A fresh look at a complex pope with a simple agenda: radically reforming the Catholic Church.
Jorge Mario Bergoglio is the consummate disruptor, disrupting archaic modes of church governance, disrupting our collective spiritual complacency in the face of new challenges to our human flourishing while at the same time remaining deeply faithful to the organic traditions of the church. He is the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, but beyond that he is a universal leader with commanding moral presence, able to connect with laypeople and with non-Christian faiths. Pope Francis is also a credible moral voice on issues of immigration, economic inequity, the devastating consequences of political populism, and the accelerating threats to the environment, in spite of the fact that he faces deep infrastructure and governance scandals in his organization.
In his determination to reform the Vatican and ensure the Catholic faith evolves in a way that is relevant to the 21st century, Francis is very much carrying on the tradition of the Jesuits, an order known for their work in education, humanitarian missions, and social justice. A deep understanding of the Jesuit order informs Michael W. Higgins’s approach in this novel reading of a papacy unlike any other.
A fresh look at a complex pope with a simple agenda: radically reforming the Catholic Church.
Jorge Mario Bergoglio is the consummate disruptor, disrupting archaic modes of church governance, disrupting our collective spiritual complacency in the face of new challenges to our human flourishing while at the same time remaining deeply faithful to the organic traditions of the church. He is the leader of the Roman Catholic Church, but beyond that he is a universal leader with commanding moral presence, able to connect with laypeople and with non-Christian faiths. Pope Francis is also a credible moral voice on issues of immigration, economic inequity, the devastating consequences of political populism, and the accelerating threats to the environment, in spite of the fact that he faces deep infrastructure and governance scandals in his organization.
In his determination to reform the Vatican and ensure the Catholic faith evolves in a way that is relevant to the 21st century, Francis is very much carrying on the tradition of the Jesuits, an order known for their work in education, humanitarian missions, and social justice. A deep understanding of the Jesuit order informs Michael W. Higgins’s approach in this novel reading of a papacy unlike any other.
| Published By | House of Anansi Press Inc — Sep 10, 2024 |
| Specifications | 304 pages | 5.5 in x 8.5 in |
| Written By |
MICHAEL W. HIGGINS is Basilian Senior Fellow in Contemporary Catholic Thought, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto, and Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Catholic Thought, Sacred Heart University, Connecticut. He writes on Vatican affairs for the Globe and Mail, served as chief consultant of Sir Peter Ustinov’s Inside the Vatican television series, and was co-author of the best-selling Power and Peril: The Catholic Church at the Crossroads. He lives in Guelph, Ontario. |
| Written By |
|
MICHAEL W. HIGGINS is Basilian Senior Fellow in Contemporary Catholic Thought, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto, and Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Catholic Thought, Sacred Heart University, Connecticut. He writes on Vatican affairs for the Globe and Mail, served as chief consultant of Sir Peter Ustinov’s Inside the Vatican television series, and was co-author of the best-selling Power and Peril: The Catholic Church at the Crossroads. He lives in Guelph, Ontario. |
Readers will be grateful that the erudite Michael W. Higgins, bitten early by ‘the papal bug,’ continues to ply his trade. With passionate wit and perceptivity, this astute observer of Vatican affairs paints a deeply personal portrait of the Argentine outlier pope. He helpfully takes the measure of Francis’s role in the reshaping of Catholicism at a moment when the whole of human civilization finds itself a crossroads.
” —Catherine Clifford, Professor of Systematic and Historical Theology, Saint Paul University, OttawaWho knew that academic rigour and intellectual subtlety could come with such energy, humour, and craic? Michael W. Higgins has given us a profound personal portrait of Pope Francis which is both accessible and entertaining. A rare gift—haute vulgarisation at its best, of interest to specialists and non-specialists alike. Exhilarating.
” —Gerry O’Hanlon, SJ, author of The Quiet Revolution of Pope FrancisWithout indulging in hagiography, the distinguished author and veteran Vatican commentator Michael W. Higgins has given us in his latest work, The Jesuit Disruptor, a clear, nuanced, and comprehensive portrait of Pope Francis and the complex, sometimes shadowy ecclesial world he inhabits. Drawing from his deep well of knowledge, he portrays Pope Francis as a spiritual pathfinder open to lived experience and dialogue in a culture of change. His book is a clarion call for a fresh way of seeing the Gospel, urgently reminding us both of the critical need to respond to God’s Mercy and that the church is not a refuge for the saved, but a field hospital for the wounded—a timely message for our confused, distempered times.
” —James Clarke, retired Ontario Superior Court judge and poetSagacious and lucid, Michael W. Higgins, ‘the church basement pope’ as he was known in his youth, writes knowingly of Pope Francis’s struggles with recalcitrant prelates, sexual abuse scandals, the controversial role of women in the church, and most of all, the fulfillment of the Second Vatican Council in unleashing the creativity of lay people in the ongoing synod process. Higgins illuminates Francis’s recovery of the original animating spirit of the church.
” —Douglas Roche, former senator and authorJudicious, well-informed, and elegant, this highly original but thoroughly persuasive reading of the papacy of Pope Francis hits the spot. Stressing the strengths without hiding the weaknesses in Francis’s leadership, Michael W. Higgins has given us a picture of the pope that illuminates the complexity of his struggle for a church that is both more merciful and more adult. Anyone who reads this lively account will come away with a clearer understanding of the immensity and importance of the task that the Jesuit disruptor was called to accomplish.
” —Paul Lakeland, Emeritus Professor of Catholic Studies, Fairfield UniversityMichael W. Higgins sensitively analyzes Pope Francis’s search for ‘ecclesial equipoise’ amidst daunting challenges in church and society. Higgins explores Francis’s Jesuit spirituality, compassion for the marginalized and abused, and commitment to hear ‘the voice of Christ speaking through the entire people of God.’ Higgins’s narrative is fresh, candid, solidly grounded, and insightful—a delight for discerning readers.
” —Richard Yanikoski, President Emeritus, Saint Xavier University, Chicago, and President Emeritus, Association of Catholic Colleges and UniversitiesMichael W. Higgins has written a very accessible academic, yet deeply personal examination of the pontificate of Francis thus far. Placing Francis within the context of some of the significant Christian thinkers of the past who have influenced him—Teilhard de Chardin, John Henry Newman, Thomas Merton, Henri Nouwen, Dorothy Day, John XXIII, and Ignatius of Loyola—readers will enjoy a complex yet not uncritical portrait of one of the most dynamic popes of the modern age. The Jesuit Disruptor ought to be required reading for those in the corridors of power in the church, those aspiring to vocations in church leadership, and teachers in Catholic schools. Best of all, written in agreeable and erudite prose, this book will be welcome reading for those in the pews, and those outside of the church.
” —Dr. Mark G. McGowan, Professor of History, University of TorontoMichael W. Higgins provides us with an accessible and insightful study of a remarkably resilient pope and his mission to renew global Catholicism, amidst considerable opposition, in the spirit of Vatican 11. And with an extraordinary command of the history and intellectual sources that have shaped Jorge Mario Bergoglio, Higgins reveals to us a pope convinced that the church must urgently reform itself, by accompanying ordinary people in the struggle to believe, in our dangerously polarized world.
” —Brother Mark O’Connor FMS, Pope Francis Fellow, Newman College, University of Melbourne, Australia