The Name of God is Mercy

Description

The Name of God is Mercy, Pope Francis' exploration on the universal theme of mercy, is a spiritual inspiration to both followers of Christianity and non-Christians around the world. Drawing on his own experience as a priest and shepherd, Pope Francis discusses mercy, a subject of central importance in his religious teaching and testimony, and in addition sums up other ideas - reconciliation, the closeness of God - that comprise the heart of his papacy. Written in conversation with Vatican expert and La Stampa journalist Andrea Tornielli, The Name of God is Mercy is directed at everyone, inside or outside of the Catholic Church, seeking meaning in life, a road to peace and reconciliation, or the healing of physical or spiritual wounds.

Pope Francis, born Jorge Mario Bergoglio on December 1936, has been the Bishop of Rome and 266th Pope of the Catholic Church since the 13th of March 2013. On the 13th of March 2015 he decided to give a decisive turn to his papacy by announcing the Holy Year of Mercy that will begin on December 8th 2015 and will end on November 20th 2016. Andrea Tornielli is a Vatican expert, journalist at the newspaper La Stampa and runs the website Vatican Insider. He contributes to many international newspapers and has written many books among which the first biography of the Pope Francis, Together was translated into sixteen languages.

Pope Francis's chatty tone, his repeated references to episodes in his own life and his clear, down-to-earth language, so rarely found in papal pronouncements, make The Name of God Is Mercy a pleasure to read. * The Guardian * Francis offers the most vivid glimpse yet of this thinking on the struggles facing the Church in the 21st Century * Sunday Telegraph * This gift for teaching - along with his inclusive vision of the world, and his warm, embracing manner - have been hallmarks of the pope's whirlwind tenure thus far in the Vatican, and they also inform his new book, The Name of God Is Mercy * The New York Times * What makes his book most moving is the way in which this man, without disrespecting his own privacy or offering false bromides of modesty (what Douthat derides as "ostentatious humility"), opens the sacred space of his conscience to explain how he came to center his ministry, and now his papacy, around mercy. * The New Yorker * Francis speaks succinctly-and with refreshing forthrightness. . . . He emphasizes moral sincerity over dogma, an understanding of the complexities of the world and individual experience over rigid doctrine. . . . The pope has an easy conversational style that moves effortlessly between folksy sayings and erudite allusions, between common-sense logic and impassioned philosophical insights -- Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times As he has done throughout his papacy, Pope Francis shows in this book a compelling way to present God's love anew to a skeptical world without denying the ancient teachings of faith. But now he is challenging the entire Church to trek a new way forward -- Time Francis enjoys sharing personal stories of God's grace and mercy in the lives of parishioners from his native Argentina, people he has known and who have recognized themselves as sinners -- The Washington Post Powerful . . . Francis's book signals a plea for a change of attitude on the part of the faithful and their pastors. . . . Bishops and priests will talk and quarrel over the text for months, even years to come. And that, perhaps, is what Francis intends -- Financial Times