Catholic Books

The Ascent of the Mind to God stands apart from St. Robert Bellarmine’s apologetical writings as a deeply personal spiritual work. Composed after a retreat in 1614, Bellarmine affectionately called it his “Benjamin,” the child of his old age, and the first of a series of spiritual reflections that have nourished Christians for centuries. Structured around fifteen steps of a spiritual ladder, the book begins with the human person—man as a “microcosm” of creation—inspired by the foundational pr...

After the devotions of May to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Church turns in June to the contemplation of divine love itself: the Sacred Heart of Jesus. It is no accident that Western culture has long associated June with love, marriage, and union, nor that Our Lord has drawn countless souls during this month toward deeper reflection on love, sacrifice, and covenant—both human and divine. The Month of the Sacred Heart, by Abbé Berlioux, offers a rich treasury of practices, meditations, and pray...

Saint Alphonsus de Liguori (1696–1787), Doctor of the Church, was a legal prodigy who earned a double doctorate at the age of sixteen. Born into a noble Italian family, he abandoned his legal career to serve the poor and sick of Naples. In 1732, he founded the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer, the Redemptorists, dedicating his life to preaching missions and guiding souls. Remarkably, his literary career did not begin until he was nearly fifty. From then on, he wrote tirelessly, producin...

The eighteenth century is often called an age of “Enlightenment,” a period marked by skepticism, worldliness, and a turning away from God in favor of constructing a purely human society. Yet long before this crisis emerged, God had already prepared an apostle to confront it: St. Alphonsus Liguori. Renouncing prestige, legal success, and worldly advantage, he placed Christ at the center of his heart and devoted his life to setting souls ablaze with love for the Redeemer. But the roots of St. A...

The two great commandments are to love God above all things and one’s neighbor as oneself. One of the highest acts of charity toward our neighbor is to remember him after death—especially the poor souls in Purgatory, who rely on our prayers and sacrifices. For this reason, the Church gives us the liturgical month of November. As autumn’s harvest is gathered and stored, the faithful are invited to draw from a different harvest: the graces and indulgences God offers for the relief of the souls ...

What happened to the Apostles? How did the early Christians live? Why did the Romans and other peoples try to destroy them with such brutality? Those answers are all provided in Fr. Pedro de Ribadeneyra, SJ's Flores Sanctorum, carefully translated by Mrs. Anne Hope. Lives of the Early Martyrs not only traces the most ancient testimony to where the Apostles went, and where they won their crowns of martyrdom, but their disciples as well. It carefully elucidates the lives that the early Christia...

St. Leonard was born in 1676 at Port Maurice, near Genoa. He went to Rome to study, and there took on the Franciscan habit at the friary of St. Bonaventure. St. Leonard was zealous for souls, and wanted to be a missionary to foreign lands; instead he was called by God to give missions to the Christians of his own country.For twenty-four years, amid great hardships and dangers, he preached missions in every corner of Italy. The power of his words, which flowed from his strict life converted co...

In the Workshop of St. Joseph, by the Rev. Heuser, presents the reader with a fictional account taking place at the time of the Holy Family's flight to Egypt, and later return to Nazareth.It follows several fictional characters, Eliab, his daughter Zelah who becomes a servant for the Holy Family, and his son Ahijah, all of whom are Jews living in Egypt. Zelah accompanies the Holy Family back to Nazareth, and Eliab and Ahijah follow them, ultimately taking up residence in Nazareth itself. The ...

"... All possible means are resorted to in an effort to discredit the phenomena of Konnersreuth, to silence the voices which speak of a Divine Hand at work there. Despite all of this, the phenomena continue to take place as hitherto."Therese Neumann was a simple girl born to good Catholic parents in an obscure village of Catholic Bavaria. Yet God would call her to make known the sacred passion of Christ in her person. After an accident that should have killed her, she was miraculously healed,...

