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Two men possess vital data on Russia's Star Wars missile defense system. One isted by the KGB. The other is Jack Ryan, hero of The Hunt for Red October,ld to peace. A 4-month #1 New York Times bestseller, with 1.3 million hardcover copies in print. HC: Putnam..
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Considered by Ratzinger devotees as his greatest work on the Liturgy, this profound and beautifully written treatment of the "great prayer of the Church" will help readers rediscover the Liturgy in all its hidden spiritual wealth and transcendent grandeur as the very center of our Christian life.

In his own foreward to the book, Cardinal Ratzinger compares this work to a much earlier classic of the same title by Romano Guardini because Ratzinger feels that his insights here are similar with what Guardini achieved in his time regarding a renewed understanding of the Liturgy.

"My purpose here is to assist this renewal of understanding of the Liturgy. Its basic intentions coincide with what Guardini wanted to achieve. The only difference is that I have had to translate what Guardini did at the end of the First World War, in a totally different historical situation, into the context of our present-day questions, hopes and dangers. Like Guardini, I am not attempting to involve myself with scholarly discussion and research. I am simply offering an aid to the understanding of the faith and to the right way to give the faith its central form of expression in the Liturgy."

—Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger.
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This intimate, affectionate portrait of Pope John Paul II by his longtime secretary and confidant reveals fascinating new details about the opinions, hopes, fears, and dramatic life of this public man.

“I had accompanied him for almost forty years: twelve in Kraków and then twenty-seven in Rome. I was always with him, always at his side. Now, in the moment of death, he’d gone on alone. . . .And now? Who is accompanying him on the other side?”
—From A Life with Karol

Cardinal Stanislaw Dziwisz worked side by side with Pope John Paul II for almost forty years, enjoying unique access to both the public and private man. In A life with Karol, he provides a close-up glimpse into the Pope’s life and the critical events of his papacy.

Dziwisz was sitting next to the Pope during the assassination attempt in 1981. He recounts the Pope's reaction to 9/11, describing his thoughts and feelings on that day. And the Cardinal’s moving description of the Pope’s haunting memories of World War II uncovers the roots of the pontiff’s intense opposition to George W. Bush’s war on Iraq.
The two men shared moments of fun and spontaneity as well. Dziwisz writes about the times the Pope would slip out of the Vatican, wearing a Panama hat, to stroll the streets of Rome, and he describes the clandestine ski and hiking trips the pair made to escape the Vatican. His firsthand account of the Pope’s last years also reveals that John Paul II considered resigning. These stories and others lend added poignancy to Dziwisz’s extraordinary portrayal of the Pope’s courage and calmness during his final illness.

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Joseph Cardinal Bernardin's gentle leadership throughout his life of ministerial service had made him an internationally beloved figure, but the words he left behind about his final journey would change the lives of many more people from all faiths, from all backgrounds, and from all over the world.

In the last two months of his life, Joseph Cardinal Bernardin made it his ultimate mission to share his personal reflections and insights as a legacy to those he left behind. The Gift of Peace reveals the Cardinal's spiritual growth amid a string of traumatic events: a false accusation of sexual abuse; reconciliation a year later with his accuser, who had earlier recanted the charges; a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer and surgery; the return of cancer, now in his liver; his decision to discontinue chemotherapy and live his remaining days as fully as possible. In these pages, Bernardin tells his story openly and honestly, and shares the profound peace he came to at the end of his life. He accepted his peace as a gift from God, and he in turn now shares that gift with the world. .
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In this book of meditations, based on a series of homilies and meditations presented and compiled by the author shortly before he became Archbishop of Munich-Freising, in 1977, theologian Joseph Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) presents his profound thoughts on the nature and person of God, building a bridge between theology and spirituality as he makes wide use of the Sacred Scriptures to reveal the beauty and mystery of who God is. He writes about each of the three persons in the Holy Trinity, showing the different attributes of each person, and that "God is three and God is one."

God is--and the Christian faith adds: God is as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three and one. This is the very heart of Christianity, but it is so often shrouded in a silence born of perplexity. Has the Church perhaps gone one step too far here? Ought we not rather leave something so great and inaccessible as God in his inaccessibility? Can something like the Trinity have any real meaning for us? It is certainly true that the proposition that "God is three and God is one" is and remains the expression of his otherness, which is infinitely greater than us and transcends all our thinking and our existence. But, as Joseph Ratzinger shows, if this proposition meant nothing to us, it would not have been revealed! And as a matter of fact, it could be clothed in human language only because it had already penetrated human thinking and living to some extent.

