Book Reviews

Author leaves Hunthausen encased in superlatives

Jun 19, 2019

Book review: A Disarming Spirit traces Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen's momentous and unanticipated plunge into political dissent. The author's handful of cited interviews with Hunthausen may have probed the archbishop's retrospective views of the controversy surrounding his activism, but there is no evidence of that in the book.

Act of resistance leaves unsettling questions

by Tom Deignan

Jun 12, 2019

Book Review: Peter Duffy's absorbing history, a page-turner packed with colorful characters and events, paints a broader portrait of an angry, complex era that "precipitated a diplomatic controversy that engaged the highest levels of the American and Nazi governments."

Fracking becomes personal suffering

by Timothy Kelly

Jun 5, 2019

Book Review: Stacey Haney likely never read Pope Francis' encyclical on humans and the environment, but her experiences highlight the relevance of the pope's environmental concerns for ordinary Americans who often feel insulated from these matters.

Feminist theologians bring wisdom to fiction

by Mary E. Hunt

May 29, 2019

Book Review: Some of today's best feminist theologians are writing fiction. I do not refer to their erudite, critical analyses of texts and concepts as novels. Rather, I alert readers to their new excursus into literature. I wondered aloud why they have embraced this genre. So, I asked them.

Sections ›

Author leaves Hunthausen encased in superlatives

Act of resistance leaves unsettling questions

Fracking becomes personal suffering

Feminist theologians bring wisdom to fiction

Peacemaker tells his remarkable life story

Book zeroes in on a particular kind of married priest

No easy answers in the miracle of life

Cardenal's memoir presents a man of great faith, humility

A black man writes to his son; three-part letter pursues 'question of how one should live within a black body'

Aquinas offers the church lessons in civic virtue

Flair for details, spiritual insight enliven collection

'Queen' columnist was a woman of faith

Book on Katrina is ambitious, flawed

Biography filled with detail puts St. Augustine in perspective

You have not read this book on pets before

'Sacred activism' reorients monasticism

The 'origin myth' of Christian America

A spiritual journey to keep hate at bay

Author mines Bible for images to describe the indescribable

Three memoirs seek transformation out of illness, addiction, loss

Reich takes on 'free market' myth

Delio breathes new life into term 'catholic'

A challenge to welcome immigrants

Bible wisdom comes to life in dialogue

Pages