The Catholic Summer Reading Program

This summer, why not take some time to discover the rich treasure of Catholic literature?

Aquinas and More Catholic Goods, the official sponsor of the Catholic summer reading program, would like to invite you to join in a book discussion at your parish, local Catholic store or online at CatholicBookDiscussion.com. Kids can also get involved by downloading our Catholic Kids Reading Path and filling it in as they read Catholic books during the summer.

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Make peace with money.
This is not a book about how to make money. Or spend it. Or give it away. Rather, it s a book for anyone who has ever worried about money, about having enough, and it begins with a startling assumption: No amount of money will ever lift your anxiety. This may seem counter-intuitive, but in Gregory Jeffrey we have an experienced guide. With degrees in business and theology, he has worked as a development consultant for two decades. In meeting with thousands of individuals to ask their support for various causes, he discovered to his amazement that some people with millions worried constantly about money; others of very modest means seemed immune.

Who was Theophilos? Scripture scholars do not know, making him a fit subject for Michael O’Brien’s vivid imagination. In this fictional narrative, Theophilos is the skeptical but beloved adoptive father of St. Luke. Challenged by the startling account of the “Christos” received in the chronicle from his beloved son Luke and concerned for the newly zealous young man’s fate, Theophilos, a Greek physician and an agnostic, embarks on a search for Luke to bring him home. He is gravely concerned about the deadly illusions Luke has succumbed to regarding the incredible stories surrounding Jesus of Nazareth, a man of contradictions who has caused so much controversy throughout the Roman Empire.

This book is the powerful story of an amazing woman, Ruth Pakaluk, who converted to Catholicism at Harvard, married her college sweetheart and joyfully welcomed seven children. She became a renowned pro-life leader and brilliant debater, who was struck with breast cancer and died at the young age of forty-one.

Abby Johnson quit her job in October 2009. That simple act became a national news story because Abby was the director of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Texas who, after participating in her first actual abortion procedure, walked across the road to join the Coalition for Life.

Described by Fulton Sheen as one of the three greatest depictions of the advent of the demonic in world literature, Lord of the World is science fiction with a difference. The West has succumbed to a sort of international socialism. The forces of secular materialism, relativism and state control are everywhere triumphant. Protestantism is no more, and Catholicism – which had made some major advances in the first half of the twentieth century – has been devastated by the development of new psychologies and the exodus of intellectuals in the wake of an Ecumenical Council. Euthanasia has become an instrument of the state, Esperanto the universal second language. Nevertheless, although organised religion has largely collapsed in the face of institutional secularism, a vague, humanistic religiosity – militantly hostile to the exclusive and supernatural claims of the Church – is present everywhere. Finally, the East, which has amalgamated into a single, pantheistic bloc, continues to pose a military threat. Enter Julian Felsenberg – diplomat, scholar, guru, Antichrist…

Brian J. Gail has written another heart pounding, page turner of a novel for Catholics who are straining to hear their Church's voice in what Pope John Paul II called "the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-Church, the Gospel and the anti-Gospel." Motherless takes the reader on a riveting behind-the-scenes journey around the globe to the boardrooms and laboratories where the architects of The Life Sciences Revolution are preparing Mankind's Final Solution... and into the confessionals and chanceries where the Church's response is being challenged.

This is the second book in Pope Benedict XVI's projected three-volume work on Our Lord Jesus Christ.

For Christians, Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God, who died for the sins of the world, and who rose from the dead in triumph over sin and death. For non-Christians, he is almost anything else—a myth, a political revolutionary, a prophet whose teaching was misunderstood or distorted by his followers.

In The Rite, journalist Matt Baglio uses the astonishing story of one American priest's training as an exorcist to reveal that the phenomena of possession, demons, the Devil, and exorcism are not merely a remnant of the archaic past, but remain a fearsome power in many people's lives even today.

The family is the foundation of the civilization of love. It cannot be underestimated nor its responsibilities cast off to society's whims and fancies. It is the front line in the renaissance of character formation. Yet, today, many families have drifted from this primordial calling. So, how can the family fulfill its true vocation without a new road map to lead the way?

In this hard-hitting book, apologetics experts Patrick Madrid and Kenneth Hensley help Christians to wake up to the crisis of godlessness, alerting them to the imperative need to take seriously atheism's challenge, while learning how to effectively engage in today's atheistic debate.

