Fourth Life: Fraying at the Edges: Shackled by the collar. Freed by the Fall (Hardcover)

Fourth Life: Fraying at the Edges is a raw intimate memoir of faith loss and rediscovery. For twenty-four years Father Thomas Rowan lived within the sacred walls of the Catholic Church-six in seminary and eighteen in priesthood. He served at altars across the Midwest led funerals and weddings heard confessions whispered in the dark and carried the weight of others suffering as his own. But when the rituals faded and the collar came off what remained was a man still searching-for grace for healing and for a sense of belonging beyond the institution that shaped him. In this deeply human reflection Rowan traces his life from small-town childhood through the rigors of seminary the crises of faith and identity and the complex beauty of ministry. Along the way he confronts questions of sexuality spiritual trauma and the fraught intersection of holiness and humanity. His journey moves from Midwest parishes to sacred sites in Israel Egypt and Rome-and finally into a life of therapeutic work where he helps others face the same pain he once buried. Told with humility and piercing honesty Fourth Life explores what it means to unravel and rebuild to lose faith and still find the sacred in unexpected places. It is a story for anyone who has loved an institution that broke their heart and for everyone learning to live with both doubt and grace. Childhood into calling priesthood into healing belief into doubt-and somehow always grace right alongside hurt. A memoir of vocation trauma and resilience Fourth Life is not an exposé but a meditation on truth faith and the courage to begin again.