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New Books in Catholic Studies

New Books Network

Interviews with scholars of Catholicism about their new books

arts books

All Episodes

46:01

Stefanie Lenk, "Roman Identity and Lived Religion:...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/06/09

Christianity is often considered prevalent when it comes to defining the key values of late antique society, whereas 'feeling connected to the Roman past' is commonly regarded as an add-on for cultivated elites. Roman Identity and Lived Religion: Baptismal Art in Late Antiquity (Cambridge UP, 2025) demonstrates the significant impact of popular Roman culture on the religious identity of common Christians from the fifth to the seventh century in the Mediterranean world. Baptism is central to the

83:46

Maya Mayblin "Vote of Faith: Democracy, Desire, and...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/30

A richly cinematic and compelling look at priest-politicians in Brazil and their religious and secular entanglements, Vote of Faith: Democracy, Desire, and the Turbulent Lives of Priest Politicians (Fordham UP, 2024) explores the complex intersection of democracy, patriarchy, and religiosity in Brazil. For over a hundred years, Catholic priests have been running for government office, challenging Brazil’s constitutional separation of church and state and its self-image as a modern, secular nation

83:50

Stephen Okey, "A Theology of Conversation: An...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/25

Sometimes described as "a theologian's theologian," David Tracy's scholarship has impacted countless thinkers around the globe. The complexity of his thought, however, has often made engaging his work into a daunting challenge. Combining analysis of the most influential features of Tracy's theology (theological method, the religious classic, public theology) with a retrieval of his more overlooked interests (Christology, God), Stephen Okey presents the essential themes of Tracy's career in

42:51

Julia McClure, "Empire of Poverty: The...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/20

Empire of Poverty: The Moral-Political Economy of the Spanish Empire (Oxford University Press, 2024) by Dr. Julia McClure examines how changing concepts of poverty in the long-sixteenth century helped shape the deep structures of states and empires and the contours of imperial inequalities. While poverty is often understood to have become a political subject with the birth of political economy in the eighteenth century, this book points to the longer history of poverty as a political subject and a

39:53

Elaine Pagels, "Miracles and Wonder:The Historical...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/12

Early in her career, Elaine Pagels changed our understanding of the origins of Christianity with her work in The Gnostic Gospels. Now, in the culmination of a decades-long career, she explores the biggest subject of all, Jesus. In Miracles and Wonder:The Historical Mystery of Jesus (Doubleday, 2025) she sets out to discover how a poor young Jewish man inspired a religion that shaped the world.The book reads like a historical mystery, with each chapter addressing a fascinating question and answering

70:32

Art and Its Holy Object (with Steve Auth)

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/08

For the transcendental and numinous things, sometimes there are no words. But art—paintings, sculpture, music, film—can knock us sideways a little and help us see something, or understand a fleeting meaning, a dream we’ve woken from, that we try to hang onto.He was a successful Wall Street investment guy for decades, but he had a deep love of art and art history; after brush with death and a re-conversion to his Catholic faith, Stev Auth applied both of those gifts in service of his lay apostolate

39:40

Nancy M. Rourke, "Ecological Moral Character: A...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/07

The images we use to think about moral character are powerful. They inform our understanding of the moral virtues and the ways in which moral character develops. However, this aspect of virtue ethics is rarely discussed.In Ecological Moral Character: A Catholic Model (Georgetown UP, 2024) , Nancy M. Rourke creates an ecological model through which we can form images of moral character. She integrates concepts of ecology with Aquinas' vision and describes the dynamics of a moral character in terms of

51:20

Stephanie Schmidt, "Child Martyrs and Militant...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/06

A cornerstone of the evangelization of early New Spain was the conversion of Nahua boys, especially the children of elites. They were to be emissaries between Nahua society and foreign missionaries, hastening the transmission of the gospel. Under the tutelage of Franciscan friars, the boys also learned to act with militant zeal. They sermonized and smashed sacred objects. Some went so far as to kill a Nahua religious leader. For three boys from Tlaxcala, the reprisals were just as deadly.In Child

71:54

Simon Mayall, "The House of War: The Struggle Between...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/04

A powerful new history detailing the most significant military clashes between Islam and Christendom over the 1,300 years of the Muslim caliphate. From the taking of the holy city of Jerusalem in the 7th century AD by Caliph Umar, to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire following the end of World War I, Christian popes, emperors and kings, and Muslim caliphs and sultans were locked in a 1300-year battle for political, military, ideological, economic and religious supremacy. In this powerful new

24:18

Donald S. Prudlo, "Governing Perfection" (St....

