Angela Bonavoglia

THE INSPIRING TRUE STORIES OF:

SISTER JOAN CHITTISTER, who refused to obey a Vatican order not to speak at the first international conference for women’s ordination groups worldwide.

MARY RAMERMAN, a wife and mother ordained a Catholic priest before 3,000 jubilant supporters in a packed theater in Rochester, New York.

SISTER JEANNINE GRAMICK, who built a pioneering ministry to gays, despite Vatican orders to silence her and ban her ministry.

FRANCES KISSLING, whose fight for women’s reproductive rights has shaken the Church at its highest levels.

BARBARA BLAINE, the priest sex abuse survivor who created the most powerful voice for victims nationwide.

“I am no innocent bystander. I am a woman with a history, a woman scarred, a woman at her wit’s end. I abide the women in this book. I echo their words. I applaud their patience. And I remind this Church how fortunate it is to have such brilliant and devoted women clamoring for the Catholic hierarchy to open its doors, bring the wizard out of the sacristy, rethink the sacred with women in mind, and make a new Catholic Church.”

So says journalist and author Angela Bonavoglia in the introduction to her provocative new book: GOOD CATHOLIC GIRLS: How Women Are Leading the Fight to Change the Church.

The recently exposed transgressions of priests within the Roman Catholic Church stunned the faithful, implicated the hierarchy, and sent a new surge of energy through the progressive Church reform movement in the United States.

Despite the movement’s growing profile, only recently has the world learned that Catholic women are the driving force behind reform. GOOD CATHOLIC GIRLS is a compelling account of those amazing and courageous women, as seen through the eyes of a sympathetic Catholic everywoman, author Bonavoglia.

Backed by supporters worldwide, these women are re-thinking Catholic theology and changing the face of ministry. They are resurrecting the lost lives of female Church leaders and boldly moving ahead with women's ordination.

They are challenging the Church’s sexual repression, defending the victims of clergy sex abuse, campaigning for optional celibacy, and calling the Church to openness and accountability.

Their work is brave, provocative and vital, for what becomes of women in the Catholic Church will determine what becomes of the Church itself. As GOOD CATHOLIC GIRLS illustrates, the Church ignores them at its peril.