The amazing life of Blessed Nicholas Factor tells of a miracle working saint from the 16th century. As a child of five, Nicholas already manifested signs of his future sanctity. He fasted three times a week and gave the food he did not touch to the poor. With cheerful words he comforted the sick, and on visiting the leper hospital, he would at times kiss the wounds of the afflicted persons. A Moorish maid in his home was so affected at the conduct of the holy child that she was attracted to t...

Many readers know John Fisher primarily as the fellow martyr of Thomas More and as a victim of King Henry VIII’s break with Rome. Far fewer realize that Fisher was already renowned in the early sixteenth century as one of Europe’s foremost theologians and as a reforming bishop of exceptional holiness and learning. His theological precision and fidelity to tradition made him uniquely suited to confront the doctrinal crisis emerging from Germany. When Martin Luther denied core Catholic doctrine...

The moral dangers of the too common and too fashionable amusements of dancing are pointed out, with as much force as clearness and learning, in this small but valuable book. The author extracts proofs from the Holy Scriptures, the Holy Fathers, Holy Councils, and from the theologians most renowned for their piety and learning.Familiarity removes, often, a due appreciation of the dangers of the dance. There are Catholics who seem to have become skeptical as to the very existence of the danger ...

"In this book, Deacon James Keating provides an opportunity for one spiritual director to introduce his mind to the minds of other directors with the hope that his ideas may season their own already developed method of direction. The book does not attend to all the possible realities a director may encounter within his or her training or within the daily execution of this ministry. The author wishes to share his approach to directing seminarians by reflecting upon themes and experiences which...

Enthusiasm, in the religious sense, is more akin to fanaticism than fervor. As Monsignor Ronald Knox describes, it is that recurring situation in Church history in which men and women, seek to be less and less "of the world" and more and more attentive to the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Their assumption is audacious yet simple: grace does not perfect nature; it destroys and replaces it. The inevitable result: separation, secession, schism. In twenty-three informative and entertaining chapter...

Our Catholic churches are filled with an abundance of signs and symbols, some of which you may have never noticed or understood. The sacred art, architecture, and artifacts of a church building proclaim the Real Presence of Christ, God dwelling among us in the Blessed Sacrament. The saints portrayed within a church are witnesses to Eucharistic living, and we can identify them through various symbols that tell us about their lives, their works, and their witness to the living presence of God.I...

Whether we realize it or not, Catholics have been deeply influenced by modernity's failed worldview. While we want to live and share our faith with joy, we struggle to do so because we unwittingly see the cosmos, the human person, and society as machines functioning independently of their Creator and of one another. If we want to bring the life-transforming effects of our faith into the world, we must first find and live real Catholicism, breaking free of the gravitational pull of modernity's...

The Sacred Heart of Jesus is the revelation of God's love for man, made flesh. The heart is a symbol of our passions, desires, and will. Meditating upon Jesus' heart can transform our own hearts so we might be one with him.Make Our Hearts Like Yours is a comprehensive collection of meditations on the Sacred Heart of Jesus, drawn from saints and scholars of every age of Church history. Arranged according to the liturgical calendar, this daily devotional highlights the centrality of the Incarna...

Are you trying to be your best but just can't seem to get past your own shortfalls? Fear not. Your unique and beautiful temperament may hold the key to becoming the saint God made you to be. And just as he did with the saints before us, God will build upon your temperament to bring you to perfection.Whether you already know your temperament -- some combination of deep Melancholy, peaceful Phlegmatic, take-charge Choleric, or playful Sanguine -- or you have never been introduced to the four cl...

To become a better Christian, you need to form your emotions aright. It might also surprise you to know that Catholic teaching doesn't disparage the emotions. Rather, the traditional Catholic view -- supported by giants in the Catholic tradition such as Saint Augustine, Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, and Saint Thomas Aquinas -- is that ongoing conversion does not mean suppressing, ignoring, or eradicating the emotions, but reforming them.In Emotional Holiness, Abbot Austin Murphy, OSB, shows how...

