Murder In The 33rd Degree: The Gagnon Investigation Into Vatican Freemasonry by Fr Charles Theodore Murr

Paperback: Was Pope John Paul I murdered? If so, by whom, and to what end? 

Was the Catholic liturgy sabotaged to strip it of truth, power and beauty? If so, by whom, and to what end? 

Was an international plot underfoot to destroy the Vatican’s financial stability? If so, by whom, and to what end?

There was one man who knew the answers to these and many other questions plaguing the post-Conciliar Church. In 1975, then Archbishop Edouard Gagnon was personally commissioned by Pope Paul VI to investigate the Vatican’s Roman Curia. This thorough investigation concluded in 1978, the “year of the three Popes.”

In Murder in the 33rd Degree (2022), author Charles Theodore Murr, a close and lifelong friend of Cardinal Gagnon, gives his firsthand account of what transpired during that papal investigation. 

Murder in the 33rd Degree answers many questions that many people have been asking for half a century.

Please support Fr Charles Murr and buy his book or buy two, and give one to a priest!

About the author: Charles Theodore Murr (1950) was born in Saint Paul, Minnesota. He holds two Licentiates from the Gregorian University (philosophical anthropology and sacred theology), and a Master's Degree in psychology from NYU. Other books by Father Murr: The Godmother: Madre Pascalina, A Feminine Tour de Force (2017); Memories of an Unwed Father, The Syrian: Hilarion Capucci and the Priceless Ransom (1995); Perhaps Love: Dyadic Interpersonalism (2000); and The Society of Judas (2006). Some of his works have been translated into Spanish, Italian and Arabic. 

The Confession (Mike Daley and Rosie Fernandez Legal Series) by Sheldon Siegel

Hardback: The Confession (2004) is the fifth instalment in the outstanding legal thriller series featuring Mike Daley & Rosie Fernandez.

Confessions abound - some of them quite unexpected - in Sheldon Siegel's new legal thriller.

Mike Daley does not go to confession much since he left the priesthood twenty years ago and became a lawyer, but that does not stop his old friend, Father Ramon Aguirre, from trying to get him there. "It wouldn't kill you to go to church once in a while," he tells Mike. 

But it does kill someone.

For several months, a ruinous sexual harassment suit has been building against the San Francisco Catholic Archdiocese, and when the plaintiff's lawyer is found dead, an apparent suicide, an almost audible sigh of relief is heard in certain quarters. But that is before the police find evidence of murder. Even worse - the evidence points to Father Aguirre.

Mike and his ex-wife law partner, Rosie, jump in to take the priest's case, but what started out as difficult soon appears impossible as forensics, witnesses, and secrets from Father Aguirre's past all incriminate their client. Soon, their wits are the only things keeping the priest from a life sentence or worse, and wits simply may not be enough-unless they can conjure up a miracle of their own.

About the author: Sheldon Siegel is a New York Times Bestselling novelist and author best known for his works of modern legal courtroom drama.

Siegel was born on the south side of Chicago, Illinois. He attended New Trier High School in Winnetka, Illinois, and later went on to attend the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as an Accounting major. He graduated with a Juris Doctor from Boalt Hall at the University of California, Berkeley in 1983. He has been in private practice in San Francisco, California for over twenty years and specializes in corporate and securities law with the law firm Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP. 

His books have been translated into a dozen languages and sold millions of copies worldwide. He currently resides in Larkspur, California, with his wife, Linda, and twin sons, Alan and Stephen.

Rating: 5/5 

Prophesies: Schisms And Tribulations In The Church by St Francis of Assisi

Jesus, You take Over: Prayers For Surrender To God's Will For Private Devotion by Fr Dolindo Ruotolo

Booklet: Don Dolindo Ruotolo was called a saint by his contemporary, St Padre Pio.

Father Ruotolo was a priest from Naples, Italy (1882-1970), who had extraordinary communications with Jesus throughout his life. He referred to himself as “the Madonna's little old man” and the Rosary was his constant companion. Padre Pio once said of this priest, “The whole of paradise is in your soul.”  

He suffered much pain and humiliation throughout his life and was once told by a bishop, “You will be a martyr, but in your heart, not with your blood.”  

His whole life is a testament to total abandonment to God.

