Collection of essays and articles about the US Civil War, with a focus on, but not limited to, people who were either members or later became members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Topics include historical facts about actual events, people, landmarks, and stories; most of which are connected to the US Civil War.

How did Southern Catholics, under international religious authority and grounding unlike Southern Protestants, act with regard to political commitments in the recently formed Confederacy? How did they balance being both Catholic and Confederate? How is the Southern Catholic Civil War experience similar or dissimilar to the Southern Protestant Civil War experience? What new insights might this experience provide regarding Civil War religious history, the history of Catholicism in America, 19th-century America, and Southern history in general? For the majority of Southern Catholics, religion and politics were not a point of tension. Devout Catholics were also devoted Confederates, including nuns who served as nurses; their deep involvement in the Confederate cause as medics confirms the all-encompassing nature of Catholic involvement in the Confederacy, a fact greatly underplayed by scholars of Civil war religion and American Catholicism. Kraszewski argues against an "Americanization" of Catholics in the South and instead coins the term "Confederatization" to describe the process by which Catholics made themselves virtually indistinguishable from their Protestant neighbors. The religious history of the South has been primarily Protestant. Catholic Confederates simultaneously fills a gap in Civil War religious scholarship and in American Catholic literature by bringing to light the deep impact Catholicism has had on Southern society even in the very heart of the Bible Belt.

The Catholic "thing" - the concrete historical reality of Catholicism as a presence in human history - is the richest cultural tradition in the world. It values both faith and reason, and therefore has a great deal to say about politics and economics, war and peace, manners and morals, children and families, careers and vocations, and many other perennial and contemporary questions. In addition, it has inspired some of the greatest art, music, and architecture, while offering unparalleled human solidarity to tens of millions through hospitals, soup kitchens, schools, universities, and relief services. This volume brings together some of the very best commentary on a wide range of recent events and controversies by some of the very best Catholic writers in the English language: Ralph McInerny, Michael Novak, Fr. James V. Schall, Hadley Arkes, Robert Royal, Anthony Esolen, Brad Miner, George Marlin, David Warren, Austin Ruse, Francis Beckwith, and many others. Their contributions cover large Catholic subjects such as philosophy and theology, liturgy and Church dogma, postmodern culture, the Church and modern politics, literature, and music. But they also look into specific contemporary problems such as religious liberty, the role of Catholic officials in public life, growing moral hazards in bio-medical advances, and such like. The Catholic Thing is a virtual encyclopedia of Catholic thought about modern life.

This Lent, we invite you to make a pilgrimage to the cross with seven extraordinary women and men of God. Come and journey with Blessed Sára Salkhaházi through Nazi-occupied Hungary, with Venerable Augustus Tolton through late-nineteenth-century Illinois, with Servant of God Dorothy Day through Depression-era New York, with St. Martín de Porres through seventeenth-century Peru, with St. Óscar Romero through twentieth-century El Salvador on the verge of civil war, with Servant of God Thea Bowman through Civil Rights-era Mississippi, and finally, with Servant of God Julia Greeley through turn-of-the-century Colorado. Each week of Lent is dedicated to one of these exemplars of faith and action, prayer and perseverance. Each day Monday through Saturday follows the same format: a reflection on the life or writings of the saint or Servant of God, a Scripture selection from the day’s mass readings, and two meditative prayer suggestions, one based on the saint or Servant of God’s life, and one based on the Scripture. Each week also highlights an aspect of Catholic Social Teaching that the saint or Servant of God exemplified in their life. On Sundays, we rest in Scripture and sacrament. It’s our prayer this lent that we may be reminded that we are all called to holiness and that there are no unlikely saints.

In the days before the Civil War, there lived a Louisiana people unique in Southern histroy. Though descended from African slaves, they were also descended from the French and Spanish who enslaved them. Called the Free People of Color, this dazzling historical novel chronicles the lives of four of them--men and women caught perilously between the worlds of master and slave, privilege and oppression, passion and pain.

