The French Revolution had wrought religious and civil havoc in France and the Italian states. Thousands of French priests had been killed or deported; other priests and bishops were forming a schismatic national Church; the previous Pope had been kidnapped and had died in exile. Catholics were losing the Faith and adopting an attitude of resistance to all authority..This was the beginning of the reign of Pope Pius VII (1800-1823)--one of the most difficult and confusing eras in Catholic history. Impr. 240 pgs; PB

A groundbreaking account of Napoleon Bonaparte, Pope Pius VII, and the kidnapping that would forever divide church and state In the wake of the French Revolution, Napoleon Bonaparte, First Consul of France, and Pope Pius VII shared a common goal: to reconcile the church with the state. But while they were able to work together initially, formalizing an agreement in 1801, relations between them rapidly deteriorated. In 1809, Napoleon ordered the Pope’s arrest. Ambrogio Caiani provides a pioneering account of the tempestuous relationship between the emperor and his most unyielding opponent. Drawing on original findings in the Vatican and other European archives, Caiani uncovers the nature of Catholic resistance against Napoleon’s empire; charts Napoleon’s approach to Papal power; and reveals how the Emperor attempted to subjugate the church to his vision of modernity. Gripping and vivid, this book shows the struggle for supremacy between two great individuals—and sheds new light on the conflict that would shape relations between the Catholic church and the modern state for centuries to come.

Controversial Concordats offers an engaging survey of the relationship of the Roman Catholic Church with three dictatorial figures in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries: Napoleon, Mussolini, and Hitler.

Reviewing 262 Popes - provides historical and theological contexts for each profile. He groups his entries into 8 historical periods, his approach is down to earth and critical.

The French Revolution had wrought religious and civil havoc in France and the Italian states. Thousands of French priests had been killed or deported; other priests and bishops were forming a schismatic national Church; the previous Pope had been kidnapped and had died in exile. Catholics were losing the Faith and adopting an attitude of resistance to all authority..This was the beginning of the reign of Pope Pius VII (1800-1823)--one of the most difficult and confusing eras in Catholic history.

The startling changes that have taken place within the Catholic Church since World War II were the direct accomplishments of Pius XII and his successors. These modern popes, however, formed their policies and wrought these changes based on the work of four transitional popes who preceded them: Leo XIII (1878-1903), who re-established a direct link between the papacy and the lay communicant; Pius X (1903-1914), who was a conservative reactionary; and Benedict XV (1914-1922) and Pius XI (1922-1939), who revived and extended Leo's efforts to modernize the Church and its policies. Based largely on unpublished or ephemeral materials, Papal Elections in the Age of Transition recounts the stories of how these four men rose to the papal throne, including previously unpublished details of the conclaves. This fascinating narrative sheds new light on the rise to power of the popes who prepared the way for the Catholic Church at the dawn of the twenty-first century.