Thea's Song: The Life of Thea Bowman - Hardcover

Charlene Smith; John Feister

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1570758689 ISBN 13: 9781570758683

Publisher: Orbis Books, 2010

Synopsis

The authorized biography of a modern-day heroine, one of the most significant figures in modern American Catholicism.

Thea Bowman was a Black girl born in civil-rights-era Memphis, Mississippi who joined a convent of white Catholic sisters in Wisconsin, and went on to inspire millions of all faiths and none. She fought prejudice, sadness, and brought joy to others even during her struggle with cancer and long after her untimely death in 1990.

Thea s motto, Let me live until I die! comes alive in this enlightening and moving work that includes never-before-seen archival writings, interviews, and photographs.

About this title

About the Author:

Charlene Smith, FSPA, was a friend of Thea Bowman for 35 years and served as Coordinator of the Thea Bowman Legacy and executive editor of Thea News. She is currentlyTreasurer of the Thea Bowman Black Catholic Education Foundation.
John Feister has been an editor at St. Anthony Messenger Press since 1989, and is founding editor of AmericanCatholic.org. He has written several books with Richard Rohr, including their most recent, Things Hidden.

From Booklist:

Sister Thea Bowman gained world renown as a scholar, singer, and speaker, promoting intercultural awareness and connectedness in the Catholic Church, which had been fairly cool to African Americans. Born in 1937, she was raised in the small black town of Canton, Mississippi, converted to Catholicism at the age of 10, and joined the Franciscan order at age 15. Despite the culture shock of white La Crosse, Wisconsin, and the racism and sexism within the broader church, Bowman found confirmation of her calling and eventual acceptance of her exuberance and push for inclusion. She was resistant to social injustice and insistent on the healing power of religion and music. As a teacher and a founder of the Institute for Black Catholic Studies at Xavier University in New Orleans, she helped to promote the black Catholic identity movement before she died of breast cancer at the age of 52. Thea’s own writings, interspersed throughout the book, give the reader a sense of her lively voice. Personal stories and family photographs add to the warmth of this recollection of the life of an extraordinary woman. --Vanessa Bush

About this edition

• Publisher: Orbis Books
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 1570758689
• ISBN 13: 9781570758683
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 352