New book of Evyatar Marienberg: Catholicism Now

Evyatar Marienberg, a Jewish Israeli who is at present a member of the academic faculty of the Department of Comparative Religion at the University of North Carolina in the USA, has written an introduction to the contemporary Catholic Church in Hebrew.

Marienberg, who is a researcher in Talmud, also studied at the Institut catholique in Paris and taught at Tel Aviv University before finding his place in the academic world in the US. His new book: "Catholicism Now: An introduction to the contemporary Catholic Church" (Carmel Editions, Jerusalem, 2010) focuses on a detailed description of the life of Catholic believers. In his writing, Marienberg was assisted by many Catholic priests and lay people including members in our kehillot.

The book represents a great contribution to Hebrew readers because a book that describes the life of the Catholic Church in Hebrew has indeed been missing. The author says on the first page of the book:
"The knowledge of the Jewish public in Israel regarding Christianity in general and the Catholic Church in particular is very limited. Even in academic frameworks, where a student might indeed study early Christianity or medieval Christianity, the chances that he or she might learn about contemporary Christianity are minimal. In order to try and fill this lacuna even in a small way, I proposed an annual course on the contemporary Catholic Church at Tel Aviv University from 2004 to 2006/ During the course and while preparing it, the lacuna with regard to Hebrew language written information, available to the students, was noticeable. This book was born out of this background".

In the introduction, the author explains:
"One in every six residents of the planet is a member of the Catholic Church. The object of this book is to allow the Hebrew readers to get to know the religious world of this enormous human group. The book does not deal with the history of the Church. It is interested in the situation today, at the beginning of the 21^st century. Those interested in studying the history of the catholic church in particular and the history of the Christian world in general will not find what they are looking for in this book but will be able to find other excellent books in Hebrew on this subject (*) (…) The purpose of the book is to describe the contemporary situation and not its origins.

The book, 287 pages, discusses various aspects of the life of Catholics. The contents include the following chapters:
-          Catholic history with great brevity – beginning with Jesus and ending with the Second Vatican Council and its consequences.
-          Being Catholic – discussing the central aspects of Catholic identity.
-          Catholic faith – including a discussion of the formulae of the Creed.
-          The Catholic Church – describing the structure of the Church in detail.
-          Catholic ritual – explaining the sacraments and their importance in the life of the Church.
-          The Catholic calendar – surveying the feasts and special days of prayer in the life of the Church.
-          Catholic challenges – discussing some of the hot topics with which the Catholic church is dealing in the modern world.
The author added a few appendices to the book. One describes the Eastern Catholic Churches and another surveys the Christian presence in Israel ( and here the author also briefly mentions the Hebrew speaking Catholics) and at the end of the book there is a list of terminology explaining basic Church terms to the Hebrew reader.

We welcome the publication of this book and thank the author for his great effort to make sure the book would be published.

(*) It is worthwhile to note the books mentioned by the author in this footnote: Aviad Kleinberg, Christianity from its beginnings to the Reformation (1995), Miri Eliav-Paldon, The Protestant Reformation (1997), Sophia Menache, The Catholic Church in the Middle Ages: Ideology and Politics (4 volumes) (2006); Rivka Nir, Primitive Christianity: The first three centuries (2009); Pau Figueras, The Spirit and the Bride: Six Chapters on Primitive Christianity (2007); Eitan Borstein, Lexicon of Christianity (2005).