It has become a tradition for magazines and other news sources to offer to help their readers as they plan their vacations by suggesting books they might like to take along to the beach or the mountains or wherever they plan their recreation. Following in those footsteps, Catholic World Report’s editorial staff offers its picks for books readers may like to bring along with their sunscreen and beach chair. Some books may be a little large for a beach bag; others have been on the market for several months (or more); but all are tomes that we have found inspirational, educational, or just fun to read in past summers. With that, we offer you our summer reading list.

The British priest Father Francis Randolph uses his book, Know Him in the Breaking of the Bread to explain the various parts of the Mass, what each element means, where it comes from, and where it fits within our Christian beliefs. He spends time on each important element of liturgy from the building and the environment for liturgy, to the disposition people should have for Mass, to each of the prayers said at Mass.

The book also reveals the history behind the elements of the Mass including how things have changed since the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s. Father Randolph sometimes expresses his opinion that some changes have gone too far, but some of those opinions may be confused with authentic Church teaching by some readers. Read the book carefully to distinguish opinion from fact.

While not advocating a return to the days of the pre-Vatican II Mass—since Father Randolph believes that the Mass was in need of organic, modest reform —he does believe the New Mass as generally celebrated is not entirely satisfactory.

Father Randolph never strays from a respect for the Eucharist and its primary importance in our lives, bringing Christ to us in a way unlike any other and bringing the whole Christian community together in a unique way. In addition to being a valuable teaching resource for both teens and adults, the book is also a guide to a deeper devotion to the Eucharist, opening up new spiritual understandings of the Sacrifice of the Mass for a contemporary audience.

Having read this book, the average Catholic should have a new experience of the Mass, growing in the ability to offer heartfelt and devoted worship to the Lord. You will never approach the Eucharist in the same way again, once you understand the richness and timelessness of the Mass.

The title of the book, Know Him in the Breaking of the Bread, is a reference to the famous scene from the gospels in which Jesus, after the Resurrection, appears to two disciples on the road to Emmaus. On the way, Jesus uses the Scriptures to teach them concerning the Passion and Resurrection, and then, once in Emmaus, gathers with them around a table for a meal and then disappears as he blesses and breaks the bread. From the earliest days, the Church has recognized that as Jesus broke and blessed the bread, he did not truly disappear but was present in the bread of the Eucharist which he himself had consecrated.

In the story of the Emmaus road, we see Jesus present in the Word, in the gathering of two or more in his name, and in the consecration of the Eucharist, just as we do today in the Mass. Father Randolph’s book helps us to know Jesus in the Mass, the breaking of the Bread, and knowing Him, to worship Him in a deeper and more devout manner.

(You can order on line at www.ignatius.com—and write your own review if you like!)

This massive book, which falls just barely short of 1,000 pages, might seem an unlikely candidate for light summer reading. But George Weigel’s masterful biography of Pope John Paul II will richly reward the reader’s investment.

Moreover, CWR can offer some comforting advice to readers who might feel daunted by the sheer size of this volume. Read the Prologue. In just 15 pages, Weigel sets forth the outline of his project, explaining why the figure of Pope John Paul looms so large, and why the reader will want to know more about this man, his background, and his goals. Most readers will find the arguments convincing, and decide to move on to the first chapter.

Then, with his description of the Poland in which young Karol Wojtyla was raised, Weigel captures the reader completely. For an American reader with very little previous knowledge of Polish history, the first few chapters are truly a revelation. Why did we know so little about this country, which sits on the crossroad that links Eastern and Western Europe? Why were we not aware of the heroic role played by the Catholic Church during the dark years of Nazi and Communist tyranny? Weigel makes an important era of modern history come alive, and leaves no doubt that only Poland could have produced a historic figure like John Paul I.