This workbook invites readers to enter deeply into their personal history, thoughts, and emotions in order to encounter Christ in a living and transformative way. Through its guided reflections, structured exercises, and prayerful invitations, it leads believers toward a more intimate, honest, and healing communion with Jesus. Its purpose is simple but profound: to help Christians discover the truth of who they are, to surrender fully to Christ, and to embrace the joy He desires for His follo...

“There can hardly be a better practice in the spiritual life than that of meeting everything as an expression of the will of God.” With this conviction, Dom Hubert van Zeller offers a concise and deeply rooted guide to one of the most essential and misunderstood aspects of Christian spirituality: abandonment to God’s will. Grounded in the wisdom of the saints and doctors of the Church, The Will of God in Other Words walks readers through what surrender to God truly means and what it does not ...

Hope is truly a lifesaver! Whether we have struggled through a world-wide pandemic, are dealing with seemingly hopeless diagnoses, losses, family troubles, or whatever else that might have caused us to become tempted to give up on hope, we should realize that God is certainly the foundation of our every hope. He will forever be. We need to continue to hope in His loving promises. He will never leave us! And He gifted us with the most eminent gift ever -- His own Mother! This book presents man...

Besides the graces of the Sacraments, God has another way for us to grow in faith from a mustard seed into a giant tree. And that way is a life of virtue. A virtue is a habit, something that must be practiced daily if it is to increase. At our Baptism, we received the virtues of faith, hope, and love. In this children's book, authors Patrick O'Hearn and Fr. Donald Calloway, MIC, with beautiful illustrations by Adalee Hude, describe 15 of the most important virtues for boys and girls. We begin...

Understanding the Sacraments offers a clear and approachable exploration of the seven sacraments of the Catholic Church, revealing how each one serves as a profound encounter with God’s grace. Written in an accessible and pastoral tone, this book helps readers deepen their appreciation for the sacramental life and see how the sacraments shape every stage of the Christian journey. Drawing from Scripture, Church teaching, and pastoral experience, the author explains the meaning, purpose, and ef...

Many people rely on Robert Spitzer, S.J., Ph.D., for his expertise on explaining the relationship between science, faith, and reason. Finally, at your fingertips, are his answers to select questions that viewers asked on his immensely popular television show, Fr. Spitzer's Universe, to help you understand and share life's greatest mysteries.A priest and philosopher of science, Fr. Spitzer offers evidence and proofs for common queries, such as: Is there really an intelligent Being who created ...

Here is the book that will help you discover how to be "fully alive." Esteemed theologian, Fr. Thomas Mullady, OP shares a fresh perspective on why you are called to union with God. He provides accessible and relevant answers on commonly asked post-Vatican II questions in Catholic theology, including Thomistic problems which have pervaded Catholic theology, both past and present.Fr. Mullady offers solutions to debates and a springboard to launch an analysis of contemporary issues such as:What...

Italy: a storied land of saints and the travel destination of dreams.For those wishing to experience this remarkable country to the fullest, just knowing where to start can be overwhelming. Enter bestselling author, Catholic media personality, and Italy aficionado Teresa Tomeo to provide the choicest sites, best routes, and most inspiring and satisfying journeys to help you soak in all the beauty Italy has to offer and make your Italy excursion utterly unforgettable.Tomeo draws from her exper...

Strained or broken relationships are an unfortunate fact of life for most of us. Friends fall away, siblings drift apart, children sever ties with their parents, and despite our best efforts, these painful fissures are difficult to mend. Bestselling author and clinical psychologist Dr. Ray Guarendi shares practical wisdom and usable strategies to aid you in navigating your way through such situations. With strong doses of humor and hope, he will help you form healthy habits in the ways you ta...

Meet your new guide and intercessor on the journey to holiness. Venerable Bruno Lanteri lived through tumultuous times -- war, revolution, and Jansenism were all raging -- yet he prayerfully accompanied his spiritual directees and encouraged them to have patience and hope amid life's challenges. This treasure trove of letters that Venerable Bruno wrote to his spiritual children will provide you with life-enhancing wisdom that you can ponder and take to heart again and again. A common enemy in...

