A comprehensive history of the Catholic Church from its beginnings in Jesus' ministry to its current status in an increasingly secular world.

____________ 'A useful book of reference by the master of the history of the councils of the Church... There is enormous value in a short, reliable, and careful study of a sequence of events that may have unfamiliar joinings and passageways to modern believers...' - Catholic Historical Review 'A short, readable and informed survey of church history.' - The Church of England Newspaper 'A rich foundation for Catholic understanding and witness.' - Catholic San Francisco ____________ A one-volume history of the Christian people from Pentecost to the present day, with principal focus on the Catholic Church. Having passed AD 2000 it seems appropriate and necessary to have a new short history of the first two millennia of the Christian era. In the last half century there has been a massive amount of research into Church history, published in learned articles and in multi-volume works. Full notice is taken of these recent scholarly initiatives in writing this short account, which is also eminently readable. In each section there is a balance between the institutional and the more directly religious dimensions of the Church - here are some of the elements: bishops, canon law, charity, councils crusades, devotions, heresies, laity, liturgy, martyrs, missionaries, parishes, pilgrimages, popes, prayer, priesthood, religious orders, sacraments, schools, theologians, universities and the vita consacrata. The scope is wide; the pace of the narrative is attractive.

Awarded third place in pilgrimages/Catholic travel by the Catholic Media Association. Historian Kevin Schmiesing takes you to more than two-dozen sites and events that symbolize and embody America’s rich and sometimes tumultuous Catholic past, including the Santa Fe Trail, Gettysburg, and the Bourbon Trail. You’ll also meet both famous and infamous Catholics—including Augustus Tolton, Dr. Samuel Mudd, and Frances Cabrini—who impacted our nation’s history. The idea for A Catholic Pilgrimage through American History came from Schmiesing’s mother, he says. She turned every childhood vacation into a pilgrimage, purposely inserting religious sites into the family’s journey to places such as Niagara Falls, Washington, DC, or Myrtle Beach. Catholics have been part of the American experiment since the beginning—in founding the colonies and expanding the west, building education and health care systems, abolishing slavery, fighting on the front lines, and advancing science, technology, and space exploration. Each of the twenty-seven sites on Schmiesing’s virtual itinerary—including, the Washington Monument, Wounded Knee Creek, the University of Notre Dame, and Mission San Diego de Alcalá—transports you to a significant time in US history and connects the dots to our Catholic heritage. You will meet notable Catholics such as John F. Kennedy, Black Elk, and Katharine Drexel, and learn more about their contributions to history. You will explore the various and sometimes conflicting roles Catholics have played in key periods and events through the stories of shrines, memorials, and other historic places including: the Catholic Plymouth Rock—St. Mary’s City, Maryland; the Bourbon Trail—Church of St. Thomas, Bardstown, Kentucky; the Pope’s Stone—the Washington Monument in the District of Columbia; a Catholic mission and a Native American tragedy: Wounded Knee Creek, South Dakota; and the home of the first Black priest—the churches of Quincy, Illinois.

This one-volume survey of the history of the Catholic Church--from its beginning through the pontificate of John Paul II--explains the Church's progress by using Christopher Dawson's division of the Church's history into six distinct "ages," or 350-400 year periods of time.

One cannot understand Latin America without understanding the history of the Catholic Church in the region. Catholicism has been predominant in Latin America and it has played a definitive role in its development. It helped to spur the conquest of the New World with its emphasis on missions to the indigenous peoples, controlled many aspects of the colonial economy, and played key roles in the struggles for Independence. The History of the Catholic Church in Latin America offers a concise yet far-reaching synthesis of this institution’s role from the earliest contact between the Spanish and native tribes until the modern day, the first such historical overview available in English. John Frederick Schwaller looks broadly at the forces which formed the Church in Latin America and which caused it to develop in the unique manner in which it did. While the Church is often characterized as monolithic, the author carefully showcases its constituent parts—often in tension with one another—as well as its economic function and its role in the political conflicts within the Latin America republics. Organized in a chronological manner, the volume traces the changing dynamics within the Church as it moved from the period of the Reformation up through twentieth century arguments over Liberation Theology, offering a solid framework to approaching the massive literature on the Catholic Church in Latin America. Through his accessible prose, Schwaller offers a set of guideposts to lead the reader through this complex and fascinating history.

Expanded and updated for the new millennium. Covering the life of Christ, the election of Pope Benedict XVI, and everything in between, A Concise History of the Catholic Church has been one of the bestselling religious histories of the past two decades and a mainstay for scholars, students, and others looking for a definitive, accessible history of Catholicism. With a clarity that will appeal to any reader, Thomas Bokenkotter divides his study into five parts that correspond to the major historical and epochal developments in Catholicism. His authoritative, thorough approach takes readers from the Church’s triumph over paganism, through "the sound and fury of renewal," to a new section devoted to such topics as dissent and current developments in the ecumenical movement. Informative illustrations throughout the book, new to this edition, enrich the reader's experience, and the addition of a wide-ranging bibliography increases its value as a sourcebook.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 540-542) and indexes.