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______the new men
INSIDE THE VATICAN'S ELITE SCHOOL FOR AMERICAN PRIESTS

293 PAGES

BY MARK ATHITAKIS | in the mysterious, cloistered world of the Vatican, Catholic seminarians are at once everything and nothing. Crippled by scandals and diminishing congregations, the Vatican is banking on the next generation of priests not only to save souls, but to rescue the church itself. The students at the Pontifical North American College in Rome are its hope for the future, but in the four years they spend before ordination they mean little and get treated like any other soul seeking a definition for its faith and commitment. Which makes the Vatican that Brian Murphy describes in "The New Men" a deeply schizophrenic one, and in tracking six of the school's first-year students, he doesn't uncover any hard answers to their dilemmas. But as any priest will tell you, sometimes asking the questions alone counts for something, and Murphy's book offers an intriguing and often revelatory glimpse into their sheltered lives.

In many ways, the first-year students at the college -- the "New Men" -- aren't so different from the freshmen at any college. They get homesick, struggle to know one another, discover a new city and balance a full load of classes -- a rigorous schedule that's characterized by the school as a sort of Catholic West Point. But the Church is no longer trying to hammer its seminarians into a canonical lockstep or compelling them to simply mouth chapter and verse and fill space in some needy diocese. Each of the six students Murphy follows is different in ways the church has begun to celebrate and encourage. They joke, they play flag football games, they indulge in the occasional fine cigar, they make furrow-browed long-distance calls to the women they left behind. But mostly they quietly panic, constantly praying for insight into their place in the Church, their relationship to their past lives and the wisdom of their choices.

"Be careful not to stash away unresolved problems about who and what you are trying to become," the faculty cautions its students. And the problems are legion: one of a pair a twins -- both attending the school -- wonders if he's merely following in his brother's footsteps. Another considers abandoning the school to join the Benedictine monks. Murphy dwells heavily on the question of celibacy, and while it's surely a concern, it's difficult to tell whether he's simply reporting the problem or amplifying it; sex is the preeminent topic of the students' conversations, while deeper spiritual issues get relegated to lip service. Murphy's been given carte blanche to interview the students as well as their teachers and parents, but occasionally one wants him to drill deeper into the smaller spiritual crises they face, a task that Frank Bianco's "Voices of Silence: Lives of the Trappists Today" performed masterfully. Murphy's attempt to show a secular side to the priesthood is admirable, but it can be frustratingly limited in scope. We know the students' personalities deeply. Their souls, however, still remain clouded in many ways.
SALON | Oct. 22, 1997

Mark Athitakis is a regular contributor to Salon. He lives in San Francisco.