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Great Modern Catholic Short Stories
Includes 10 stories about nuns, seven stories about monks, and nine stories about priests; by a variety of 20th century American and British authors.
Hardcover
Published January 1, 1942
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March 16, 2026
Published in 1942, this candid collection of 26 short stories makes for heartfelt reading. For those of us of a particular age and station, it's also a deceptive reminder of a perceived "simpler time," if such a thing ever existed. Once the reader gets into it, though, they quickly come to appreciate the "normal, intelligent persons doing normal, intelligent work," against a realistic backdrop of convents, monasteries, and the daily routine of parish life.
The stories range from the lighthearted - Frank O'Connor's young Jackie has a delightfully unlikely ally in the priest as he makes his "First Confession" - to the truly reflective, as an elderly sister whose entire religious life has been spent in one place, prepares for her "Jubilee At Baysweep" (Richard Sullivan).
And it is a surprising cast of authors featured in this collection. O'Connor and Antonia White. Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Katherine Mansfield and Sean O'Faolain. All and more in one volume, thanks to the efforts of Sister Mariella Gable, O.S.B., who was for many years an English professor at the College of St. Benedict at St. John's University. Also a Dante scholar, poet, editor and writer. She was, by all testaments, no slouch, banished from the campus for four years by the local bishop for allowing the inclusion of The Catcher in the Rye on one faculty member's suggested reading list. And all before the changes brought to religious life by Vatican II.
A wonderful collection of stories! Whether or not you're Catholic!
The stories range from the lighthearted - Frank O'Connor's young Jackie has a delightfully unlikely ally in the priest as he makes his "First Confession" - to the truly reflective, as an elderly sister whose entire religious life has been spent in one place, prepares for her "Jubilee At Baysweep" (Richard Sullivan).
And it is a surprising cast of authors featured in this collection. O'Connor and Antonia White. Ernest Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Katherine Mansfield and Sean O'Faolain. All and more in one volume, thanks to the efforts of Sister Mariella Gable, O.S.B., who was for many years an English professor at the College of St. Benedict at St. John's University. Also a Dante scholar, poet, editor and writer. She was, by all testaments, no slouch, banished from the campus for four years by the local bishop for allowing the inclusion of The Catcher in the Rye on one faculty member's suggested reading list. And all before the changes brought to religious life by Vatican II.
A wonderful collection of stories! Whether or not you're Catholic!
Displaying 1 of 1 review