The latest installment of the Bad Catholic’s Guides examines the greatest threats to the virtuous life—the seven deadly sins. Theological and historical insights, tongue-in-cheek vignettes of history's greatest saints and sinners, and cringe-inducing quizzes entice readers to tally their scores on the virtue and vice index and calibrate to what degree they have imperiled their immortal souls. Andy Warhol, Ayn Rand, and Mother Angelica are invoked as exemplars of the best and worst of human behavior, while a heady blend of serious theology and pointed satire—punctuated by trivia, charts, and vignettes—brings theology into sharp, hilarious relief, and demonstrates that religious education need not be boring.

The Bible plays a vital role in the life of the Catholic Church. In fact, we are called to immerse ourselves daily in the Scriptures. But many of us get lost when we actually dive into the Bible, and our time spent can be more frustrating than fruitful. We are reading a collection of writings drafted by an ancient people, in an ancient culture. But Scripture is nothing less than the Living Word of God, and it is meant just as much for us as for those who lived thousands of years ago.

In her great historical epic Kristin Lavransdatter, set in fourteenth-century Catholic Norway, Nobel laureate Sigrid Undset tells the life story of one passionate and headstrong woman. Painting a richly detailed backdrop, Undset immerses readers in the day-to-day life, social conventions, and political and religious undercurrents of the period. Now in one volume, Tiina Nunnally’s award-winning definitive translation brings this remarkable work to life with clarity and lyrical beauty.

The acclaimed historian and "New York Times" bestselling author offers the first in-depth biography of the Roman Catholic priest who fought against prejudice and founded the Knights of Columbus.

Between the two world wars, on a hike in the English countryside, Professor John Hill takes refuge from a violent storm in a cave. There he nearly loses his life, but he also makes an astonishing discovery - an ancient manuscript housed in a cunningly crafted metal box. Though a philologist by profession, Hill cannot identify the language used in the manuscript and the time period in which it is was made, but he knows enough to make an educated guess - that the book and its case are the fruits of a long-lost, but advanced civilization.

After the death of her daughter, grief-spawned delusions cause Rachel to lose her husband, her home, and custody of her son.

Help arrives from two unlikely sources: a young teen, Lilly, battling her own demons, and a tattered holy card depicting St. Thérèse of Lisieux.

Everybody has one. It's called a "haunt detector." It's the little alarm that goes off in our heads whenever we detect that something mysterious or supernatural has occurred. You could be sitting around relaxing one day at home, and for no special reason you start thinking about someone. Maybe you haven't thought about this person in years. Then the phone rings; you pick it up, and amazingly, it's that person! Many of us have experienced this phenomenon.

"On Friday noon, July the twentieth, 1714, the finest bridge in all Peru broke and precipi-tated five travelers into the gulf below." With this celebrated sentence Thornton Wilder begins "The Bridge of San Luis Rey, one of the towering achievements in American fiction and a novel read throughout the world.

Written during the dark hours immediately before and during the Second World War, C. S. Lewis's Space Trilogy, of which Out of the Silent Planet is the first volume, stands alongside such works as Albert Camus's The Plague and George Orwell's 1984 as a timely parable that has become timeless, beloved by succeeding generations as much for the sheer wonder of its storytelling as for the significance of the moral concerns. For the trilogy's central figure, C. S. Lewis created perhaps the most memorable character of his career, the brilliant, clear-eyed, and fiercely brave philologist Dr. Elwin Ransom.

The daughter of a King and a Fairy, the Princess Niamh is glorious fair. But her incredible beauty proves a curse when no suitor can withstand even a moment in her presence without running mad. The kingdom's only hope rests upon a mysterious Hermit. With the claws and wings of an eagle, the head and tail of a lion, the mystery of a magician, and the piety of a saint, he alone may hold her. But a vengeful Count schemes to ruin the Princess and lead her to perdition before her betrothed arrives. A rich story crafted in the evocative lyric style of Lord Dunsany, Niamh and the Hermit is an exultation of the classic fairy tale.

A new historical novel about the unusual life of King Baldwin IV of Jerusalem, the leper crusader king. who-despite ascending to the throne at only 13, his early death at 24 and his debilitating diseaseperformed great and heroic deeds in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds. Teenagers and avid readers of all ages will be amazed at this story and be inspired by a faith that accomplished the impossible! And it is true! Great supplemental reading for homeschoolers-or anyone who wants to be inspired by history.

In this high-tech thriller, Alex returns from college to find that his dad, a computer hacker and software programmer, has inadvertently discovered a mysterious website which leads to sudden wealth. But at what cost?

Every year, thousands of young Catholics leave their homes for higher education at our nation’s colleges and universities. Very few realize, however, that from orientation day onward, they will be indoctrinated with a vision of reality that is very different from the values their families hold dear. Sadly, many of our young people will fall prey to one or more of the dominant ideologies engrained in their college education, ideologies that can lead them away from the Church and, ultimately, their faith in God. Students who are not taught how to think critically or who lack the tools needed to sift through the logic of these positions are easily swayed by the smooth sophistry of the intellectual elite.

