Subject: Religion and Theology

Topic:  Catherine de Hueck Doherty’s Vision for Catholic Social Action  Instructions: I need a proposal for my historical theology dissertation on Catherine de Hueck Doherty’s vision for Catholic social action. I want the dissertation to focus upon the shift in her thought from her first movement, Friendship House, to her second movement, Madonna House. My proposed thesis is: As she matured in her experience of the apostolate, her theological conception of it as sacramental matured. I am trying to forward the idea that over time, she increasingly drew her inspiration for her work from the Eucharist, and the related idea that all members of the Church are part of the Body of Christ. As there is little secondary literature available about Doherty, I’m mostly working with primary sources, and I can provide scanned copies of all archival material. I know the topic extremely well, but I’m having trouble writing something that fits into the dissertation proposal format set by my department. I have attached the rubric. I am also attaching a draft of the proposal that I had previously attempted to write, along with my advisor’s comments. My trouble is being able to communicate my knowledge in the set format. On the point about multilingual literature, the writer should emphasize the point that I’ve reviewed literature in languages other than English, but no significant scholarly studies are available on this topic in foreign languages. I can provide examples of works I have reviewed in other languages so the writer can make a footnote. My advisor has assured me that handling the multi-lingual literature point on the rubric in this way is fine. I need the proposal to be approximately 25 pages in length, with a short bibliography that includes 1-2 pages of my main sources. As for the chapter outline included in my draft, I would like it to be trimmed down to five chapters: probably get rid of the chapter on gender and the chapter on agriculture. The proposal needs to have the following sections: Title, State of the Question (Literature Review), Thesis, Primary Sources, Methods, Chapter Outline. I’m glad to work closely with the writer and provide any resources he/she needs.