The New York Times–bestselling inside look at one of the world’s most powerful and mysterious institutions For more than twenty-five years, John Thavis held one of the most remarkable journalistic assignments in the world: reporting on the inner workings of the Vatican. In The Vatican Diaries, Thavis reveals Vatican City as a place struggling to define itself in the face of internal and external threats, where Curia cardinals fight private wars and sexual abuse scandals threaten to undermine papal authority. Thavis (author of The Vatican Prophecies: Investigating Supernatural Signs, Apparitions, and Miracles in the Modern Age) also takes readers through the politicking behind the election of Pope Francis and what we might expect from his papacy. The Vatican Diaries is a perceptive, compelling, and provocative account of this singular institution and will be of interest to anyone intrigued by the challenges faced by religion in an increasingly secularized world.

“The process by which these supernatural events are authenticated is expertly told by John Thavis, one of the world’s leading Vaticanologists. In fact, that a book on so secretive and complex a topic is so deeply researched, beautifully written, and artfully told is something of a small miracle itself.”—James Martin, S.J., author of Jesus: A Pilgrimage From the New York Times bestselling author of The Vatican Diaries, a fascinating behind-the-scenes look at how the Vatican investigates claims of miraculous events Apocalyptic prophecies and miraculous apparitions are headline-grabbing events that often put the Catholic Church’s concept of “rational faith” at odds with the passion of its more zealous followers. To some, these claims teeter on the edge of absurdity. Others see them as evidence of a private connection with God. For the Vatican, the issue is much more nuanced as each supposed miraculous event could have serious theological and political consequences. In response, the Vatican has developed a highly secretive and complex evaluation system to judge the authenticity of supernatural phenomena. Former journalist John Thavis uses his thirty years’ experience covering the Vatican to shed light on this little-known process, revealing deep internal debates on the power of religious relics, private revelations, exorcisms, and more. Enlightening and accessible to Catholics and non-Catholics alike, the book illustrates the Church’s struggle to balance the tension between traditional beliefs and contemporary skepticism.

There are one billion Catholics in the world today, spread over every continent, speaking almost every conceivable language, and all answering to a single authority. The Vatican is a unique international organization, both in terms of its extraordinary power and influence, and in terms of its endurance. Popes come and go, but the elaborate and complex bureaucracy called the Vatican lives on. For centuries, it has served and sometimes undermined popes; it has been praised and blamed for the actions of the pope and for the state of the church. Yet an objective examination of the workings of the Vatican has been unavailable until now. Drawing on more than a hundred interviews with Vatican officials, this book affords a firsthand look at the people, the politics, and the organization behind the institution. Reese brings remarkable clarity to the almost Byzantine bureaucracy of congregations, agencies, secretariats, tribunals, nunciature, and offices, showing how they serve the pope and, through him, the universal church. He gives a lively account of how popes are elected and bishops appointed, how dissident theologians are disciplined and civil authorities dealt with. Throughout, revealing and colorful anecdotes from church history and the present day bring the unique culture of the Vatican to life. The Vatican is a fascinating institution, a model of continuity and adaptation, which remains constant while functioning powerfully in a changing world. As never before, this book provides a clear, objective perspective on how the enormously complex institution surrounding the papacy operates on a day-to-day level, how it has adapted and endured for close to two thousand years, and how it is likely to face the challenges of the next millennium.

Arranged chronologically and thematically, Dark Mysteries of the Vatican sifts fact from fiction and illuminates the truth of what lies in the archives. From murder in Holy Orders to financial scandal and UFOs, this is the definitive volume on the most secretive place on earth. Most books about the Vatican are dense and scholarly, but Jeffers delivers an easy-to-read, fact-driven investigation, covering historical as well as current events.

While on a visit to the United States, Pope Pius XIII is kidnapped by a terrorist cell calling itself the Soldiers of Islam. If the United States and its allies do not meet their demands, they will execute the pope. So when FBI Specialist Shari Cohen is called to duty to track down the terrorist cell responsible, she learns that she is not alone. Deep behind the Vatican walls a secret order dispatches a clandestine op group of elite commandos known as the Vatican Knights. Their mission: bring the pope back alive. As Cohen and the Knights work in tandem they uncover a White House conspiracy involving high-ranking members on Capitol Hill. When she begins to get too close to the truth about the pope's kidnapping, she becomes the target of indigenous forces trying to keep the conspiracy safe. However, in order to get to her they must go through the Vatican Knights.

This book explores the bilateral relations between the United States and the Vatican from 1975 to 1980, a turbulent period that had two presidents, three presidential envoys, and three popes. This previously untold story shows how the United States and the Vatican worked quietly together behind the scenes to influence the international response to major issues of the day. Peter Sarros examines the Iran hostage crisis, the tensions of the Cold War, the Helsinki process, and the Beagle Channel dispute, among other issues. These interactions produced a tacit alliance in the foreign policies of the United States and the Vatican even before the establishment of full diplomatic relations. This unique book is based largely on official documents from the archives of the Office of the U.S. Special Envoy of the United States to the Vatican, supplemented by Sarros's contemporaneous diaries, notes, and other unpublished sources. The confidential consultations at the Vatican by three special envoys and by Sarros in his role as chargé and ambassador at the Vatican were critical in obtaining Vatican support on major international issues. The Vatican also derived substantial benefits from the partnership through U.S. support of Vatican initiatives in Lebanon and elsewhere, and by U.S. policies that gave Vatican diplomacy the flexibility to play a larger role in the international sphere. Sarros concludes that American diplomacy was successful at the Holy See during this period because it took advantage of the Vatican's overarching international strategy, which was to increase its influence through support for the global balance of power while blocking the expansion of Soviet power and communism in Europe. U.S.-Vatican Relations, 1975–1980 will be of interest to students and scholars of history and political science, especially in the fields of diplomatic relations and church history.

In 1888 Father Edgardo Mortara wrote his autobiography so that the world would understand he had not been kidnapped by the Vatican. So what had happened to him--to the baptized Jewish boy whose removal from his family by Pope Pius IX remains an international controversy to this day? Mortara's previously unpublished memoirs, accompanied with commentary by Italian journalist Vittorio Messoi, answer this question with an account that runs contrary to popular opinion. As an infant, Mortara was on the point of death and secretly baptized by a Catholic servant employed by his family. He recovered his health, and in the Papal State where his family lived, the law required that he, like other baptized children, receive a Christian education. After several failed attempts to persuade his parents to enroll him in a local Catholic school, in 1858 Pope Pius IX had the boy taken from his family in Bologna and sent to a Catholic boarding school in Rome. There the child grew in faith and eventually responded to the calling to become a Catholic priest. The Mortara case reverberated around the world. Journalists, politicians, and Jewish leaders tried to pressure the pope to reverse his decision. The pope's refusal to do so was used as one of the reasons to dissolve the Papal State in 1870. Here now for the first time in English is the actual true story in the words of Mortara himself.