For Christians, Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God, who died for the sins of the world, and who rose from the dead in triumph over sin and death. For non-Christians, he is almost anything else--a myth, a political revolutionary, a prophet whose teaching was misunderstood or distorted by his followers.

Jesus of Nazareth is the Son of God, and no myth, revolutionary, or misunderstood prophet, insists Benedict XVI. He thinks that the best of historical scholarship, while it can't prove Jesus is the Son of God, certainly doesn't disprove it. Indeed, Benedict maintains that the evidence, fairly considered, brings us face-to-face with the challenge of Jesus--a real man who taught and acted in ways that were tantamount to claims of divine authority, claims not easily dismissed as lunacy or deception.

Benedict XVI presents this challenge in his new book, Jesus of Nazareth: Holy Week: From the Entrance into Jerusalem to the Resurrection, the sequel volume to Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration.

Why was Jesus rejected by the religious leaders of his day? Who was responsible for his death? Did he establish a Church to carry on his work? How did Jesus view his suffering and death? How should we? And, most importantly, did Jesus really rise from the dead and what does his resurrection mean? The story of Jesus raises many crucial questions.

Benedict brings to his study the vast learning of a brilliant scholar, the passionate searching of a great mind, and the deep compassion of a pastor's heart. In the end, he dares readers to grapple with the meaning of Jesus' life, teaching, death, and resurrection.

Only in this second volume do we encounter the decisive sayings and events of Jesus' life . . . I hope that I have been granted an insight into the figure of Our Lord that can be helpful to all readers who seek to encounter Jesus and to believe in Him.
-Pope Benedict XVI

In this bold, momentous work, Joseph Ratzinger--in his first book written since he became Pope--seeks to salvage the person of Jesus from recent popular depictions and to restore Jesus' true identity as discovered in the Gospels. Through his brilliance as a theologian and his personal conviction as a believer, the Pope shares a rich, compelling, flesh-and-blood portrait of Jesus and invites us to encounter, face-to-face, the central figure of the Christian faith.

From Jesus of Nazareth: the great question that will be with us throughout this entire book: What did Jesus actually bring, if not world peace, universal prosperity, and a better world? What has he brought?

The answer is very simple: God. He has brought God! He has brought the God who formerly unveiled his countenance gradually first to Abraham, then to Moses and the Prophets, and then in the Wisdom Literature--the God who revealed his face only in Israel, even though he was also honored among the pagans in various shadowy guises. It is this God, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the true God, whom he has brought to the peoples of the earth.

He has brought God, and now we know his face, now we can call upon him. Now we know the path that we human beings have to take in this world. Jesus has brought God and with God the truth about where we are going and where we come from: faith, hope, and love.

The Study Guide is also available!

After Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI resigned from the papacy in 2013, he never stopped thinking or writing. Near the end of his life, he and editor Elio Guerriero gathered together a whole volume of new material, dealing with the themes closest to his heart. The pope asked that it be published upon his death.

This final work is What Is Christianity? It takes up a kaleidoscopic array of themes: the Christian faith's relationship with other religions, especially Judaism and Islam; the theology and reform of the liturgy; the priesthood; the saints; the Eucharist; the tragedy of abuse; the beauty of nature; Italian and German culture; and much more.

With prophetic insight into our times, Benedict warns of a radical manipulation of man in the name of tolerance, insisting that the only authentic counterweight to every form of intolerance is Christ himself--and Christ crucified.

A lifelong Catholic, the late pope pays tribute to some of the giant figures of Christianity who have served him through the years as guiding stars: his predecessor Pope John Paul II, the twentieth-century German Jesuit martyr Alfred Delp, and the silent carpenter Joseph, his patron saint.

What Is Christianity? is a frank spiritual testament from a theological master, a churchman who loved the faith of simple Christians but who always stood ready, even in his last days, to dialogue about every aspect of human life--in love and in truth.

The ecological movement discovered that 'nature' prescribes for us a moderation that we cannot ignore with impunity. Unfortunately, 'human ecology' has still not been made concrete. A human being, too, has a 'nature' that is prescribed for him, and violating or denying it leads to self-destruction.
-- Benedict XVI, from the preface

This collection of selected works is Benedict XVI's heartfelt call for Europe to rediscover its true origin and identity, in order to become once again a beacon of beauty and humanity for the world. Such a revival would be not simply about imposing the truths of faith as the foundation of Europe, but about making a fundamental choice for justice: to live as if God exists rather than as if he does not.

