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Saintly Men of Modern Times

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The Catholic Church offers many blessings, the sacrements being one of the most significant. But coupled along with that are the global children of the Church and the vast shining examples of good that they not only represent but advocate. Over the past few years, the Catholic Church has had to acknowledge its serious shortcomings in relation to the horrific sex scandal, among other things. The hierarchy was looked upon-and unfortunately to a certain degree still is-with scorn and jaded cynicism, and any chance of genuine rectification seemed almost impossible. It appeared to be an institution that was floundering in a sea of mistrust and anger, and rightfully so, especially in fully comprehending what happened to the victims. Along with the religious was the devout laity who took the helm and helped to usher in a deeper understanding of not humanism, per se, but of the true, palpable manifestation of faith and of the Divine gift that it really was and is. They, the laity and religious did not say that the doctrine of the Church was unsound and unstable, but rather, it was the varied manipulative and disordered practitioners of the dogma(s) that were. It was the foreknowledge and secretiveness that only added fuel to the fire. So much turmoil and havoc on so many. Hence, it was a real joy to read Saintly Men of Modern Times by Joan Cruz Carroll, because in this biographical work she illustrates the vital importance played by lay Catholics and how their holy essence of living out the Gospel has redefined, refined and added to the totality of the Catholic Church. When one thinks of sainthood, one normally thinks of that honor being afforded only to mystics, monks, priests and nuns and so forth. Yet, Pope John Paul II changed all that, and Carroll's book details in picturesque detail the lives of these men who had or are on their way to affording the honor of the alter. And some of the examples are quite startling: a former alcoholic (Matt Talbot), a former satanic priest (Bartolo Long) to medical doctors (Joseph Moscati and Ladislaus Batthyany-Strattmann) or just everyday holy blue-collar joes (Franz Jagerstatter and Dominic Cesari). A reader will be able to identify with any number of examples profiled in this book, and therein is where the beauty lies, in the underlying truth of the beauty of confession, the Holy Eucharist, the Mass, the rosary, et cetera. These men, married, single, martyred, lived out their baptism in the truest sense of the word, making the universal call to holiness an integral part of their identity. Men to stand with priests.