3 Review(s)

Paul VI, Giovanni “Battista” Montini, ranks among the most influential even if less recognized figures in the history of the twentieth and we can even say twenty-first century Roman Catholic Church. Elected pope in 1963 he inherited and fully embraced the “hornet’s nest” of Vatican II created by his friend and predecessor John XXIII. In fulling the mandate of aggirornamento, of renewing and updating the Church set by John, Paul VI took particular interest in the Church’s engagement in the modern world. He was a man of “dialogue,” of conversation. He used the term for the first time in a papal document in his first encyclical, Ecclesiam Suam, “Christ’s Church,” in 1964. He uses the expression 64 times. He saw the Church, saw himself in dialogue with the world in the quest for peace. To this dialogue he dedicated his papacy. A singularly important moment in that quest was his address to the General Assembly of the United Nations on October 4, 1965. There he boldly challenged the 116 represented nations to “move forward” to a world where there was “Never again one against the other! Never again war!” He was not just a pope of rhetoric. He was a pope of action as he sought for example to personally negotiate an end to the Nigerian Civil War. More so we see his practical investment in the pursuit of world peace in his engagement with US President Johnson in the war in Southeast Asia. In time at the president’s request, he came to play a key role in the initiation of talks that would eventually end that war he spent his papacy protesting. In 1968 he began the practice of issuing a New Years’ Message of Peace, giving annually key and often prophetic insights into the way forward “if we want peace,” insights that survive to today in relevance. In these two volumes Tuohey gives a coherent and compelling narrative of key historical moments and theological insight into this sometimes described as “forgotten” pope, bringing the pope and his message back to mind for the benefit of humanity.