Just as Pope John XXIII once called on the great nations of the earth to avoid a devastating nuclear war, Benedict XVI addresses not only Europe but the whole West, so that, by again finding their own soul as a people, they can save the world from self-destruction--both physical and spiritual.

With his characteristic clarity, immediate accessibility, and at the same time depth, the Pope Emeritus magnificently outlines here the 'idea of Europe' that undoubtedly inspired its Founding Fathers and is the basis for its greatness; the definitive dimming of this ideal would ratify its complete and irreversible decline.
-- Pope Francis, from the Introduction

While the stories of the world's creation and the fall of humankind have often been subjected to reductionism of one sort or another -- literalists treat the Bible as a science textbook whereas rationalists divorce God from creation -- Ratzinger presents a rich, balanced Catholic understanding of these early biblical writings and attests to their enduring vitality.

Beginning each homily with a text selected from the first three chapters of Genesis, Ratzinger discusses, in turn, God the creator, the meaning of the biblical creation accounts, the creation of human beings, and sin and salvation; in the appendix he unpacks the beneficial consequences of faith in creation.

Expertly translated from German, these reflections set out a reasonable and biblical approach to creation. 'In the Beginning . . .' also serves as an excellent homiletic resource for priests and pastors.

With this concise anthology of Benedict XVI's lessons on the Christian life--on faith, hope, love, joy, youth, holiness, and freedom--readers find themselves walking side by side with a great spiritual father.

Benedict XVI, as Pope Francis reflects in the book's foreword, knew how to bring heart and mind, thought and feeling, rationality and emotion in concert with one another--a fruitful model of how one can tell the world about the shattering power of the Gospel.

The crystallized excerpts in God Is Ever New are drawn from lectures, speeches, homilies, and documents across the course of Benedict's papacy. Each grants a glimpse of a God who is full of surprises, never dull. Here, Benedict speaks not in the voice of an academic theologian but of a pastor, a companion on the journey.

Let these poetic insights of Benedict XVI accompany you daily: in prayer, in adoration, in study, and in love.

After meditating on the Apostles and then on the Fathers of the early Church, as seen in his earlier works Jesus, the Apostles and the Early Church and Church Fathers, Pope Benedict XVI devoted his attention to the most influential Christian men from the fifth through the twelfth centuries. In his first book, Church Fathers, Benedict began with Clement of Rome and ended with Saint Augustine. In this volume, the Holy Father reflects on some of the greatest theologians of the Middle Ages: Benedict, Anselm, Bernard, and Gregory the Great, to name just a few. By exploring both the lives and the ideas of the great popes, abbots, scholars and missionaries who lived during the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of Christendom, Pope Benedict XVI highlights the key elements of Catholic dogma and practice that remain the foundation stones not only of the Roman Catholic Church but of Christian society itself. This book is a wonderful way to get to know these later Church Fathers and Teachers and the tremendous spiritually rich patrimony they have bequeathed to us.

Without this vital sap, man is exposed to the danger of succumbing to the ancient temptation of seeking to redeem himself by himself.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

Saint Paul is one of the most important figures in Christian history. As Saul of Tarsus he vigorously persecuted Christianity, even collaborating in the death of Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr. Paul's encounter with the resurrected Jesus on the road to Damascus changed his life, the Church, and the world. More than anyone else in the early Church, Paul saw the universal nature of the Christian message. He became the Apostle to the Gentiles and the Teacher of the Nations. As the author of half of the New Testament, Paul is a figure who cannot be overlooked by anyone who wants to understand Jesus Christ and Christianity.

In this book, Pope Benedict XVI, a profound spiritual leader and a first-rate theologian and Bible commentator, explores the legacy of Saint Paul. The pope follows the course of the Apostle's life, including his missionary journeys, his relationships with the other Apostles, and his martyrdom in Rome. Benedict also examines the following questions: Did Paul know Jesus during his earthly life. How much of Jesus' teaching and ministry did he know about? Did Paul distort the teachings of Jesus? What role did Jesus' death and resurrection play in Paul's teaching? What are we to make of Paul's teaching about the end of the world? What does his teaching say about salvation and the roles of faith and works in the Christian life? How have modern Catholic and Protestant scholars come together in their understanding of Paul? What does Paul have to teach us today about living a spiritual life?