Our Lord entrusted a very special revelation to St. Margaret Mary Alacoque: the Heart of Jesus longs for your heart.This divine revelation inspired numerous saints to know, receive, and adore Our Lord in the Holy Eucharist and to quench His thirst for our love by cultivating friendships, performing spiritual and corporal works of mercy, undertaking missionary endeavors, and imitating His Sacred Heart in daily life.The current Jubilee of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which commemorates the 350th ...

The epistles of St. Ignatius are presented here in their entirety, offering valuable historical insight through an accessible English translation. St. Ignatius of Antioch, one of the earliest and most significant Christian leaders, became Bishop of Antioch around 67 A.D. During his ministry, he wrote several letters to Christian communities and individuals, many of which survive as some of the earliest Christian texts. Known for his extensive travels and missionary zeal, Ignatius also gave us...

This work introduces the fundamentals of logical thinking by examining how the human mind forms ideas, evaluates evidence, and arrives at sound conclusions. William Walker Atkinson explains the major modes of reasoning—deductive, inductive, and hypothetical—using clear language and accessible examples designed for the general reader. Beginning with the formation of ideas and concepts, the book distinguishes between concepts and mere terms, showing how memory supplies names while reasoning det...

Reverend James L. Meagher explores how Jesus Christ and the twelve apostles offered the first Mass and what Christ’s own example reveals about the nature, structure, and origins of Christian worship. Meagher begins by correcting a widespread misunderstanding: that the Mass began solely at the Last Supper as a symbolic ritual of bread and wine. While the Last Supper is momentous, Meagher shows that the roots of the Mass reach far deeper into centuries of Jewish liturgical and temple tradition....

St. Felix of Cantalice was a Capuchin Franciscan in the 16th century. Placed among great personages such as St. Philip Neri, St. Charles Borromeo, and others, St. Felix lived a life of poverty and fidelity to the rule of St. Francis. Born in 1515, he lived as a farm worker until he was 28, when he became a Capuchin. He not only begged alms, but gladly distributed them to the poor. It was said that his alms sack was as bottomless as his heart. He walked bare-foot through the streets of Rome, a...

There are two reasons to rejoice at the publication of this new edition of Hugh Ross Williamson's important work on the evidence for Shakespeare's Catholicism. The first is its restoration of the author to his rightful place in the Catholic cultural conversation, a place he held for a full forty years from the 1930s to the 1970s; the second is the restoration of the present volume to its rightful place in the scholarly conversation on the nature and importance of Shakespeare's faith. -Joseph ...

Today's world is rocked by claims and counter-claims made by the most diverse groups. The result is ideological conflict, violence, destruction and always the threat of a wider war, often based on contested land and boundaries. At bottom, all these disputes resolve themselves into conflicts about justice. But what is justice? Does it even make sense to talk about justice today, when so many use and misuse the concept for their own ends?In this ever timely book, the Belgian philosopher, Marcel...

The chequered life of Ludolph the Carthusian (c. 1295-1378) found its spiritual contentment in the writing of his colossal work on the Vita Jesu Christi in Latin. The book on the Life of Christ occupied some forty years of Ludolph's life in a charterhouse in Mainz. It has been styled as a summa evangelica and as it contains a series of meditations, spiritual instructions and prayers, it has also served to many a medieval scholar as a collation of dogmatic and moral dissertations. These are st...

This collection of sonnets confronts the tension between human weakness and the call to holiness with honesty, reverence, and poetic restraint. Written against the backdrop of modern religious speech that can feel sanitized or self-consciously pious, these poems insist on a more truthful Christian voice—one that acknowledges sin, failure, and the costliness of grace. The sonnets move along the fault line between aspiration and inadequacy. They reach for Christ not by denying the human conditi...

