"One of the greatest sources of violence in modern history has been the question of what Jesus meant when he told his disciples at the Last Supper to eat the bread of his body and drink the wine of his blood and to do so always in remembrance of him. It erupted in Europe in the sixteenth century and was carried around the globe by colonizers, missionaries, explorers, and scholars. In its opening chapters, History and Presence examines the power of...

In his most provocative book yet, Pulitzer Prize¬-winner Garry Wills asks the radical question: Why do we need priests? Author Wills spent five years as a young man at a Jesuit seminary and nearly became a priest himself. But after a lifetime of study and reflection, he now poses some challenging questions: Why do we need priests at all? Why did the priesthood arise in a religion that began without it and opposed it? Would Christianity be stronger...

An ancient secret brotherhood. A devastating new weapon of destruction. When world-renowned Harvard symbologist Robert Langdon is summoned to a Swiss research facility to analyze a mysterious symbol—seared into the chest of a murdered physicist—he discovers evidence of the unimaginable: the resurgence of an ancient secret brotherhood known as the Illuminati...the most powerful underground organization ever to walk the earth. The Illuminati has...

The fictional story of a newly elected pope, the youngest in history and first-ever American, whose audacity, independence, and arch-conservatism wreak havoc within the Vatican.

A collection of highlights from homilies given from March 2013 to May 2014. Along with summaries by Radio Vaticana (who recorded and transcribed the homilies) and edited by Father Antonio Spadaro, SJ, these reflections provide intimate moments of inspiration, simplicity, and a glimpse into the thoughts and words of Pope Francis that very few get to experience.

Easy-going Father O'Malley and iron-willed Sister Benedict find themselves in a subtle battle of wits over how the children should be educated at St. Mary's parochial school. Meanwhile, the skinflint businessman next door wants the school condemned.

"It is 1985 in a small Irish town. During the weeks leading up to Christmas, Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and family man faces into his busiest season. Early one morning, while delivering an order to the local convent, Bill makes a discovery which forces him to confront both his past and the complicit silences of a town controlled by the church. Already a bestseller in France and certain to be read worldwide for generations to come, Small Things...

Father Greg Lockwood is unlike any Catholic priest you have ever met, a man who lounges in boxer shorts, loves action movies, and whose constant jamming on the guitar reverberates "like a whole band dying in a plane crash in 1972." His daughter is an irreverent poet who long ago left the Church's country. When an unexpected crisis leads her and her husband to move back into her parents' rectory, their two worlds collide. In Priestdaddy, Lockwood interweaves...

A captivating historical novel, Pope Joan is an international best-seller. Set in the brutal Dark Ages, a time when women were viewed as the root of sin, this novel tells the remarkable tale of one of history's greatest controversies. Denied the priesthood by society's rules, young Joan seizes her opportunity to join a monastery when she assumes her murdered brother's identity and takes the name John Anglicus. Putting her brilliant mind to good use,...