Thursday, July 3, 2003

Is the Boston Globe's choice of Garry Wills to review Phillip Jenkins' book evidence of, well, anti-Catholicism on their part? No - it's evidence of laziness on the Globe's part, and, when you read the review, by Wills as well. . When in need of something Catholic, call on Wills, or so says the NYTimes and The Boston Globe a astonishing proportion of the time. What makes it even more astonishing is the poor quality of Wills' work in these short pieces. While I think Wills raises a couple of provocative points in this review, for example, it's actually a stretch to call it a "review." Sure, it engages one element of Jenkins' thesis, but that's it. One emerges from the review with no real sense of what Jenkins was saying except, as Wills characterizes it, a definition of "anti-Catholicism" that includes Catholics questioning their church.

Please. Let me get really famous and then get to coast on my reputation by having major newspapers inviting me to trash books that I've obviously barely read.