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131 of 139 persons found the following review helpful.
The Rest of the Story
By Gord Wilson
I purchased the hardback of this book after seeing the author on C-Span Book TV. I disagree exclusively with the negative reviews of this book for the following reasons. First, the writers of those reviews seem to be well-versed in the history of the last 2000 years and object to how Mr. Crocker presents his version. All I may say is they have been lucky not to have had to sit through what passes as history as I have. I have never heard Mr. Crocker’s side, even in so-called Catholic books. “A church that never went right would be rather as miraculous as a church that never went wrong,” Chesterton quipped in Orthodoxy. In all the other versions of history I’ve been exposed to, the church never goes right. Obviously their fairy tales were as flawed as Mr. Crocker’s critics feel his activity of formally presenting something to be. Yet even now these inventive revisions top the best vender list. How I pity the innocent readers who, incognizant of the merchandising ploy foisted on them, may try to create a consistent doctrine from the hacked together bits of historical shrapnel that pass for, and are taught as, history. Second, if you wonder why so a good deal of persons are today reconsidering the Catholic Church, it’s because it is detractors have overstated their case. It’s as if, to quote Chesterton again, “any stick was good sufficient to beat Christianity with.” All that happens is one loses respect for the beaters and gains respect for the beaten. Chesterton wrote his remarks 100 years ago, summarily dismantling the idiotic pre-modern world (back now as the idiotic post-modern world). As a convert, Crocker is naturally excessively affected emotionally to tell the other side of the story, and as a hungry soul starved by the meaninglessness of the non-philosophies of today I was excessively affected emotionally to read it. One caveat: the time of the Reformation and the Thirty Year war is an account of unbelievable violence and carnage. But as Mel Gibson’s movie shows, a great some in our day are hungry for the truth to set us free.
64 of 69 humans found the following review helpful.
Don’t judge it for what it is not.
By Kevin Davis
If you suppose this to be an academic, critical history of the Catholic Church, then you need to read the title again. Crocker is not a professional historian, and he doesn’t pretend to be. However, as a man’s honorable interpretation and commentary of unfeigned historical events, the book is excellent. This is history through the eyes of a faithful, orthodox Roman Catholic, in the historico-apologetic tradition of Hilaire Belloc, Christopher Dawson, and G.K. Chesterton. Crocker is without doubt or question indebted to them for his understanding of the Church and it is development as it struggles versus a lot of foes, secular and religious. Of peculiar interest to Western Christian readers is the second half beginning with the Reformation. Like Belloc, Crocker wants to locate the rampant secularism of today within the principles of the Reformation — such as in this unforgettable quote:
“The result [of sola scriptura], over time, was that in Protestant countries, theology was no longer ‘the queen of sciences’ but only one source of knowledge, subject to person interpretation, and was disunited from secular inquiry. Because secular inquiry was seen as goal to be attained it in the long run gained overweening predominance and prestige over doctrinally subjective Protestant religious thought — an intellectual development that has been the major factor in secularizing the Western world” (240).
Whether one agrees or not, such issues are worth pondering, and this book is a suitable probability to do so with a committed Catholic.
28 of 30 humans found the following review helpful.
Fun read
By bookscdsdvdsandcoolstuff
As a faithful, orthodox, Catholic this book was a fun read for me. It presents an wholly factual and pro-Catholic view of the history of the Church. It is unapologetically triumphalist (just see the title!) and well footnoted.
It is, however, not a severe work of academic history. It is more of a “‘History of Christendom’ for Dummies.” (more on the History of Christendom later) In it is defense, it doesn’t pretend to be anything else. However, I wish the book had more academic heft. Writing a book like this will engage people. When they are engaged, it is nice to prevent them from having ready and easy criticisms.
Several reviews here (all protestant and/or secularist and stinging with righteous indignation) point out the books flaws. Crocker uses secondary roots too much. He engages in too much polemic. He doesn’t tell both sides of the story. These criticisms, while they comprise numerous validity, are overblown.
Writing an unbiased history was not Crocker’s purpose. Pick up the dust jacket, look at the design, and read the flaps and the book itself tells you that. Unlike various anti-Catholic “history” books when it comes to the reformation I have picked up, this book does not pretend to be unbiased. Peruse the reviews of Crocker’s book and one sees that some Protestants still have the gall to assert that only fellow Protestants may write unbiased histories of the reformation.
Writing a pro-Catholic history of the Catholic Church was Crocker’s purpose. If one can’t deduce that from looking at the jacket, then one has poor deductive reasoning skills! Interestingly enough, in spite of the books flaws, his case is comparatively strong. Even critics of Crocker point out that he doesn’t percentage any untrue selective information in this book.
The use of secondary origins is not as undesirable as one reviewer claims. MANY, MANY innovative histories of ancient times rely on secondary sources. There just isn’t that much necessary source material out there for a heap of events. Historiography would not subsist as a discipline if every one just went to the necessary documents and told the fixed tale they could find there.
So why just 3 stars? Despite the fact that I will defend Crocker’s right to make a case regarding the history of the Church to anyone, I plainly don’t like the book’s approach. It is fun and funny; yet it is supposed to be history. Crocker may write, but he is no historian. He writing style is flip, irreverent, and arrogant. I ofttimes feel that books written in this manner are insulting my intelligence. For instance, I don’t care much for Ann Coulter either. She and Crocker have a similar writing style, and a similar taste for polemics.
Furthermore, Crocker has his culturally protestant leanings which are left over from before his conversion. Too many times I have seen him in consultations pointing out perceived flaws the Magesterium he proclaims to defend. The grounds of his seemingly continuous criticism of the last two popes? They failed to support the US invasion of Iraq. Just read his divisions on the Crusades in this book to see Crocker’s pro-war bias. Crocker is so pro-war that it makes my eyes injure to read his stuff.
Because of these flaws, I am forced to give Crocker’s book 3 stars out of five; I would commend alternate readings to get one started on Catholic history that do not suffer from Crocker’s weaknesses.
Warren H. Carroll for instance is a scholar of severe weight. He holds a Ph.D. in history from Columbia University and is the founder and past president of Christendom College.
His EXCELLENT multi volume series on the History of Christendom (each volume roughly 500 pages or so) is the real deal. It tells much the same history Crocker tells, but he tells it with SERIOUS scholarly ammunition: the best sources, the best argumentation, and the best writing. He has counterarguments versus other scholars at the ready and engages his colleagues in his copious footnotes. Even altho Carroll’s books are LONG, they are engaging and read easily. He stays away from using too much academic jargon; any reasonably educated person could read them.
I found the Cleaving Of Christendom: History Of Christendom Vol 4, which is the volume that deals with the reformation, most engaging and informative. If one finds Crocker too simplistic, too flippant, too over the top, I would check out Dr. Carroll’s work.
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