Prove It! God stands ready to answer teen questions -- the really tough ones -- about God, the Catholic Church, other religions, evolution, good and evil, and a whole bunch of other things you never hear about in religion classes and Sunday Homilies -- or even from your parents.

There is something different about Angelina. She is a passionate and headstrong young woman, German on her father's side, Italian through her mother. She is also an ardent communist and outspoken atheist. With Europe embroiled in World War II and her father missing in Russia, Angelina journeys alone to seek out her mother's family in Italy. Instead, she finds Giulia, a kindred spirit.

Set in the second century of the early Christian Church, Grain of Wheat takes you into the heroic lives of the early Christians. Along the way, it shows the beauty and dignity of the Christian family, along with the power of the vocation to celibacy — a charism lived not only by priests and bishops, but by many of the lay faithful. These brave men and women, both single and married, followed Christ and spread his Kingdom while remaining in society. Through their courageous faith an entire culture was transformed, one person at a time, one family at a time.

Jump into this story, set in Imperial Rome! Paul, left an orphan by the uprising of the tribes in Britain, travels across the empire to help his friend the poet, Severus. Along the way he meets villians, charioteers, indifferent patricians, and at last...the emporer he seeks.

Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is one of the most influential and controversial novels of the nineteenth century; it is also one of the most misunderstood and misinterpreted. It has been vivisected critically by latter-day Victor Frankensteins who have transformed the meanings emergent from the novel into monsters of post-modern misconception. Meanwhile Franken-feminists have turned the novel into a monster of misanthropy. Seldom has a work of fiction suffered so scandalously from the slings and arrows of outrageous criticism. This critical edition, containing tradition-oriented essays by literary scholars, refutes the errors and serves as an antidote to the poison that has contaminated the critical understanding of this classic gothic novel.

In every young Catholic's heart there is a search for meaning. Yet many of our youth never get beyond the material distractions of the world. In fact, in a recent survey, teenagers were eight times more desirous of “being rich” and five times more desirous of “being famous” than pursuing a life of faith.

Riley and Delaney are supposed to stay with their aunt, Sister Philomena, in her convent near Rome for the summer. Riley expects this to be a horrible summer living with a bunch of nuns with nothing to do but pray and go to church. That attitude starts to change when the secret nature of their aunt's work begins to unfold.

Digory and Polly discover a secret passage that links their homes, and they are taken into the World of Charn, where they wake up the evil Queen Jadis. There, they witness the creation of the Land of Narnia as it is sung into being by the Great Lion, Aslan.

This tale takes place in Iscium, an isolated Roman village in Britain. Most of the town senators and officials are primarily concerned with keeping a low profile with the neighboring barbarians-with the exception of the crotchety old bishop. But when young Falx decides to run away to Rome and, instead, finds a lost barbarian girl, things begin to happen. The children are found by a merchant who returns them to Iscium. A zany mix of history, humor, and the miraculous-in the tradition of Don Camillo.

The events surrounding the burning of Rome and the subsequent Christian persecution provide the backdrop for this story of faith and friendship. A young slave from Britain finds himself in Rome at a tumultuous time. Through his acquaintance with Christians he comes to understand and love the new religion. Out of his zeal for the love of the Christ, he performs a great spiritual work of mercy that sadly goes awry. In the end, God's providence and mercy shine through. (We don't want to give away too many more details of the story and ruin it for you!) We are honored that Mrs. Polland has given us permission to reprint this beautiful story.

This captivating story begins by describing the young life of Bernadette as a 13 year old shepherdess. It also beautifully portrays the family and geography which plays so prominently in this book. You will love the resplendent description of the apparitions of Our Lady to Bernadette—the Pilgrims—The Queen’s Commands—Lourdes Water—Miracles—the dogma of The Immaculate Conception—The Basilica of Lourdes, etc.

Even nuns get to take a holiday! This adventure begins with Sister Philomena and the children going off to Siena, for a vacation and to attend the famous Palio horse race and festival. A mystery unfolds as the threesome visit the original home of Saint Catherine of Siena. An original, but until now unknown, letter of Saint Catherine is discovered along with a plan to ransom it to the Pope. Clues send them off to Avignon, France and the famous Palace of the Popes. The history of the Church in the 1300s when the papacy was forced to flee from Rome to Avignon for safety, and Saint Catherine's role in bringing it back to Rome are revealed in this exciting adventure.