Saint Paul

The jubilee year of St. Paul is ending this month. What have you done to celebrate and honor the year? Read anything about St. Paul? Any of his letters? You still have some time left!

This wonderful, short book about St. Paul is a collection of addresses that His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI gave during general audiences between July 2008 and February 2009. They fit into the "ongoing catechesis" that the Holy Father has been engaged in for some time now. He spoke extensively on Our Lord in earlier audiences and then covered the Apostles in later audiences and finally the Early Church Fathers. All along the way, he spoke about the Apostle, St. Paul.

Why do I recommend this particular book about St. Paul? Well, its hard to do any better than Pope Benedict XVI for one thing. Although His Holiness is gifted with a stunningly powerful intellect, and can at times be theologically dense, these general audience talks are directed to all of us. Yeah, you and me. They are short, direct, topical and relatively easy to understand.

Paul of Tarsus was the greatest missionary and preacher of the Apostolic Age. He was instrumental in shaping the understanding of the early Christian faith and was truly the "spiritual father" of many of the early church communities. He wrote half the New Testament! We should all get to know him a little better.

Pope Benedict starts out by giving us some background information, as he always does. We learn about the culture and milieu of Paul's time and we are given biographical information about the man himself. His remarkable and dramatic conversion make up an entire chapter on their own - who, to this day, does not know what took place "on the road to Damascus?"

Subsequent chapters (addresses) cover Paul's apostolate, his theology, more importantly his Christology, and Christian Doctrine as set forth by St. Paul. Finally, Pope Benedict brings it all home and tells us what Paul means to the Church and to our lives as the faithful living in our own age. The power of St. Paul's witness to Our Lord echoes down through the ages and speaks to us, in timeless fashion.

This is definitely the best pick for Pauline Year reading, and is the best introductory book I have come across on St. Paul the Apostle. My hope is that readers will want to dive into Paul's letters after reading this and, perhaps, strive for the total dedication to the Lord and to His Church that St. Paul had.

Let St. Paul be your guide on your continuing journey to Jesus Christ.