The Wounded Church

Tending to the Harm within Catholicism

Annie Selak

Pages: 224

Illustrations: 3 b/w illustrations

Fordham University Press
Fordham University Press

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(Pre-order)
Paperback / softback
ISBN: 9781531513375
Published: 02 June 2026
$29.95
Available to order on 02 February 2026
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Hardback
ISBN: 9781531513368
Published: 02 June 2026
$105.00
Available to order on 02 February 2026

Confronting racism, sexism, and clericalism in Catholic life and inviting real conversion and justice.

In The Wounded Church, theologian Annie Selak argues that the Catholic Church must confront its own injuries in order to credibly be Church. Using a feminist framework, she develops a new ecclesiology around three wounds, racism, sexism, and clericalism, that actively harm the Body of Christ and distort its witness.

Attentive to history, pastoral practice, and lived experience, Selak shows how each wound is both inflicted by the Church and borne within the Church. She offers the resurrected body of Jesus, scarred yet no longer bleeding, as a guiding metaphor for ecclesial renewal, a body that does not deny its wounds but is transformed through them. Drawing on Karl Rahner, she grounds hope in the reign of God while insisting on concrete institutional and spiritual conversion.

Written for students and scholars, ministers and lay leaders, The Wounded Church uncovers overlooked histories tied to racism, sexism, and the clergy sexual abuse crisis, and proposes clear theological principles for reform. The result is a constructive, pastorally engaged vision that tells the truth about harm and imagines credible paths toward change, accountability, and justice.

Annie Selak is a feminist theologian based in Washington, DC, and a visiting scholar at Georgetown University. She has more than fifteen years of experience in Catholic ministry. Her teaching and writing focus on ecclesiology, feminist theologies, and ethics.