The Pope's Last Crusade

  • Author: Peter Eisner
  • Narrator: Rick Adamson
  • Publisher: HarperCollins USA
  • Duration: 7:47:11
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Synopsis

A conspiracy within the Vatican—to stop an outspoken Pope

In 1938, Pope Pius XI was the world's most prominent critic of Hitler and his rhetoric of ethnic "purity." To make his voice heard, Pius called upon a relatively unknown American Jesuit whose writing about racism in America had caught the Pope's attention. Pius enlisted John LaFarge to write a papal encyclical—the Vatican's strongest decree—publicly condemning Hitler, Mussolini, and their murderous Nazi campaign against the Jews.

At the same time conservative members of the Vatican's innermost circle were working in secret to suppress the document. Chief among them was Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli, whose appeasement of the Germans underlay a deep-running web of conspiracy. Pacelli, who would become Pope Pius XII, was joined by Wlodimir Ledóchowski, leader of the Jesuit order, to keep the finished encyclical from reaching the increasingly ill Pope.

Peter Eisner, award-winning reporter and author of the critically acclaimed The Freedom Line, combines shocking new evidence (released only recently from Vatican archives) and eyewitness testimony to create a compelling journey into the heart of the Vatican and a little-known story of an American's partnership with the head of the Catholic Church. A truly essential work, it brings staggering new light to one of the most critical junctures in modern history.

Chapters

  • ThePopesLastCrusade_01_Open

    Duration: 16s
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_02_Prologue

    Duration: 08min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_03_Chapter1

    Duration: 24min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_04_Chapter2

    Duration: 33min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_05_Chapter3

    Duration: 28min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_06_Chapter4

    Duration: 36min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_07_Chapter5

    Duration: 33min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_08_Chapter6

    Duration: 34min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_09_Chapter7

    Duration: 38min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_10_Chapter8

    Duration: 44min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_11_Chapter9

    Duration: 31min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_12_Chapter10

    Duration: 22min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_13_Chapter11

    Duration: 31min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_14_Chapter12

    Duration: 39min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_15_Chapter13

    Duration: 32min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_16_Epilogue

    Duration: 24min
  • ThePopesLastCrusade_17_Credits

    Duration: 35s
  • sample

    Duration: 01min