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Vicars of Christ: A History of the Popes

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Only to get a real understanding should you read this book. If you want to love all popes as if they were perfect, or hate them all as if they were a blight upon their eras, give this book an extra wide berth. Mr. Coulombe explains at the start his approach: "If we are to be fair with them, the only evaluation we can make of each of them is whether they did well by the Church's own lights. If, in pursuit of this, many have done things that outrage our sensibilities, it should be bourne in mind that our society allows many things that would have done the same for them." One fact that strikes this reader is the threat of violence that hung over most of the popes. It is one thing to have a general notion that the first few centuries were dangerous for anyone holding the Keys of St. Peter. But I, at least, was not prepared for the spectacle, as I read each short (2-3 pages, on average) biography of the popes (with the anti-popes thrown in as a bonus). The overwhelming majority were either killed, or forced to flee Rome to avoid that fate. The worst were very bad indeed, and even the best were constantly thwarted in efforts such as reunion with the Eastern Church. Mr. Coulombe conveys much in a few words. St. Puis X (1903-14) struggled with Modernism. Well, how is Mr. Coulombe to sum up the thought of the pope's adversaries? "Doctrinal formulations are, for the Modernist, not true, per se, but symbolic of some greater truth--whatever that means." Each pope gets a summation--here is a Neapolitan, Paul IV (1555-59): "Due to his economical ways and increasingly morose demeanor, he was not excessively mourned by the Romans." This is a wonderful, and rigorouly honest, book.

This is the one to own if you want to learn about the popes in an objective fashion. If you read between the lines you'll also learn that the Conciliar Church (the "Catholic Church" since Vatican II) is a vastly different institution from it's predecessor, the Roman Catholic Church of history. As St.Athanasius wrote in the 4th century, concerning the Arians, "They may have the buildings but we have the faith." That said, the book is readable by Catholics and non-Catholics alike and is one that can be reads in bytes. One also comes to the conclusion that the history of western civilization is inseparable from that of the Church.

What Harry Crocker achieved for general Church history with his zesty "Triumph: the Power and the Glory of the Catholic Church," Charles A. Coulombe has done for papal history with his "Vicars of Christ."

In 440 pages, he takes the interested reader through a series of fascinating biographies of the men who have sat on the throne of Peter. From brief sketches to essay-length discussions, Coulombe is equally at ease describing the sack of Constantinople under Urban II to the disintegration of much of the post-conciliar Church under the sadly hapless Paul VI.

Coulombe has a knack for presenting a memorable anecdote to make a point. For instance, have you ever wondered why the churches and cathedrals of France escaped the wreck-o-vations that have laid waste to so much architectural splendor in the U.S. since the 1960s? It isn't due to the preservationist instincts of the French. In 1905, the rabidly secular French government broke its concordat with Rome and nationalized church property. So when French priests succumbed to the prevailing horizontal zeitgeist of the disastrous sixties, the left-leaning, anti-clerical government refused to renovate the buildings -- now government property -- more or less out of spite.

The Modernism so pervasive during the past century suffers a withering critique from Coulombe's pen. In his chapter on Pius X (1903 - 1914) he describes Modernism as "the notion that not only the Church's government and practices (as Liberals and Americanists believed) but her very doctrines had to evolve along with the ever-upward movement of mankind toward the great wonderful future." He continues: "[d]octrinal formulations are, for the Modernist, not true, per se, but symbolic of some greater truth -- whatever that means. Thus from Transubstantiation to the Trinity, the Church's teaching, while doubtless literally understood by those who first formulated them, are simply stages in human consciousness, and are not to be taken literally." Coulombe could be describing the beliefs held by faculty members of the theology departments of most major Catholic universities, not to mention the dissident who leads your parish faith formation program.

His book went to press in 2003 when John Paul II was "enfeebled." Nonetheless, Coulombe accurately describes the difficult task faced by Benedict XVI. "The neo-Catholicism of such as Rahner is dominant in much of the Catholic world" and will need to be confronted, resulting in either a "break" or reintegration. He describes the current state of the Protestant "revolt" as "dissolving into a bland Unitarianism" but with a more orthodox wing that could be reconciled to the Church. Moreover, "future popes," Benedict included, must realize "that they exist to assist the individual Catholic to escape the gates of hell." Truer words are rarely written.

