express them in new form. This book, while hardly a manual, is practical in nature: it offers a number of specific recommendations about what might be done to further the renewal of religious congregations in the U.S. The questions at the end of each chapter are meant to foster further discussion and, hopefully, action that will advance the cause of consecrated life and its future in America.

About the Author: Sean D. Sammon, F.M.S., well-known to American religious as a Past President of the U.S. Conference of Major Superiors of Men, is presently the Superior General of the Marist Brothers. The author of a number of Alba House books including Alcoholism's Children (1989), An Undivided Heart: Making Sense of Celibate Chastity (1993), Life After Youth: Making Sense of One Man's Journey through the Transition at Mid-life (1997), and A Heart That Knew No Bounds: The Life and Mission of Saint Marcellin Champagnat (2000), he is also responsible for a number of Alba House video and audio-cassette programs including Coping with the Genuinely Difficult Person; Alcoholism's Children; Fidelity; and An Undivided Heart.