The Apostle Paul, an outstanding and almost inimitable yet stimulating figure, stands before us as an example of total dedication to the Lord and to his Church, as well as of great openness to humanity and its cultures.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

Based on Pope Benedict XVI's weekly teaching on the relationship between Christ and the Church, this book tells the drama of Jesus' first disciples -- his Apostles and their associates -- and how they spread Jesus' message throughout the ancient world. Far from distorting the truth about Jesus of Nazareth, insists Pope Benedict, the early disciples remained faithful to it, even at the cost of their lives.

Beginning with the Twelve as the foundation of Jesus' re-establishment of the Holy People of God, Pope Benedict examines the story of the early followers of Christ. He draws on Scripture and early tradition to consider such important figures as Peter, Andrew, James and John, and even Judas Iscariot. Benedict moves beyond the original Twelve to discuss Paul of Tarsus, the persecutor of Christianity who became one of Jesus' greatest disciples. Also considered are Stephen, the first Christian martyr, Barnabas, Timothy, Titus, the wife and husband team of Priscilla and Aquila, and such key women figures as Mary, the Mother of Jesus, Mary Magdalene, and Phoebe.

Jesus, the Apostles and the Early Church is a fascinating journey back to the origins of Christianity. It reveals how Jesus' earliest disciples faithfully conveyed the truth about the Jesus of history and how they laid the foundations for the Church, through whom people today can know the same Jesus.

In these catecheses the Pope is not delivering academic lectures or preaching sermons. Rather, he is instructing Christian believers who want to have their faith confirmed and strengthened. Pope Benedict firmly believes that the Fathers of the Church still speak powerfully today, and his accessible presentations will make many readers eager to look further into the writings of these great early Christians.

The Complete Edition

Prayer is essential to the life of faith. In this superb book, based on Pope Benedict's weekly teaching, he examines the foundational principles of the life of prayer. Believers of various backgrounds and experience in prayer-from beginners to spiritually advanced-will be enriched by this spiritual masterpiece.

Benedict begins considering what we can learn from the examples of prayer found in a wide range of cultures and eras. Next, he turns to the Bible's teaching about prayer, beginning with Abraham and moving though Moses, the prophets, the Psalms to the example of Jesus. With Jesus Christ, Pope Benedict considers not only the Lord's teaching about prayer, but also his example of how to pray, including the Our Father, his prayers in the Garden of Gethsemane, and prayers on the Cross. The prayers of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, and the early Church are also explored. Benedict also draws on insights from spiritual masters, the saints, and the Church's liturgy. He challenges readers to live their relationships with God even more intensely, as it were, at a 'school of prayer'.

Although Benedict provides a sweeping survey of great figures of prayer, his discussion centers on Jesus Christ and even invokes him in the study of prayer. It is in fact in Jesus, writes Benedict, that man becomes able to approach God in the depth and intimacy of the relationship of fatherhood and sonship. Together with the first disciples, let us now turn with humble trust to the Teacher and ask him: 'Lord, teach us to pray' (Lk 11:1).

Charity and Truth was expected to be--and is--the Pope's encyclical on social justice. And indeed justice and rights find their proper place. But charity and truth are shown to be the fundamental principles. Charity is at the heart of the Church's social doctrine, he writes. Without truth, without trust and love for what is true, there is no social conscience and responsibility, and social action ends up serving private interests and the logic of power.

Benedict calls for integral human development, which promotes the good of every man and of the whole man, including the spiritual dimension, the perspective of eternal life. Without this, human progress in this world is denied breathing-space.

What's more, true development requires openness to life. If there is lack of respect for the right to life and a natural death, he writes, if human conception, gestation and birth are made artificial, if human embryos are sacrificed to research, the conscience of society ends up losing the concept of human ecology and, along with it, that of environmental ecology. It is contradictory to insist that future generations respect the natural environment when our educational system and laws do not help them to respect themselves.