The pace of the volume slows somewhat when Weigel begins to chronicle John Paul’s pontificate. The author had access to an unprecedented volume of information, and this papacy has seen an unprecedented plethora of writings, speeches, foreign visits, and strategic plans. To avoid sinking under the sheer weight of material at his disposal, Weigel organizes these chapters around several main themes of the Pope’s overall plan: the struggle against totalitarianism, the proper understanding of human love, the ecumenical imperative, and the drive to restore a “culture of life.” Again and again, he relates these initiatives back to the Pope’s formative years, his unique pastoral style, and his personalist understanding of human freedom.

The appearance of this excellent biography in 1999 leaves only one question pending. Weigel knows—indeed he relates—that for years the Pontiff was looking forward to the Jubilee as a watershed point in his pontificate and even in the history of the Church. So for a fuller understanding of this Pope’s impact, would it not be useful to look back at his life from across the threshold of the 21st century? There will, we trust, be a sequel.

However, neither viewpoint reflects the historical reading of the last book of the Bible by Catholics throughout the ages. From the beginning, scholars and saints saw the enigmatic book as a vision of the heavenly banquet, the wedding feast of the Lamb, that we hope to experience at the end of our lives. While its symbolism could be seen to include the sweep of salvation history, it was not primarily a guide to The End.

Dr. Scott Hahn is a professor of theology at Franciscan University of Steubenville in Ohio and a convert from Protestantism. His conversion story has become familiar to millions and his audiotapes exploring Scripture and Church teachings have sold by the thousands. Trained in Scripture as a Protestant, Hahn admits in The Lamb’s Supper that he once held the standard view of Revelation as an End Times chronology, but says that when he experienced his first Mass he recognized that book of Scripture in it.

His dreams that he was the first to see the connection were dashed as he read the Church Fathers and saw they took for granted what he was just beginning to see.

When Hahn led a group of students in a Bible study of St. John’s Revelation several years ago, he challenged them to go home and count how many references to the Mass they found in the first 12 chapters. As they returned the next week, most reported a few or maybe a dozen, but they were astounded when he said he had found dozens. The entire book is full of them, including the Lamb “standing as though slain”—the Lamb of God referred to before Communion. There is the wedding feast, which Hahn links to the Eucharistic feast at which Christ weds his bride, the Church. He also finds the Gloria sung by angelic choirs. And many more.

The book is divided into three logical parts. The first is an examination of the parts of the Mass, especially with an eye toward their connection to the Old Testament covenants and the Covenant of Christ and the history of the Mass. The second section connects the Mass to the imagery and symbolism of the Book of Revelation, not excluding the images of judgment and apocalypse prefigured in the Mass. Finally, the book ends with the application of the lessons learned to the life of the individual, the family, and the parish.

This examination of the Book of Revelation can be a valuable tool for Catholics of all levels of academic training. The Lamb’s Supper is an inspirational book that teaches. It teaches one to appreciate the Mass so that the numinous curtain between heaven and earth is pulled aside for a moment and we can celebrate the heavenly banquet for a time each day.

In fact—as the Pope has reminded us—more Christians died for the faith in the 20th century than in all the previous history of the Church. There were the hundreds of thousands who died behind the Iron Curtain, the Christian victims of the Nazi death camps, the priests and religious hunted down and killed during the Spanish Civil War, the missionaries who suffered in Africa and Asia, and many more. Nor has the carnage ended. Christians are still the subjects of active persecution in Sudan and China; sectarian violence is still claiming lives in India and Indonesia.

Christians of the Western world have generally ignored the persecutions of our brothers during the 20th century. We have not, as a rule, protested or even lamented their deaths. Fortunately, the Church is now recovering her reverence for her heroes, especially including our contemporary martyrs. By doing so, we are also recovering a source of enormous strength, consolation, and evangelical zeal. As Robert Royal observes, “After the reality of trial by fire, the modern intellectual objections to religions seem bloodless abstractions.”

