Jesus Wept
Seven Popes and the Battle for the Soul of the Catholic Church
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- 9,99 €
Description de l’éditeur
From the best-selling author and former New York Times investigative reporter, an unprecedented look at the defining struggles of the modern Catholic Church, told through the lives of the last seven popes—carrying us from the wake of World War II up through the present day and providing essential context around the most pressing issues faced by Pope Francis
"An extraordinary accomplishment: controversial, but crucial for discussions in today’s Catholic Church.” —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
When the jolly Italian peasant-turned-cardinal Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli of Venice was elected Pope John XXIII in 1958, change was in the air. The Church, many said, had refused to enter the twentieth century. In response, Pope John launched Vatican II, an “ecumenical council” that summoned hundreds of church leaders to Rome. It marked one of the most progressive turns the Church had taken in centuries: “medicine of mercy,” as Pope John called it. Yet not everyone in the Church was prepared to accept this modernization. The lines were drawn—in a battle that continues to rage into the twenty-first century.
In Jesus Wept, Philip Shenon takes us inside the Holy See to reveal its intricacies, hypocrisies, and hidden maneuverings, bringing all the momentous disputes and issues vividly to life: priestly celibacy, birth control, homosexuality, restoring ties with other Christians and Jews, shameful sex abuse crimes, the role of women in the Church.
In his rich portrayals of the popes from John to Francis, Shenon draws on research across four continents, including hundreds of interviews and the exhaustive archival material. He also brings to light other key figures in the Church, such as Cardinal Alfredo Ottaviani, the incredibly powerful, conservative, and staunchly anticommunist director of the Holy Office under Pius XII, who lived proudly by the motto semper idem—“always the same.” This is a consummate, vibrant history of the modern Church.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Journalist Shenon (The Commission) delivers a dense history of the modern Catholic church. Covering the past 75 years, he depicts an institution caught between the competing ideals of authority versus tolerance, or what Pope John XXIII referred to as the "medicine of mercy." During WWII, Shenon notes, Pope Pius XII promulgated "dire warnings about sinful practices" and ignored "irrefutable intelligence" about the deaths of millions of Jews at the hands of the Nazis. Later, he centralized power in the Vatican with a 1949 decree that reinforced strict divisions between Catholics and Protestants. In the 1960s, John XXIII permitted worship in Latin to be replaced with vernacular language and pursued reconciliation efforts with the Jewish people. Subsequent popes were drawn into debates over birth control, sexuality, and relations with the world's religions. Shenon digs most deeply into the church's child sexual abuse scandals, arguing that John Paul III and Benedict XVI helped to cover them up by sitting on reams of evidence and failing to investigate accused clergy members. Drawing on prodigious research, the author paints a richly detailed portrait of a complex, hierarchical, and secretive institution as it grappled with a modernizing world. Unfortunately, the profusion of detail sometimes precludes broader meditations on the long-term implications of the crises described. Still, devoted Catholics and scholars of Catholicism will want this on their bookshelves.
