Shaken by the ongoing clergy sexual abuse scandal, and challenged from within by social and theological division, Catholics in America are at a crossroads. But is today’s situation unique? And where will Catholicism go from here? With the belief that we understand our present by studying our past, James O’Toole offers a bold and panoramic history of the American Catholic laity. O’Toole tells the story of this ancient church from the perspective of ordinary Americans, the lay believers who have kept their faith despite persecution from without and clergy abuse from within. It is an epic tale, from the first settlements of Catholics in the colonies to the turmoil of the scandal-ridden present, and through the church’s many American incarnations in between. We see Catholics’ complex relationship to Rome and to their own American nation. O’Toole brings to life both the grand sweep of institutional change and the daily practice that sustained believers. The Faithful pays particular attention to the intricacies of prayer and ritual—the ways men and women have found to express their faith as Catholics over the centuries. With an intimate knowledge of the dilemmas and hopes of today’s church, O’Toole presents a new vision and offers a glimpse into the possible future of the church and its parishioners. Moving past the pulpit and into the pews, The Faithful is an unmatched look at the American Catholic laity. Today’s Catholics will find much to educate and inspire them in these pages, and non-Catholics will gain a newfound understanding of their religious brethren.

With 2015 marking the 10th commemoration of Hurricane Katrina, education reform in New Orleans continues to garner substantial local, national, and international attention. Advocates and critics alike have continued to cite test scores, new school providers, and different theories of governance in making multiple arguments for and against how contemporary education policy is shaping public education and its role in the rebuilding of the city. Rather than trying to provide a single, unified account of education reform in New Orleans, the chapters in this volume provide multiple ways of approaching some of the most significant questions around school choice and educational equity that have arisen in the years since Katrina. This collection of research articles, essays, and journalistic accounts of education reform in New Orleans collectively argues that the extreme makeover of the city’s public schools toward a new market-based model was shaped by many local, historically specific conditions. In consequence, while the city’s schools have been both heralded as a model for other cities and derided as a lesson in the limits of market-based reform, the experience of education reform that has taken place in the city – and its impacts on the lives of students, families, and educators – could have happened only in New Orleans.

In Nonprofit Nation, the new edition of his classic work,O'Neill takes a fresh look at the nonprofit sector and the power ithas to use its growing visibility and strength. Like the firstedition, this new book is an up-to-date, comprehensive guide tounderstanding the nonprofit sector. Identifying and examining themajor nonprofit subsectors-health care, arts, social service, andreligious organizations, for example-and detailing their particularconcerns and impact enable O'Neill to explore their influence onbusiness, government and society. The new edition also features: * Expanded sections on scope and impact * Updated and enlarged statistical information * New insights on the development of the nonprofit sector * A new section on theories of the nonprofit sector