With respect to economics, the Pope insists every economic decision has a moral consequence. He avoids the extremes of an unbridled capitalism and socialism. Instead, he holds that the logic of the market and the logic of the State--free economic exchange with political oversight and restraint--are not enough to secure human flourishing. There must be a generosity and gratuitousness among citizens and nations that goes beyond economic and political systems. Charity is necessary for justice to be justice.

Benedict also argues that technology must not be seen as automatically providing solutions to problems, without the need for morality. Nor must man seek to avoid responsibility for overcoming social problems by rejecting technological development as inevitably evil. Benedict insists that man must be humble yet confident that he can, through faith and reason, make true progress in human development.

In this book of meditations, based on a series of meditations by the author shortly before he became Archbishop of Munich-Freising, in 1977, theologian Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) presents his profound thoughts on the nature and person of God, building a bridge between theology and spirituality as he makes wide use of the Sacred Scriptures to reveal the beauty and mystery of who God is. He writes about each of the three persons in the Holy Trinity, showing the different attributes of each person, and that God is three and God is one.

God is - and the Christian faith adds: God is as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, three and one. This is the very heart of Christianity, but it is so often shrouded in a silence born of perplexity. Has the Church perhaps gone one step too far here? Ought we not rather leave something so great and inaccessible as God in his inaccessibility? Can something like the Trinity have any real meaning for us? It is certainly true that the proposition that God is three and God is one is and remains the expression of his otherness, which is infinitely greater than us and transcends all our thinking and our existence.

But, as Joseph Ratzinger shows, if this proposition meant nothing to us, it would not have been revealed! And it could be clothed in human language only because it had already penetrated human thinking and living to some extent.

Without Jesus, we do not know what 'Father' truly is. This becomes visible in his prayer, which is the foundation of his being. A Jesus who was not continuously absorbed in the Father, and was not in continuous intimate communication with him, would be a completely different being from the Jesus of the Bible, the real Jesus of history... In Jesus' prayer, the Father becomes visible and Jesus makes himself known as the Son. The unity which this reveals is the Trinity. Accordingly, becoming a Christian means sharing in Jesus' prayer, entering into the model provided by his life, i.e. the model of prayer. Becoming a Christian means saying 'Father' with Jesus.
-- Joseph Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI)

The priesthood is going through a dark time, according to Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI and Robert Cardinal Sarah. Wounded by the revelation of so many scandals, disconcerted by the constant questioning of their consecrated celibacy, many priests are tempted by the thought of giving up and abandoning everything.

In this book, the pope emeritus and the prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments give their brother priests, and the whole Church, a message of hope. They honestly address the spiritual challenges faced by priests today, while pointing to deeper conversion to Jesus Christ as the key to faithful and fruitful priestly ministry and genuine reform.

Benedict XVI and Cardinal Sarah fraternally offer these reflections to the people of God and, of course, in a spirit of filial obedience, to Pope Francis, who has said, I think that celibacy is a gift for the Church. . . . I don't agree with allowing optional celibacy, no.

Responding to calls for refashioning the priesthood, including proposals from participants in the Amazonian Synod, two wise, spiritually astute pastors explain the importance of priestly celibacy for the good of the whole Church. Drawing on Vatican II, they present celibacy as not just a mere precept of ecclesiastical law, but as a sharing in Jesus' sacrifice on the Cross and his identity as Bridegroom of the Church.

The celebration of the Eucharist, in which Jesus Christ becomes present, is the center of the Catholic faith. This volume brings together substantive texts of the Holy Father on the many aspects and dimensions of the Mass and the Mystery of the Eucharist, a rich source for every Christian and a spur to reflection and personal prayer. Delivered in addresses and homilies to a wide variety of audiences, these reflections reveal the depth and breadth of Pope Benedict XVI's profound and life-long love for the Holy Eucharist.

A major theme throughout the works of Joseph Ratzinger, the Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist is the Church's source of life, unity and fruitfulness. This theme has been carried deeply into his pontificate, as can be seen in this collection, which challenges the faithful to believe that by receiving Christ in Holy Communion, they are drawn not only into the very life of God, but into the community that is Christ's Body, the Church.