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/03

"In the beginning, God administrated." For as Donald Prudlo observes, "There can be no achievement without administration." In this book he seeks to restore the idea that while administration is necessary even in the institutional Church, holiness is not only possible for those charged with governance, but is a fulfillment and type of Christus Rector omnium, or "Christ, Ruler of all." Scrutinizing the relevant thought of Aristotle, Machiavelli, Thomas Aquinas, and Nietzsche, among others, Prudlo

54:19

Miles Pattenden, "Electing the Pope in Early Modern...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/05/02

Jana Byars talks to Miles Pattenden about his book, Electing the Pope in Early Modern Italy, 1450-1700 (Oxford UP, 2017), just about to be released in paperback. This study offers a radical reassessment of the history of early modern papacy, constructed through the first major analytical treatment of papal elections in English. Papal elections, with their ceremonial pomp and high drama, are compelling theater, but, until now, no one has analyzed them on the basis of the problems they created for

70:06

Timothy Twining, "The Limits of Erudition: The Old...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/30

The history of early modern biblical scholarship has often been told as a teleological narrative in which a succession of radical thinkers dethroned the authority of the sacred word. The Limits of Erudition: The Old Testament in Post-Reformation Europe (Cambridge UP, 2024) tells a very different story. Drawing on a mass of archival sources, Timothy Twining reconstructs the religious, cultural, and institutional contexts in which the text of the Old Testament was considered and contested throughout

30:27

Donald S. Prudlo, "Stimulus Pastorum: A Charge to...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/29

The work of St. Bartholomew of Braga, O.P. (1514-1590) appears here in English for the first time despite its long and enduring influence in ecclesiastical circles. His meditations on the office of pastor have provided critical insight bishops since their initial circulation and have helped form the most famous among them, including Bartholomew's proteges Charles Borromeo. Pope Paul VI ordered a copy of Bartholomew's work to be distributed among the Catholic bishops at the Second Vatican Council

73:56

Udi Greenberg, "The End of the Schism: Catholics,...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/25

Reconciliation between Europe's Protestants and Catholics led to a new era of Christian collaboration. Why did these erstwhile foes end their schism and begin to make peace? In this riveting study, Udi Greenberg shows that ecumenism grew out of a shared desire to protect against perceived threats to Christian life. The End of the Schism: Catholics, Protestants, and the Remaking of Christian Life in Europe, 1880s-1970s (Harvard UP, 2025) overturns conventional wisdom about this revolutionary

66:22

Asa Simon Mittman, "Cartographies of Exclusion:...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/24

From the battles over Jerusalem to the emergence of the “Holy Land,” from legally mandated ghettos to the Edict of Expulsion, geography has long been a component of Christian-Jewish relations. Attending to world maps drawn by medieval Christian mapmakers, Cartographies of Exclusion: Anti-Semitic Mapping in Medieval England (Penn State University Press, 2024) by Dr. Asa Simon Mittman brings us to the literal drawing board of “Christendom” and shows the creation, in real time, of a mythic state

41:51

Faith Tibble, "Crown of Thorns: Humble Gods and...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/18

Jesus' Crown of Thorns has become one of the most ubiquitous features of Christian religious art, but was the original crown anything like the crown of popular medieval art and piety? The image conjured by art history is that of a bloodied, beaten Jesus, wearing a cruelly fashioned, woven crown made of sharp thorns. But this image is deeply misleading, based on a fundamental misunderstanding and possible mistranslation.In The Crown of Thorns: Humble Gods and Humiliated Kings (Bloomsbury, 2025) Dr

43:45

Salve Regina (with Bishop Athanasius Schneider)

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/14

“And a great storm of wind arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already filling [.…] And he awoke and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, ‘Peace! Be still!’ And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you no faith?” (Mk 4: 37-41)Bishop Athanasius Schneider, auxiliary bishop of Astana in Kazakhstan, has identified the challenges of our age, “a new pagan society,” he calls it, and “anti-Christian”; others have said

26:59

Forest Issac Jones, "Good Trouble: The Selma, Alabama...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/10

Forest Isaac Jones is an award-winning author of non-fiction and essays, specializing in the study of Irish History, the US Civil Rights Movement and Northern Ireland. His latest essay, ‘The Civil Rights Connection Between The USA and Northern Ireland’ was awarded honorable mention in the category of nonfiction essay by Writer’s Digest in their 93rd annual writing competition.In this interview, he discusses his new book Good Trouble: The Selma, Alabama and Derry, Northern Ireland Connection

47:13

Loretta Vandi, "Eufrasia Burlamacchi" (Getty...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/06

Eufrasia Burlamacchi (Getty Publications, 2025) by Dr. Loretta Vandi is a timely exploration of the skilful illuminated manuscripts of Sister Eufrasia Burlamacchi (1478–1548) demonstrates her artistry within this sometime neglected artistic medium. Within the convent walls of San Domenico in Lucca where she lived and worked, Burlamacchi attained high levels of artistic proficiency through her knowledge of drawing and colour technique, composition, treatment of space and proportions.This book

73:39

Lived Experience and the Search for Truth: Revisiting...

New Books in Catholic Studies ·

2025/04/05

“What is truth?” Pontius Pilate scoffed at Jesus (Jn 18:38), and that’s how we think about matters today in our culture—subjectively: my truth, your truth, etc. To make the argument that there is a knowable Truth (with a capital T) that is written in the world and in our bones, theologians Deborah Savage and Robert Fastiggi examine a selection of autobiographical accounts of ‘lived experience.’ They take a number of personal essays written by those who have erred from the path of Catholic social

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