Asian Catholicism and the Remaking of Contemporary Families (Contemporary Asian Catholics)

Asian Catholicism and the Remaking of Contemporary Families (Contemporary Asian Catholics)

Foreword by José Casanova Asian Catholicism and the Remaking of Contemporary Families attends to the ways in which Asian Catholics navigate and negotiate the ethical ideals, normative discourses, and devotional practices of their religion as they construct and reconstruct their understandings of the family in contemporary society. In addition to family structures based on biological ties, contributors to this volume also examine other kinship groups based on systems of mutual care, highlighting the multiple perspectives and diverse values shared by Asian Catholics who produce and define social groupings that are recognized as families. Featuring case studies from South, Southeast, and East Asia, these chapters complicate the conventional view that Catholicism disrupts local cultures, considering not only how Asian families and Catholicism mutually constitute and transform each other in terms of interfaith dialogue, ethnic identity, and clergy-laity dynamics, but also how marriage, kinship, and filial piety become sites of active engagement and constant negotiation with their faith in the shaping and living of their family relations. Despite being home to more than 140 million Catholics, Asia remains marginalized in Catholic studies. This excellent volume breaks new ground by showing how Catholicism both shapes and is shaped by kinship systems which affect marriage, intergenerational transmission, and even anti-Christian persecutions. Chambon and Ponniah’s collection provides a much-needed corrective to Western-centric accounts of Catholicism. -- Brandon Vaidyanathan, Catholic University of America Asian Catholicism and the Remaking of Contemporary Families offers a comprehensive and innovative analysis of how faith, culture, daily lived experiences, community, and society intersect in contemporary Catholic families in different parts of Asia. It invites us to rethink and re-envision the diversity and plurality of the ways in which Asian families are inculturating the Catholic faith in ways that are deeply rooted in―and flow out of―indigenous, local, and subaltern voices across Asia. -- Jonathan Y. Tan, Case Western Reserve University This volume offers multifaceted and original insights into how the Catholic Church in Asia has addressed issues affecting family and kinship, two central concerns in Asian culture and religion. Contributors’ examinations of interreligious marriages, the clergy’s intricate relationships with kinship norms, and the Catholic family’s intersections with larger social structures such as ethnic belonging and caste offer exemplary historical, sociological, and theological scholarship. I wholeheartedly recommend their work to anyone seeking a comprehensive understanding of Asian Catholicism. -- Peter C. Phan, Georgetown University Although Catholics comprise one of the largest faith communities in Asia, for many years they have been the subject of considerably less comparative research than other faith communities. In this wide-ranging and well-written book, leading experts on Catholicism in different Asian nations shed a fascinating and comparative light on the dynamics of religion, family, and nation across Asia. The result is one of the most insightful and important books on Asian Catholicism in years. -- Robert W. Hefner, Boston University An Ethnographic Exploration of Catholicism and Family Life in Contemporary Asia Michel Chambon (Editor) Michel Chambon is a research fellow in the Asia Research Institute at the National University of Singapore and a coordinator of the Initiative for the Study of Asian Catholics. He is author of Making Christ Present in China: Actor-Network Theory and the Anthropology of Christianity . James Ponniah (Editor) James Ponniah is assistant professor and head of the Department of Christian Studies at the University of Madras. He is author of Culture, Religion, and Home-Making in and Beyond South Asia and coeditor of Democratization of Indian Christianity: Hegemony, Accessibility, and Resistance . He also serves as editor in chief of the International Journal of Asian Christianity .