Catholics
By Brian Moore

160 Pages • $12.95

QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION
AND REFLECTION

The Unoriginal Sinner and the Ice-Cream God
By John R. Powers

[Open a pdf version]

Use the following questions as guides to deeper individual understanding of the novel or for group discussion.

1. This novel is set in an indeterminate time, sometime after “Vatican IV.” Does the state of the church as described in the novel strike you as possible in the future? Why or why not?

2. Describe the character of James Kinsella. What does he believe in? Why has he been sent to the abbey? What is the primary interreligious concern that the abbey’s existence is thought to threaten?

3. Why do you think Kinsella is angered (p. 11) when the hotel keeper tells him that public confessions “never took” in his area?

4. Kinsella has some difficulties in Cahirciveen because he doesn’t “look like” a priest, and he doesn’t refer to himself normally as “Father.” Do you think the appearance of and the titles used in reference to clergy and religious are important? At their best, what do they help us see? At their worst, what harm do you think they can do?

5. Kinsella sees a rainbow, and turns from it (p. 28). What does his gesture reveal about his own beliefs?

6. Describe the abbot’s character. What is his attitude toward what is going on at the abbey and on the island? What statements does he make that surprise Kinsella?

7. The abbot tells Kinsella that he does not like living on the island, that he doesn’t think he really has a vocation for it, but also that this doesn’t mean he would prefer to be somewhere else. What does this mean? Have you ever felt like this about your life situation? How might you explain the paradox to someone else?

8. What is the stated reason, in the letter from the father general, for asking that the Tridentine liturgies stop? What do you think of this reasoning?

9. What are Father Manus’s objections to the new rite (pp. 56–59)? What does Kinsella, in his conversation with the abbot (p. 84), say that he believes about the Mass?

10. What is the surprise about the abbot’s own spiritual life? What is his own assessment of what he has become?

11. Catholics presents a world of changing, even fading, faith, two very different versions of which are represented by the monks of Muck Abbey and by James Kinsella. Is the disparity between their approaches to faith caused by the changes in the church, or was this disparity the reason the changes were made?

12. What are the abbot and his monks doing in the final scene of the novel?

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