Alice McDermott is pictured in a 2013 photo. (CNS photo/courtesy Epic Photography Jamie Schoenberger)
By Anna Weaver
Hawaii Catholic Herald
When Alice McDermott began work on her most recent novel, “The Ninth Hour,” she had no intention of writing about Catholic nuns.
“I was really displeased with myself when the first nun showed up in the first chapter,” she told those gathered to hear her speak on Sept. 21 at the third biennial Catholic Imagination Conference at Loyola University Chicago.
And yet “The Ninth Hour,” which came out in fall 2017, is perhaps the most overtly Catholic of her novels, which are all streaked with her faith.
An America magazine book review of McDermott’s 2013 novel “Someone” seems to describe her writing at large: “It is Catholic and humane and open to transcendence. It recognizes sin and failure and distinguishes the two. It portrays ordinary human suffering and pain thoughtfully. It has wit and surprise.”
McDermott told the crowd that it’s been harder to keep holding on to her Catholicism after the clerical abuse crisis reemerged in 2018, saying that “institutional corruption has seeped into my faith life in the last year.”
“This is an existential moment for the church,” she said. She finds herself at the intersection between having a difficult time going to Mass and staying Catholic to be a part of change in the church.
McDermott spoke about a small women’s group she’s in that drew up “five theses” on ways the church needs to change in light of the abuse crisis. The points include full transparency, survivors’ voices, simple living, putting women in church leadership, and praying for a reformed church.
The women posted the list on the church door a la Martin Luther and distributed it to all the leaders at a U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops gathering.
She believes that it’s the average lay Catholic that will make changes in the church for the better, through speaking and working with each other.
This question McDermott brought forth of why someone stays Catholic was a recurring theme throughout the Catholic Imagination Conference. What heartened me is the many deeply engaged and thoughtful Catholics who attended the gathering (close to 500). They have remained in the church and are finding ways to make a difference through their own creative voices.
As McDermott put it, a writer’s impulse is “to hurl words against suffering, against meaninglessness.”
We need that more than ever.
Read Anna Weaver’s posts from the Catholic Imagination Conference at Loyola University Chicago here.
