In the Midst of His People. The Authorized Biography of Bishop Maurice J. Dingman by Shirley Crisler, SFCC, and Mira Mosle, BVM (review)

338 BOOK REVIEWS 1965, "I still want above all to try to be a bridge builder for everybody and to keep communication open between the extremists at both ends" (p. 325). Clyde F. Crews Bellarmine College, Lousiville In the Midst of His People. The Authorized Biography of Bishop MauriceJ. Dingman. By Shirley Crisler, SFCC, and Mira Mosle, BVM. (Iowa City: Rudi Publishing. 1995. Pp. xvii, 283- $14.95 paperback.) To borrow George Will's comment about David McCullough's Truman, this book is a 300-page "valentine" to Maurice J. Dingman. Not that the sixth bishop ofDes Moines does not deserve such. He was a most gracious, holy, inspirational gentleman, whose name is still revered in his home Diocese of Davenport, and the Diocese of Des Moines, where he served as bishop from 1968 until his debilitating stroke forced his resignation in 1986. Nor does the quasi-hagiographical style make it less than informative reading. Particularly will those who knew the man find this collection of memories and anecdotes about this effective shepherd interesting and moving. The work also provides a human portrait ofa typical "pastoral bishop," a term used to describe some bishops appointed after the close of the SecondVatican Council who exercised a collégial, informal, collaborative style and who were aggressive in promoting what they understood to be the mandated reforms of the council. The sections on the papal visit to Iowa masterminded by Dingman, his struggle over the question of womens' ordination , and the effects of his crippling stroke, are particularly well done. Where the book disappoints is in its lack of depth. Dingman—as he himself would be the first to admit—was no revolutionary, but was building on a tradition ofAmerican Catholicism, particularly in the Midwest, called Catholic agrarianism , from which creative developments in liturgy, catechetics, social theory, and ecclesiology came. Thus he was in the line of leaders such as Luigi Ligutti, Edwin O'Hara, Virgil Michel, Martin Hellriegel, and Aloysius Muench. Never is this tradition treated in the book. Nor are we given much reason for the sudden transformation in Dingman's life: from a rather strict, shy, ecclesiastical bureaucrat —afraid to have even his own sister in the front seat of the car with him! — to an informal, personable pastor with a tendency to flexibility regarding church law. Careful readers will be distracted by some errors: ad limina is "to the thresholds ," not "to the doors"; the SecondVatican Council opened in 1962, not I96I (p. 10); Luigi Ligutti was the representative of the Holy See to FAO, not director of that UN organization (p. 14); the proper title of Pius XI's encyclical against Naziism is Mit brennender Sorge (p. 78); and there is a printing lapse on page 169. BOOK REVIEWS 339 The authors have provided a service in collecting data about this churchman who, in the words of Monsignor Robert Lynch, was indeed one of those known as a "Vatican II bishop." Timothy M. Dolan Pontifical NorthAmerican College Latin American Die Anfänge der Kirche auf den Karibischen Inseln: Die Geschichte der Bistümer Santo Domingo, Concepción de la Vega, San fuan de Puerto Rico und Santiago de Cuba von ihrer Entstehung (1511/22) bis zur Mitte des 17.fahrhunderts. By Johannes Meier. [Neue Zeitschrift für Missionswissenschaft , Supplementa, Volume XXXVIII.] (Immensee, Switzerland :Verein zur Förderung der Missionswissenschaft. 1991. Pp. xxxiv, 313. sFr. 44,- paperback.) It was the aim of the church historian Johannes Meier to recount and to analyze the history of the Catholic Church in the Caribbean Islands from the beginning of Spanish overseas expansion until the mid-seventeenth century. He has accomplished his goal quite well. This book consists of a foreword, an introduction,five chapters, a conclusion, a place and person register, a picture appendix, and maps. The twenty-five-page bibliography, itself a helpful tool to anyone interested in Latin American church history, reveals Meier's acquaintance with literature in many languages. Meier describes in Chapter One the origin of the Caribbean dioceses of Santo Domingo, Concepción de la Vega, San Juan de Puerto Rico, and Santiago de Cuba. In Chapter Two he discusses the bishops. Chapter Three deals with the...