"Without Jesus, we do not know what 'Father' truly is. This becomes visible in his prayer, which is the foundation of his being. A Jesus who was not continuously absorbed in the Father, and was not in continuous intimate communication with him, would be a completely different being from the Jesus of the Bible, the real Jesus of history... In Jesus' prayer, the Father becomes visible and Jesus makes himself known as the Son. The unity which this reveals is the Trinity. Accordingly, becoming a Christian means sharing in Jesus' prayer, entering into the model provided by his life, i.e. the model of prayer. Becomng a Christian means saying 'Father' with Jesus, and thus becoming a child, God's son--God--in the unity of the Spirit, who allows us to be ourselves and precisely in this way draws us into the unity of God. Being a Christian means looking at the world from this central point, which gives us freedom, hope, decisiveness, and consolation."
-- Joseph Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI)

In this profound series of meditations, Ratzinger shows the enduring core of his theology. The future pope begins with an ancient Jewish story: The prophet Jeremiah and his son one day succeeded in creating a living man, through the correct combination of words and letters. "Now that you are able to create a man, God is dead. My life is the death of God," the man says. Ratzinger then shows that man's knowledge of God depends on the relationship that a man establishes between himself and the world and his life; that the question of whether God exists can be answered only in terms of some image of who or what God is, of some sense of how he shapes the whole of our existence."
-- David L. Schindler, John Paul II Institute.
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Originally published in English in 1988, Joseph Ratzinger's Eschatology remains internationally recognized as a leading text on the "last things"--heaven and hell, purgatory and judgment, death and the immortality of the soul. This highly anticipated second edition includes a new preface by Joseph Ratzinger/Pope Benedict XVI and a supplement to the bibliography by theologian Peter A. Casarella.

Eschatology presents a balanced perspective of the doctrine at the center of Christian belief--the Church's faith in eternal life. Recognizing the task of contemporary eschatology as "to marry perspectives, so that person and community, present and future, are seen in their unity," Joseph Ratzinger brings together recent emphasis on the theology of hope for the future with the more traditional elements of the doctrine. His book has proven to be as timeless as it is timely..
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This is a book of wisdom and insight that explains how providential are the trials through which the Catholic Church is now passing. The need of the Papal Primacy to ensure Christian unity; the true meaning of the Priesthood as a sacrament and not a mere ministry; the necessity of the Eucharist as the Sacrifice of the Savior now offering Himself on our altars; the role of the Bishops as successors of the Apostles, united with the successor of St. Peter, the Bishop of Rome; the value of suffering in union with Christ crucified; the indispensable service of the laity in the apostolate - all these themes receive from Cardinal Ratzinger new clarity and depth..
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(Revised Edition) One of Cardinal Ratzinger's most important and widely read books, this volume is a newly revised second edition with an improved translation and an in-depth 20 page preface by the Cardinal. As he states in the preface, since this book was first published over 30 years ago, many changes and significant events have occurred in the world, and in the Church. But even so, he says he is firmly convinced that his fundamental approach in this book is still very timely and crucial for the spiritual needs of modern man. That approach puts the question of God and the question about Christ in the very center, which leads to a "narrative Christology" and demonstrates that the place for faith is in the Church.

Thus, this remarkable elucidation of the Apostle's Creed gives an excellent, modern interpretation of the foundations of Christianity. Ratzinger's profound treatment of Christianity's basic truths combines a spiritual outlook with a deep knowledge of Scripture and the history of theology..
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In four superb homilies and a concluding essay, Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI, provides a clear and inspiring exploration of the Genesis creation narratives.

While the stories of the world’s creation and the fall of humankind have often been subjected to reductionism of one sort or another — literalists treat the Bible as a science textbook whereas rationalists divorce God from creation — Ratzinger presents a rich Catholic understanding of these early biblical writings and attests to their enduring vitality.

Beginning each homily with a text selected from the first three chapters of Genesis, Ratzinger discusses, in turn, God the creator, the meaning of the biblical creation accounts, the creation of human beings, and sin and salvation; in the appendix he unpacks the beneficial consequences of faith in creation.

Expertly translated from German, these reflections set out a reasonable and biblical approach to creation. ‘In the Beginning . . .’ also serves as an excellent homiletic resource for priests and pastors..
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