Domine Exaudi is the fifth of six volumes of Denis the Carthusian’s monumental Commentary on the Davidic Psalms. Denis (1402–1471), known as the “ecstatic Doctor,” devoted himself to expounding all 150 Psalms according to the traditional fourfold sense of Scripture: literal, allegorical, tropological, and anagogical. This volume continues the effort to make his rich spiritual and theological insights available in English for the first time. Denis understood the Psalter to be the heart of Chri...

This learned and historically grounded work traces the development of mystical theology leading up to John of the Cross. The author offers a careful study of the principal figures and texts that shaped the medieval mystical tradition and prepared the way for its great synthesis in the Carmelite reform. The book examines the contributions of Hugh and Richard of St Victor, St Bonaventure, and a number of influential works long attributed to other authors. It includes substantial treatment of Hu...

Abbé Georges Michonneau (1899-1983) was a dedicated and zealous parish priest among the working class of Paris. In his three works of this anthology the reader will find a profound awareness of the full reality of the Church of Christ, its role in the world, and the service it must render to the people who make up the Body of Christ on earth. For that reason, and because his priestly heart was very much in the right place, and also because the pre-conciliar pastoral problems he sought to addr...

The figure of Girolamo Savonarola looms large over Italian secular and ecclesiastical history, but remains obscure to the English-speaking world. Now, as part of a larger project dedicated to the translation and study of the life and works of Savonarola, this highly accessible biography of the Friar of San Marco has been republished in the hopes of introducing faithful Catholics to a man that Pius XII called "an apostle who has a lively sense of things divine and eternal, who takes a stand ag...

We are made to be happy, to experience eternal beatitude, the face-to-face vision of God. And we attain to this happiness through our actions here below. The cardinal virtues are the key to ordering our acts to this end according to correct reasoning. Fortitude and temperance strengthen our will so that we will not succumb to fear or disordered passions. Justice regulates our relations with others. Yet, as all human acts are the fruit of the intellect and will, we need a virtue which directs ...

This volume gathers a series of short theological pamphlets originally published between 1941 and 1946 by the National Headquarters of the Holy Name Society with ecclesiastical approval. Slightly edited and unified here in book form, the chapters were designed specifically for lay readers seeking a deeper and more systematic understanding of the relationship between God and man. Based on the structure and thought of the Summa Theologiae of St. Thomas Aquinas, the series presents theology not ...

For too many of us, life is harder than it needs to be. We have forgotten the ancient system of "super habits" -- a specific set of habits for making decisions, managing our emotions, and dealing with other people that fosters lives of greater ease, happiness, and power.Ancient civilizations relied on these habits to produce some of the greatest achievements in human history. Now, contemporary researchers in psychology, education, and management are rediscovering these habits and empirically ...

Although frequent Confession is meritorious, one can easily become complacent and fall into a routine that diminishes sorrow for sins. This classic compendium provides preparations and thanksgivings to guide you step-by-step through the Confession process to help you develop a firm resolution, make reparation for sins, and become more disposed to receive God's grace.Whether you are a recent convert or someone who confesses regularly, this book is for you. Fr. Hubert McEvoy, S.J., breaks open ...

How recollected are you during the Collect, the Opening Prayer at Mass? To assist you in entering more deeply into the Mass and the mysteries of this sacred season, Fr. Edward Looney offers short daily meditations and reflection questions so that you may absorb all the richness of the prayers in the liturgy.Whether over a cup of coffee or while resting in the Lord's Presence before or after Mass, these meditations inspire both fruitful contemplation and vibrant group discussion. Fr. Looney re...

Society no longer encourages wonder or spending time pondering the big questions of life. Indeed, the childlike gifts of curiosity and gratitude have been trampled over by technology and benumbed by complacency.In these engaging pages, Bobby Angel reveals how and why your life has meaning. Drawing from major thinkers from ancient to modern times, personal stories, historical lessons, and popular movies, he assists the layperson in absorbing vital philosophical concepts in an easily digestible...