Philip Shenon — Jesus Wept: Seven Popes and the Battle for the Soul of the Catholic Church - with Neil Lewis

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.PURCHASE BOOK HERE: https://politics-prose.com/book/9781101946411?ic_referral=YcardjgabyVTxPdnMSV2_TaC92xHe6lI1UBUQHycv34wM6DI1YrLlayoeUwt9KfPcf2ZxV_RZ0BbHw00C7MZq58erfIY8gV8Xgw6brkeMiZB2MwRCRdcVOULvCWwZyzelxdrMQPhilip Shenon is an award-winning investigative reporter and bestselling author who spent more than twenty years at The New York Times. As a Washington correspondent for the paper, he covered the Pentagon, the Justice Department, the State Department and Congress. As a foreign correspondent, he reported from more than sixty countries and several warzones. He is the author of two New York Times-bestselling books: A Cruel and Shocking Act: The Secret History of the Kennedy Assassination and The Commission: The Uncensored History of the 9/11 Investigation. A native of San Francisco, he now lives in Washington, D.C.Shenon is in conversation with Neil Lewis. Lewis was a correspondent with the New York Times from 1985 until 2009 when he resigned his full time assignment and became a contract writer for the paper. During that period, his assignments included the Justice Department, the State Department and a variety of other issues including investigative projects and presidential campaigns. In November, 2015 he became the Press Freedom Fellow at the University of Maryland Merrill School of Journalism.*recorded 2/10/2025