In the institution of the Eucharist we see the very foundational act of the Church. Through the Eucharist the Lord not only gives himself to his own, but gives the reality of a new community 'until he comes' (cf. 1 Cor 11:26). Through the Eucharist the disciples become his living house that grows through history as the living Temple of God in this world.
-- Pope Benedict XVI

For a Christian, the way to reach perfection is to strive for holiness. What is true perfection? Christ's words are clear, sublime and disconcerting: Be perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect. To have God as our model is a dizzying thought! Yet the Church reminds us that, All the faithful, whatever their condition or state in life, are called by the Lord to that perfect holiness.

The Church teaches us that holiness is not the concern of a privileged few, nor does it only pertain to Christians of the past. Holiness is always a call to every Christian of every age, a challenge for anyone who wants to follow in the footsteps of Christ.

Pope Benedict XVI says: Holiness never goes out of fashion; on the contrary, with the passage of time it shines out ever more brightly, expressing man's perennial effort to reach God. Mother Teresa of Calcutta wrote: Holiness is not something for the extraordinary; it is not a luxury of the few. Holiness is the simple duty for each one of us.

The saints are our models and teachers in the ways of holiness. They show us that holiness is possible for us, since they experienced the same difficulties and weaknesses we do, yet persevered in achieving sanctity. The world of saints is a world of wonders, and in this book Pope Benedict XVI helps us to enter into that world.

This inspiring volume presents the Pope's numerous reflections on many saints arranged according to the calendar year. He shows how the life of each saint has something unique to teach us about virtue, faith, courage and love of Christ. Dozens of saints are covered in this wonderful spiritual book. The Pope exhorts us through their lives, Be holy! Be saints!

This beautifully produced, high quality coffee-table book is a deluxe edition for all those who want to have a keepsake treasure of this powerful six day visit to the USA by Pope Benedict who won the hearts and minds of countless people with his inspiring words and gestures of love, truth, hope and compassion.

From his first stepping off the Shepherd One plane in Washington, to his White House visit and warm exchange with President Bush, the moving, festive Masses in two baseball stadiums, his inspiring address to the United Nations, his talks to U S Bishops, Catholic educators and to youth, and deeply moving visit to Ground Zero, the many memorable moments of Pope Benedict's apostolic journey are captured in moving pictures and words in this collector's edition.

Lavishly illustrated with dozens of inspiring photos!
Includes all the Pope's talks and homilies!
Large 8.5 x 10.5 coffee-table size

As David Schindler notes in his introduction, Cardinal Ratzinger -- Pope Benedict XVI -- rarely writes on any churchly matter that does not manifest its implications for man and culture, and vice versa. Indeed, this indissoluble linking is one of the main distinguishing features of his theology. This volume on the Church is to be followed by two others from Pope Benedict on, respectively, the themes of anthropology and theological renewal.

In this book, Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI, presents the Word of God as a living reality in the Church. God's Word, according to Ratzinger, is encountered in the Bible, in tradition, and through the teaching office of the bishop, who, through apostolic succession, is to be the servant of and the witness to the divine Word. Ratzinger examines as well the relationship between the episcopacy and the papacy. He also considers the nature of apostolic succession, and he responds to objections to the Catholic view of the subject. His treatment is sympathetic to the concerns of non-Catholic Christians while remaining faithful to Catholic teaching and practice.

This book also includes the famous Erasmus Lecture of Cardinal Ratzinger, which assesses the strengths and weaknesses of modern critical approaches to biblical interpretation. Ratzinger proposes a new approach that avoids the pitfalls of a narrowly critical outlook on the Bible without succumbing to fundamentalism.

God's Word provides insights into Pope Benedict XVI's efforts to renew the Church's participation in God's Truth through the divine Word, as well as the Church's mission to proclaim the Word to all people.

In this second volume of Joseph Ratzinger in Communio, Pope Benedict XVI speaks to various issues relating to humanity today -- conscience, technological security, the origin of human life, the meaning of Sunday, Christian hope, and more.

As editor David L. Schindler notes, Cardinal Ratzinger (Pope Benedict XVI) rarely writes on any churchly matter that does not manifest its implications for man and culture, and vice versa. Indeed, this indissoluble linking is one of the main distinguishing features of his theology. This is the second of three volumes; the first deals with themes relating to the Church, and the third volume is to focus on theological renewal.