Royal makes an effort to include all of the major persecutions of the century, helping the reader comprehend that both hatred for the Church and heroic Christian virtue come in a wide variety of guises. Martyrs, he points out, are ordinary men who “managed to act in extraordinary ways.” Their example should spur us on, and even a description of their suffering, in all its brutal detail, helps to drive home the message. Royal reasons: “When we understand concretely the enormous price they were willing to pay for no earthly reason, we might just catch a glimpse of what they achieved and why.”

Although the Church is a kingdom not of this world, for nearly 1,500 years it was also a political powerhouse and the source or conduit of almost all of the culture and customs of Western Europe. In his book, Noonan uses the fruits of seven years research in the Vatican archives as well as other diocesan libraries to describe the present-day incarnation of the Church in her external life: ceremonies, traditions, vestments, insignia, protocol, and temporal and spiritual governance.

The book is divided into five sections: the Vatican itself, papal honors including orders of knighthood, Church protocol, vestments and insignia, and a brief history of the papacy. There are also a glossary, a name and subject index, and a variety of appendixes including several Church documents.

Noonan has done a wonderful job of answering those niggling questions that never seem to be answered in the standard Catholic question-and-answer books, such as the reason why cardinals have their title placed in the middle of their name and how exactly a papal election is performed. For the latter, the author leads the reader step by step through the protocol that follows the death of a pope, citing examples from recent history, and then to the elections process and then enthronement of a new pope. He even includes sample liturgies and ceremony programs that have been used in the past. The chapter on the College of Cardinals is especially a gem.

He then examines the different papal honors, who may receive them, how their insignia should be worn, and their relative precedence to other honors. He studies the two major equestrian orders, the Knights of Malta and the Knights of the Holy Sepulcher. For any readers entranced by the idea of knighthood and chivalry, these chapters are a joy to read as they reveal that true knighthood, which begins with Christ, still exists in the world today and that chivalry does have a place in the 21st century.

The section on protocol is very interesting and especially helpful for Americans who are not familiar with matters of rank, protocol, and etiquette. Here Noonan even provides sample dinner menus and invitations from past functions. The chapter on forms of address is also a practical guide for anyone who may have an opportunity to write to any clergyman. Overall, this section will be mainly interesting for those who are curious about orders of precedence and etiquette, even if most will never have the chance to be (or perhaps even desire to be) part of formal pomp and circumstance.

The final section treats of vesture and insignia. What is a zuchetto? When is it worn? A nice addition to this section, and the whole book, is a series of color plate pages on heavy stock that illustrate the various vestments, insignia, awards, and historical events covered in the book.

The Church Visible is a fascinating introduction to what might otherwise be an intricate web of inscrutable customs, but are now clearly illuminated as the logical product of the Church’s long history as the centerpiece of Western civilization.

Pope Fiction, a play on the type of easy-to-read magazines or books popular several decades ago, delivers on its promise. It is an eminently readable series of rebuttals to the myths you’ve heard dozens of times from that post-modernist feminist on the “talking head” shows—and of misconceptions you’ve perhaps never encountered before.

Proceeding in chronological order, Madrid catalogues myths from the standard “Peter had no special authority” through more obscure questions regarding Pope Honorius to the topic in the news today, Pope Pius XII and the Jews.

The real jewel of the book is the last section. Contained in that chapter are details concerning the story of Pius XII that aren’t found in most secular news stories. Did you know that Israel planted 800,000 trees in the Negev to commemorate the number of lives they credited the Pope with saving? Or that the New York Times lauded the Pope in editorials on Christmas in 1941 and 1942 for his calls for peace and an end to persecution of Jews? Evidently, the editorial writers of today’s Times haven’t dug that far back in their archives.

In fact, the section on Pius XII might be worth the price of the book alone. But all of the chapters are highly educational and entertaining. Madrid uses scholarly sources, but writes in an accessible style. Pope Fiction is what every book of apologetics should be. It’s readable and equips Catholics to answer challenges from fundamentalists and secular humanists alike while educating us about the office of a man we call “Father.”

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