Part biography of a wartime adventurer, part detective story, and part faith journey, this intriguing book from a New York Times journalist and bestselling author takes us inside the modern-day making of a saint. The Saint Makers chronicles the unlikely alliance between Father Hotze and Dr. Andrea Ambrosi, a country priest and a cosmopolitan Italian canon lawyer, as the two piece together the life of a long dead Korean War hero and military chaplain and fashion it into a case for eternal divinity. Joe Drape offers a front row seat to the Catholic Church's saint-making machinery—which, in many ways, has changed little in two thousand years-and examines how, or if, faith and science can co-exist. This rich and unique narrative leads from the plains of Kansas to the opulent halls of the Vatican, through brutal Korean War prison camps, and into the stories of two individuals, Avery Gerleman and Chase Kear, whose lives were threatened by illness and injury and whose family and friends prayed to Father Kapaun, sparking miraculous recoveries in the heart of America. Gerleman is now a nurse, and Kear works as a mechanic in the aerospace industry. Both remain devoted to Father Kapaun, whose opportunity for sainthood relies in their belief and medical charts. At a time when the church has faced severe scandal and damage, and the world is at the mercy of a pandemic, this is an uplifting story about a priest who continues to an example of goodness and faith. Ultimately, The Saint Makers is the story of a journey of faith—for two priests separated by seventy years, for the two young athletes who were miraculously brought back to life with (or without) the intercession of the divine, as well as for readers—and the author—trying to understand and accept what makes a person truly worthy of the Congregation of Saints in the eyes of the Catholic Church.

In 1832 Joseph Smith, Jr., the Mormons’ first prophet, foretold of a great war beginning in South Carolina. In the combatants’ mutual destruction, God’s purposes would be served, and Mormon men would rise to form a geographical, political, and theocratic “Kingdom of God” to encompass the earth. Three decades later, when Smith’s prophecy failed with the end of the American Civil War, the United States left torn but intact, the Mormons’ perspective on the conflict—and their inactivity in it—required palliative revision. In The Civil War Years in Utah, the first full account of the events that occurred in Utah Territory during the Civil War, John Gary Maxwell contradicts the patriotic mythology of Mormon leaders’ version of this dark chapter in Utah history. While the Civil War spread death, tragedy, and sorrow across the continent, Utah Territory remained virtually untouched. Although the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—and its faithful—proudly praise the service of an 1862 Mormon cavalry company during the Civil War, Maxwell’s research exposes the relatively inconsequential contribution of these Nauvoo Legion soldiers. Active for a mere ninety days, they patrolled overland trails and telegraph lines. Furthermore, Maxwell finds indisputable evidence of Southern allegiance among Mormon leaders, despite their claim of staunch, long-standing loyalty to the Union. Men at the highest levels of Mormon hierarchy were in close personal contact with Confederate operatives. In seeking sovereignty, Maxwell contends, the Saints engaged in blatant and treasonous conflict with Union authorities, the California and Nevada Volunteers, and federal policies, repeatedly skirting open warfare with the U.S. government. Collective memory of this consequential period in American history, Maxwell argues, has been ill-served by a one-sided perspective. This engaging and long-overdue reappraisal finally fills in the gaps, telling the full story of the Civil War years in Utah Territory.

This is a famous educational text by Gilbert J. Hunt presenting an account of the War of 1812 in the style of the King James Bible. It starts with President James Madison and the congressional declaration of war and then describes the Burning of Washington, the Battle of New Orleans, and the Treaty of Ghent.

Sacrifice. Religion. Death. Read stories of courage and faith as told by valiant LDS veterans. Their uplifting testimonies will refresh your soul and recharge your patriotism as you read of their journeys to stay true to their beliefs and values in the midst of the chaos of war.

The civil war is over, but the struggle for power in the aftermath is just starting. Continue the adventure in Sons of War 2: Saints, coming fall 2020.