Readers should be aware that "Vicars of Christ" was recently reissued under the imprint of Barnes & Noble and renamed "A History of the Popes" (with the original, less bland title serving as a subtitle.) Order it online or pick up the new version for $10 in the bargain aisle of your local B&N store.

Excellent. Indispensable. Complet. Efficient. Concise. Witty. Dry. Wry. Informative. Accurate. One hesitates to cease the superlatives, because Charles Coulombe truly has achieved something here: a work useful for the interested casual reader, or a student completing an assignment, or a reference librarian, or an expert. There is not a single word wasted, and those seeking further details would necessarily need to turn to specialized complete biographies and contemporary histories, but my advice would be to first read here for a well-thought through sketch before adding details from other sources.

Because each Papal biography is contained within itself, Coulombe's Vicars of Christ is easy to put down and take up as time permits. In addition, it serves as a welcome contextual reference when you are reading another history and need a quick perspective on the Pope of the time. Perhaps the best place to read the book would be St. Paul Outside the Walls in Rome, with the famous mosaic portraits of the Popes, from Peter to John Paul the Great, along the nave. The small pen and ink sketches introducing each biography remind one of these similarly low-resolution depictions. In summation, Coulombe's Vicar's of Christ should be in the reference section of every public and private library as an essential work on the successors of St. Peter. In the interest of full disclosure, this reviewer and author Coulombe correspond on a variety of topics, however, my own admiration and thanks for that happy exchange in no way colors my opinion of this volume. "Vicars of Christ" is excellent on its own merits, and I commend it to both your reading pleasure and instruction.

I love books that are very complete and you can't get much more complete than this book. It has details on all the Roman Catholic popes up to and including John Paul II. Coulombe even lists the so-called anti-popes and includes the dates of each popes time in service. I learned many interesting facts and history. The book I would imagine be more interesting to Catholics on the whole, but anyone interested in the history of Christianity might also find this an interesting and informative read. We learn some of the bad things as well as some of the good things many of the popes did through-out two thousand years. It's quite a feat to put such an amazing book like this together.

I have read a lot of papal history, and so my daughter thought this would be a good book to give me. The first thing one who opens the book should note that it is dedicated to three persons: John Paul II (fine), Otto von Habsburg (who the author seems to think should again be Emperor, whether of the Holy Roman Empire, Austria-Hungary, or merely Austria is not clear) and Louis XX, who the author apparently thinks should be king of France. The book has no footnotes, and there is a short two-page bibliography, which does not include the works of either Ludwig von Pastor or Monsignor Horace Mann. (Personally I think any book which is written about papal history which does not indicate its author consulted those classic sources is suspect, since those 59 volumes are indispensable for a student of papal history.) The author is critical about many Popes, and that is no problem since Popes like John XII and Benedict IX are well deserving of criticism. But the author is critical of John XXIII and Paul VI, and for reasons which you may not agree with. While most scholars would prefer that Innocent VIII not have issued his bull about witches, the author seems to think it was a good bull. The book includes the text of "Important Papal Documents" and one selected to be included is Boniface VIII's Unam Sanctam. This gives a potential reader an idea of the author's slant. Of course he has the right to his view, but a potential reader should know what that view is: little that has changed in the Church in the last fifty years meets with the author's approval.

I do like the extrem high quality of this book. It is difficult.

Coulombe writes from a position of "I'm Christian, but I'll try to be objective." He still seems to see the popes as "holier-than-" the rest of us, which is not something I'm willing to grant. His writing points out (to me, at least) that the leaders of the Catholic Church are plain old ordinary Human Beings, which means (to me, at least) that they behave and have behaved and still continue to behave as though they were {kings, CEOs, managers, etc, take-your-pick} of a group of human beings. Some of them have insight and foresight, but overall, they are not much different from the rest of us. Coulombe's biographies are interesting; they give me another view of history. It would be interesting to ask questions of the Papacy and The Church based on this book, such as: why have there been no American popes? Coulombe also seems to neglect one important aspect of John Paul II's term of office: the handling of Seattle's Archbishop Raymond Hunthausen, in 1986. I will recommend (and have done so) this book to others, but perhaps I will now also search for something a little more objective.

I do like the extrem high quality of this book. It is difficult.