Lessons in Hope

July 1, 2017

At age 44, Weigel (Ethics and Public Policy Ctr.; Witness To Hope), whose previous work The Final Revolution detailed the role of the Catholic Church in the fall of communism, was asked to write a new biography of Pope John Paul II. The former pope was not satisfied with earlier accounts, considering their portrayal of the church's relationship with Eastern Europe and his position on political events to be flawed. Weigel relates his relationship to John Paul as it developed during the time he spent writing this book, and his interactions with other Vatican and political officials he interviewed in the process. Weigel criticizes several church figures he sees as too liberal, while offering reflections on the general state of the religious institution. He includes many personal asides about his own life in the church and many visits with John Paul, both alone and with his family. VERDICT Fans of Weigel and John Paul II will love this very personal portrait of the pope and its observations about the Catholic Church in the post-Vatican II era. Fans of those clergymen whom Weigel considers liberal will probably loathe it.--Augustine J. Curley, Newark Abbey, NJ

Copyright 2017 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

August 28, 2017
Weigel, official biographer of Pope John Paul II and distinguished senior fellow of the Ethics and Public Policy Center, episodically reveals his experiences accompanying (and studying) Pope John Paul II and the impact this famous pope had on contemporary society. Early in life, Karol Wojtyla demonstrated enormous intellectual capacity and expressed precocious interest in the intersection of faith and reason. The early account of his life, although sourced and factual, comes off as rosy—a sentiment that underpins the rest of the text. Weigel spent decades studying John Paul out of sheer curiosity, and he also brings a journalist and scholar’s attention to his account. His focus is not so much on John Paul’s place in the line of popes, but rather how Karol Wojtyla became pope and then used his power to transform both the Church and religious society at large. This is an enchanting biography about a popular pope.

August 15, 2017
The story behind the defining biography of John Paul II (1920-2005).Vatican expert Weigel (Evangelical Catholicism: Deep Reform in the 21st-Century Church, 2013, etc.) tells the tale behind the writing of his most influential book. In 1999, the author published Witness to Hope: The Biography of Pope John Paul II. Though not technically an authorized biography, Weigel received the written permission of the pontiff to write the book as well as the assistance of the Curia in researching it. The book changed Weigel's life, but only partly through its publication. The process of researching and writing it was also life-changing, and that is the story the author conveys here. He takes readers back in time to the closing years of the Cold War, chronicling how he rose up the ranks of Catholic scholars and writers as the Catholic Church pivoted, with difficulty, toward a new worldview in terms of communism and its own future. As his story passes into the 1990s, the author describes a pope of immense moral stature who was often at odds with the church bureaucracy that often fought, or ignored, John Paul's agenda in a changing world, as well as many of the problems besetting the church as the 20th century closed. Weigel interviewed these bureaucrats, among many others, to piece together the story of John Paul's papacy. In the end, the author completed his acclaimed biography and received his greatest remuneration: the gratitude of the pope himself. Weigel brings out an astounding collection of names, and the work could easily sound like a continued exercise in name-dropping were it not for his skill as a storyteller. Though the language is occasionally overly forma, the author's standing as a thinker and writer keeps his work from seeming arrogant. A page-turner for fans of John Paul II, devotees of papal history, or those who simply enjoy a good and literate personal story.

COPYRIGHT(2017) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.