Absolute Monarch By John Julius Norwich

A Book Review

The story of the Papacy from St. Paul. The men who led the throne of St Peter since Peter the Apostle. The intrigues, the sin, the stupidity, the politics, the power, the shame, the betrayals, and the heroism of men, shamefully, no woman yet, who led the church of Christ.

This is a mammoth book, 504 pages. I wanted to know the history of the Popes that came before Pope Francis, and this is their story in brief. This is nearly 2,000 years compressed in short. If you consider how long the Holy Roman Empire had been in control of the world, it is impressive that he could shorten it to this number of pages.

You could read this book and be shaken by how men could do very terrible things in the name of God. There are several instances when there was more than one Pope in place. The church was supposed to be Catholic, One, but had two heads. Ironic, right?

When the world learned of the stories of abuse happening in Catholic convents, schools, and churches by Priest, it was surprised. This was in the 21st Century. But we need not be surprised, it was something that was part of church history. The financial scandal that shocked the news headlines a few years ago was nothing new, they were part of church history.

History does not repeat itself, men always repeat history, and that's mostly because they don't know history itself.

I find the stories of specific Popes surprising. One particular Pope was shocked by his selection. His sister said they chose the worst of men while his mother died of shock. 😂.

I'm also developing new arguments about specific things. The accusation that the Church suppressed knowledge and science can only be made if we are not looking at the whole picture of history. In fact, the enlightenment could only have happened in a "Christian country". At the forefront of the enlightenment, of democracy, of human rights, of abolition, were Christians. And rightly, on the other side of the divide, there are also Christians. That's just history.

An interesting thought I've been exploring for a while was whether the reformation had to happen, I've come to a conclusion, it had to. The reformation happened because the Catholic Church wouldn't change itself.

One question that ran through my mind all through was how men who were supposed to live and act according to the tenets of the Apostle behaved almost without conscience?

The author said that in the end, St. Peter will be proud, I doubt. I doubt if Peter will be proud that at some point his seat instigated the crusade, murdered in the name of Christ, ransacked cities in the name of Christ, and perpetrated some of the worse acts for centuries. It is true, he will be proud of some of the things they did, standing up for human rights, supporting the spread of knowledge and arts, and most importantly, spreading the message for which he died.

That's the paradox of Christianity. God left the spreading of his message in the hands of mortal men. Men who can be good or bad.

If you want a brief, long history of the Papacy, you can start here. The seat of St. Peter started a spiritual role, became a powerful political role, and is now a spiritual role again. Could we be going back to the beginning?

Lengdung Tungchamma, 2020.