The Catholic Church has never been so deeply immersed in crisis - crisis of authority, priestly scandal, celibacy, hierarchy - stretching right up to the Vatican itself.

Most people in authority are keeping quiet or squabbling among themselves.

Mark Dooley is a Professor of Philosophy who is also a serious commentator, journalist and broadcaster. He has written a book of hope for those who have none.

It is, he argues, only when the sacramental life of the local parishes is revitalised that renewal in the Church can be achieved.

Mark Dooley has held lectureships at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth, and at University College Dublin where he was John Henry Newman Scholar of Theology. From 2003-2006, he wrote a controversial column on foreign affairs for the Sunday Independent. Since 2006, he has written for the Irish Daily Mail. Dooley is also a regular broadcaster on Irish radio and television, and has served as a political speech writer. He is author of The Politics of Exodus: Kierkegaard's Ethics of Responsibility (2001), The Philosophy of Derrida (2007), and Roger Scruton: The Philosopher on Dover Beach (2009). He is editor of Questioning Ethics (1999), Questioning God (2001), A Passion for the Impossible (2003), and The Roger Scruton Reader (2009).