Communism And The Conscience Of The West

Communism and the Conscience of the West revolves around the single, disconcerting idea that Communism, in both its ideological and practical forms, is on the conscience of the Western world. Because the West has broadly lost that spiritual sensibility which made it great, thus reducing both man and cosmos to wholly material and base realities, Fulton J. Sheen argues, there is nothing to prevent the dissolution of the old order into a new and terrifying totality. And thus appears Communism: the recalcitrant, neurotic child of a permissive, neglectful parent. Since it first appeared in 1948, during the initial frigid days of the Cold War, Communism and the Conscience of the West has proven to be a prophetic witness to the grave dangers of decadent, individualistic liberalism and atheistic, collectivist totalitarianism alike. While the Cold War has ended and Soviet Union passed away, these dangers have endured and even metastasized. For the basic struggle remains: the moral and spiritual struggle for the very soul of mankind.

For decades, this book has been recognized as the finest book ever written by a Catholic on the subject of communism. Dedicated to Our Lady in prayerful hope for the conversion of Russia, this is one of Fulton Sheen's most forgotten yet most important books. In Communism and the Conscience of the West, Sheen explains the problems with society stemming from socialism and communism, which continue to infect universities and political discourse today. This timeless book exposes communism's defects, its attitude toward the family, the decline of historical liberalism, and the rise of the antireligious spirit that pervades our world. Readers will be impressed as Sheen diagnoses the issues facing our once peaceful cities, with history being put on trial, scrubbed, rewritten, and explained in terms of class hate. While communism destroys human freedom, Sheen illustrates how man is free as a result of two guarantees: one economic and the other spiritual. The economic enables man to call something his own which is outside of himself. The spiritual is the soul, which makes man independent of an earthly tyrant or a political dictator. In short, man's soul is his own on the inside, as his property is his own on the outside. Sheen carefully illustrates how even though we are living at a time when man has all the material conditions necessary for his happiness, "having lost the purpose of life which religion supplied, modern man became increasingly frustrated as his disappointed hedonism turned to pessimism. Thus man, who isolated himself from the religious community, now by reaction finds himself absorbed by the political community as despair becomes the dominant note of contemporary philosophy and literature." For anyone seeking to understand one of the greatest threats to the Faith and our world, Communism and the Conscience of the West will be your guide.

Named Best Major Publication by Concordia Historical Institute During the anxiety-laden period from the Great Depression through World War II to the Cold War, Americans found a welcome escape in the new medium of radio. Throughout radio's "Golden Age," religious broadcasting in particular contributed significantly to American culture. Yet its historic role often has been overlooked. In Ministers of a New Medium, Kirk D. Farney explores the work of two groundbreaking leaders in religious broadcasting: Fulton J. Sheen and Walter A. Maier. These clergymen and professors—one a Catholic priest, the other a Lutheran minister—each led the way in combining substantive theology and emerging technology to spread the gospel over the airwaves. Through weekly nationwide broadcasts, Maier's The Lutheran Hour and Sheen's Catholic Hour attracted listeners across a spectrum of denominational and religious affiliations, establishing their hosts—and Christian radio itself—as cultural and religious forces to be reckoned with. Farney examines how Sheen and Maier used their exceptional erudition, their sensitivity to the times, their powerful communication skills, and their unwavering Christian conviction, all for the purpose of calling the souls of listeners and the soul of a nation to repentance and godliness. Their combination of talents also brought their respective denominations, Roman Catholicism and Missouri Synod Lutheranism, from the periphery of the American religious landscape to a much greater level of recognition and acceptance. With careful attention to both the theological content and the cultural influence of these masters of a new medium, Farney's study sheds new light on the history of media and Christianity in the United States.

In Religion in the Public Square, James M. Patterson considers religious leaders who popularized theology through media campaigns designed to persuade the public. Ven. Fulton J. Sheen, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Rev. Jerry Falwell differed profoundly on issues of theology and politics, but they shared an approach to public ministry that aimed directly at changing how Americans understood the nature and purpose of their country. From the 1930s through the 1950s, Sheen was an early adopter of paperbacks, radio, and television to condemn totalitarian ideologies and to defend American Catholicism against Protestant accusations of divided loyalty. During the 1950s and 1960s, King staged demonstrations and boycotts that drew the mass media to him. The attention provided him the platform to preach Christian love as a political foundation in direct opposition to white supremacy. Falwell started his own church, which he developed into a mass media empire. He then leveraged it during the late 1970s through the 1980s to influence the Republican Party by exhorting his audience to not only ally with religious conservatives around issues of abortion and the traditional family but also to vote accordingly. Sheen, King, and Falwell were so successful in popularizing their theological ideas that they won prestigious awards, had access to presidents, and witnessed the results of their labors. However, Patterson argues that Falwell's efforts broke with the longstanding refusal of religious public figures to participate directly in partisan affairs and thereby catalyzed the process of politicizing religion that undermined the Judeo-Christian consensus that formed the foundation of American politics.

Even as historians credit Ronald Reagan and Pope John Paul II with hastening the end of the Cold War, they have failed to recognize the depth or significance of the bond that developed between the two leaders. Acclaimed scholar and bestselling author Paul Kengor changes that. In this fascinating book, he reveals a singular bond—which included a spiritual connection between the Catholic pope and the Protestant president—that drove the two men to confront what they knew to be the great evil of the twentieth century: Soviet communism. Reagan and John Paul II almost didn't have the opportunity to forge this relationship: just six weeks apart in the spring of 1981, they took bullets from would-be assassins. But their strikingly similar near-death experiences brought them close together—to Moscow's dismay.Based on Kengor's tireless archival digging and his unique access to Reagan insiders, A Pope and a President is full of revelations. It takes you inside private meetings between Reagan and John Paul II and into the Oval Office, the Vatican, the CIA, the Kremlin, and many points beyond. Nancy Reagan called John Paul II her husband's "closest friend"; Reagan himself told Polish visitors that the pope was his "best friend." When you read this book, you will understand why. As kindred spirits, Ronald Reagan and John Paul II united in pursuit of a supreme objective—and in doing so they changed history.