Two garbage books
In my last post I reviewed Jon Sweeney’s biography about renegade cleric Fr. James Martin. It’s really not a book worth reading. I suppose that it’s the opposite of hagiography when you think about it. Pray for the lost soul.
Back in 2017 Fr. James Martin released a book called Building a Bridge which talks about how the Church can reach out to the LGBT community. Here’s my review of the book:
Naturally, Sweeney’s biography talks about the release of this book. On page 144, Sweeney writes:
The outpouring of response to Building a Bridge did not translate easily into book sales. Thirteen months in and sales were only 15,590 copies according to Nielsen BookScan, an industry data provider that counts copies purchased at major retailers, online and brick-and-mortar. BookScan does not include copies purchased at Catholic shops. Eighteen weeks after the release of the second edition, sales according to BookScan were just 3,704.
These numbers were uncommon for a James Martin book. His popularity was at its zenith before Building a Bridge. My Life with the Saints for instance, had sold 118,762 copies to date across three editions as of the day when these Bridge numbers were accessed.
I must admit I was a bit shocked by a these low numbers; at least initially. Why would this major homosexualist Catholic celebrity not be running up the huge numbers in sales when he had for his previous books? After a bit of reflection, it started to make sense.
First of all, most active Catholics disagree with James Martin’s views on the LGBT community. I’ll have to hand it to Fr. Martin that he’s really good at walking a tight rope. He’s very careful in what he says to make it sound like he’s not officially promoting homosexuality. The amount of scandal is simply through the roof and he knows it. So, active Catholics typically wouldn’t be interested in heresy. I mean, I bought the book but I essentially had to so I could review it. Nothing more.
What about the supporters of Fr. Martin? He does have supporters after all; why aren’t they buying it in droves? The truth is that his supporters aren’t interested in truth. They like the idea of being Catholic and endorsing the LGBT community. They know deep down that it goes against Church teaching but that doesn’t matter to them. The god that they worship isn’t the God of the Bible, but the god they see in the mirror every morning. In other words, they don’t need to be convinced. Their highest authority has already said that it’s okay.
So that’s why Fr. Martin’s book won’t sell. It really serves no purpose for the Christian or those pretending to be one. The latter group constitutes most of the followers of Fr. James Martin. To summarize, I certainly wouldn’t read Building a Bridge(people seem to agree with me on this one judging by sales) or Sweeney’s biography of Fr. Martin. If you want to read some decent literature, you can always click the Recommended Reading tab at the top of this website and start there.
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