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Women: Models of Liberation. By Mayeski Marie Anne. Kansas City, MO: Sheed & Ward, 1989. xii + 240 pages. $12.95 (paper).

On the American scene, in the nineteenth century, the writer raises the question of whether or not it is possible to be Catholic and American given the strength of the American drive to equality and independence. Again with broad strokes she traces the growth of the immigrant church in the United States with its ethnic minorities and enormous acceleration through the Catholic school system. But she notes that the simple piety of immigrant Catholics shifts in the late twentieth century to mainstream Catholicity with its touch of liberalism so recently condemned as the "phantom heresy" of Americanism. Under the rubric of patriarchy Donovan examines the fate of sisters as the new Code of Canon Law becomes official in 1983 and leaves the relationship of obedience to authority in the same mode of dominance and submission mode it had in the earlier forms of religious life. Her claim is that the thesis of two natures among humans, one of men and the other of women, based as it must be on sex differences and hence reproduction, must yield to a single nature theory divisions of labor in worship, language, responsibility for the church, and the roles of the laity will then take varied and more functional forms. She observes that the institutionalization of male power has also included male privilege, noting that this is contrary to an authentic modern adult relationship and lacks credibility today. After reviewing the agenda of works of justice and peace women commit themselves to, Donovan concludes that a new era is upon us. She ends asking the same question with which she began: What does it mean to be a women in the church, an ecclesial women? She answers: down through history, many different things. But now the signs of the times call for a peer relationship that challenges old structures of advantage for men. This reflective essay will engender serious thought, discussion, and maybe even some social action for needed changes in church and society.