Category Archives: Book Reviews
Book Reviews
If someone we trust suggests a good book for us to read, we are more inclined to do so. On the other hand, if someone we trust tells us not to bother reading this or that book, we usually heed their advice. Book reviews provide that service. The reviewers that contribute to our website are excellent critics. So far, all of our book reviews, except one, have been commendatory. Brian Kelly’s review of Deepak Chopra’s The Third Jesus was condemnatory.
Positive book reviews that appear in good Catholic media outlets would not be there if the books were not of great value. Earnest reviewers would not bother to push mediocrity. Their mission is to whet the appetites of potential readers. They want to share their own enthusiasm for another’s written work in order to benefit the readers of their own columns. It is actually an act of charity. A potential reader has to be motivated. As G.K. Chesterton pointed out: “There is a great deal of difference between an eager man who wants to read a book and a tired man who wants a book to read.”
Book Review of ‘Church Militant: Bishop Kung and the Catholic Resistance in Communist Shanghai’
Thomas J. Craughwell for National Catholic Register: No China scholar wants to answer a knock on the door and find Chinese government officials standing at his doorstep. Yet, in 2006, that is what happened to Jesuit Father Paul Mariani. He had traveled to China to research how the Communist Party crushed the Catholic Church in Shanghai, one of the most dynamic Catholic communities in the … More →
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Gary Potter’s ‘In Reaction’: A Vision of Virtue
THE VISION OF VIRTUE 1 that informs In Reaction, the literary testament of a man who speaks the truth, is, essentially, the culture of sacramentality: the cultivation of grace upon our createdness; the intimate culture of the Incarnation. It is the culture of the Humility of God and the extensions of His mercy: His love reaching out to our lowliness, deep disorder, and destructively cramped … More →
Solving a Two Thousand Year-Old Mystery
Review of The Bones of Saint Peter by John Evangelist Walsh. Sophia Institute Press, 2011. This fascinating and fairly short volume (178 pages) is a reprint of the original published in 1982. It tells the story of the search for the remains of the first pope of the Catholic Church, Saint Peter, martyred at Rome in the year 68 (some sources say 64) A.D. Tradition … More →
A Frightening Future If We Do Not Change
Review of Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025? by Patrick J. Buchanan, Thomas Dunne Books, 2011 This 428 page book, containing copious notes in the end note section (1104 of them to be exact), is so jam-packed with historic and current information that any review truly cannot do it justice. One can only pick and choose a few topics within it and … More →
Monsignor Joseph Clifford Fenton’s Review of ‘The Leonard Feeney Omnibus’
THE AMERICAN ECCLESIASTICAL REVIEW, Feb, 1944. THE LEONARD FEENEY OMNIBUS. A Collection of Prose and Verse Old and New. New York, Sheed and Ward, 1943. Pp. xiv + 399. $3.00.
Saint Paul: His Time, His World, Himself
[Review of The World of Saint Paul, by Joseph M. Callewaert, Ignatius Press, 2011] This little volume of fewer than two hundred pages is a fascinating look at Saint Paul, the person, the many places he evangelized, and his times. It reads like an adventure story, which it surely is – the great adventure of the Apostle to the Gentiles bringing the Good News to … More →
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The Jesuit Missions in South America
(A Little-Known Story: The Jesuit Missions in South America and How Their Success Led to the Dissolution of the Order of Saint Ignatius) [Review of Black Robes in Paraguay: The Success of the Guarani Missions Hastened the Abolition of the Jesuits by William F. Jaenike. Kirk House Publishers] This well-written book is a totally fascinating look at a period of New World history in an … More →
The Saint and His Mountain: Brother André Bessette
[Review of Brother André: Friend of the Suffering, Apostle of Saint Joseph, by Father Jean-Guy Dubuc, C.S.C. Ave Maria Press, Notre Dame, Indiana] How we all rejoiced last October when Blessed Brother André was canonized by Pope Benedict XVI. As the first male Canadian-born saint, as well as the first saint of the Congregation of Holy Cross, Brother André’s sainthood gladdens the hearts of his … More →
One Bloody Battle in a Faraway Land
[Review of The Battle for Oscar Six by Eugene R. De Lalla] The Battle for Oscar Six: Life and Death in Vietnam – April, 1968, by Eugene DeLalla, LaSalette Publications, 2010
Warrior, Patriot, Gentleman, and Catholic, Colonel John Ripley USMC
[Review An American Knight by Norman J. Fulkerson] Every war has its share of heroes. Vietnam was no different. One of the greatest and most decorated officers of that bloody conflict was John Ripley, USMC. Born in 1939, Ripley was the youngest son of very interesting parents. His father, “Bud,” was a Catholic Midwesterner from Illinois; his mother, a Virginia Protestant blueblood who swore that … More →
In the Beginning
In the Beginning: Compelling Evidence for Creation and the Flood By Walt Brown, Ph.D. Center for Scientific Creation This is a book written by a scientist about science. The scientist is also a Christian, and the motivation for his book is the reconciliation of science with the description of the origins of the earth described in the biblical Book of Genesis. As the title suggests, … More →
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María of Guadalupe
In Paul Badde’s recent book about Our Lady of Guadalupe, he writes, “The modern age began with this image. It has changed both the weight and the balance of the earth.” And yet, although she is the most famous woman in the world, represented in millions of images, she “has become the great unknown.” María of Guadalupe: Shaper of History, Shaper of Hearts was written … More →
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Bella Dodd — From Communist to Catholic
How was it that a little Catholic girl – born in Italy – became one of the most powerful figures of the American Communist Party at the height of its power during the late 1930’s and 1940’s? The story of Maria Assunta Isabella Visono’s journey from a poor southern Italian village to the intrigues of Soviet Communist penetration of America is fascinating and frightening. It … More →