Jesus, You Take Over (2021) is a peace-invoking, beautiful little prayer book which includes the Surrender Novena, Rosary of Abandonment and words of comfort. It is a perfect little prayer book to add to one's prayer life when one is struggling with stress and anxiety, especially during our weary, present-day times. Placing one's trust in God alone is the only remedy for truly calming the soul. Padre Pio also often recommended souls to Don Ruotolo while he was alive.  

About the author: Father Dolindo Ruotolo was born, in Naples, Italy on 6 October 1882. Ordained at the young age of 23 on 24 June 1905, he dedicated every moment of his long life to prayer and penance at the service of the thousands of faithful who asked for his spiritual direction and turned to him for help and comfort.

Don Dolindo Ruotolo is the author of a profound and huge Commentary on the Holy Scripture in 33 volumes. Beside that, he left a very large number of theological, ascetical and mystical writings. He also answered thousands of letters. He wrote also thousands of notes on holy images to offer spiritual direction to people, and a few of these are now collected in a little book, “Meditations on the Holy Rosary”. 

Don Dolindo had a keen understanding of the human soul and thus he was always able to help people to see the light of God. Forever at work, tireless in helping souls, in the midst of unspeakable suffering of every kind, as victim soul for mankind, he was sustained by a wonderful freshness of spirit that transformed his life into a hymn to life.

Paralyzed for the last ten years of his life, Don Dolindo Ruotolo died in Naples on 19 November 1970, in the extreme voluntary poverty he had lived all his life. His body lies in the Church where he served as Pastor, Our Lady of Lourdes and St Joseph of the Aged, via Salvatore Tommasi, in Napoli, Italy.

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God Or Nothing: A Conversation On Faith With Nicolas Diat by Robert Cardinal Sarah

Paperback: "Because the man of the world wants to change his place, his destiny, his idols, and to change them perpetually, the friend of God must remain and stay in the place where God has put him. Indeed, between the friends of God and the world there is an antithesis and a rupture. What the one chooses, the other rejects. Otherwise there would no longer be two camps, but only one: the world." - Père Jérôme, Écrits monastiques

In this fascinating autobiographical interview, one of the most prominent and outspoken Catholic Cardinals gives witness to his Christian faith and comments on many current controversial issues. 

The mission of the Church, the joy of the gospel, the “heresy of activism”, and the definition of marriage are among the topics he discusses with wisdom and eloquence.

Robert Cardinal Sarah grew up in Guinea, West Africa. Inspired by the missionary priests who made great sacrifices to bring the Faith to their remote village, his parents became Catholics. Robert discerned a call to the priesthood and entered the seminary at a young age, but due to the oppression of the Church by the government of Guinea, he continued his education outside of his homeland. He studied in France and nearby Senegal. Later he obtained a licentiate in theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome, followed by a licentiate in Sacred Scripture at the Studium Biblicum Franciscanum of Jerusalem.

At the age of thirty-four he became the youngest Bishop in the Catholic Church when John Paul II appointed him the Archbishop of Conakry, Guinea, in 1979. 

His predecessor had been imprisoned by the Communist government for several years, and when Archbishop Sarah was targeted for assassination John Paul II called him to Rome to be Secretary of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples. 

God or Nothing (2015, Dieu ou rien: Entretien sur la foi) is translated from the French by Michael J Miller.

About the authors: Robert Cardinal Sarah was born in Guinea, West Africa. Made an Archbishop by Pope John Paul II and a Cardinal by Pope Benedict XVI, he was named the Prefect of the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments by Pope Francis in 2014. He is the author of The Cardinal Sarah Book Trilogy: God or Nothing (2015); The Power of Silence (2016); and The Day Is Now Far Spent (2019). He is also the author of From the Depths of Our Hearts: Priesthood, Celibacy and the Crisis of the Catholic Church (2020) in collaboration with Pope Benedict XVI; Couples, Awaken Your Love (2021); and Pour l'éternité: Méditations sur la figure du prêtre (2021, For Eternity: Meditations on the Figure of the Priest).

Nicolas Diat is a French journalist and author. His latest book is A Time to Die: Monks on the Threshold of Eternal Life. Nicolas Diat is a French journalist and author who has collaborated with Cardinal Robert Sarah on God or Nothing, The Power of Silence and The Day Is Now Far Spent.

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St Gerard Majella: Your Way To Heaven by Gerard Eaton

Paperback: The soul, which is the infinity of man which every person has within them, is the place where God is and yet, ready to be found. The course St Gerard Majella set on uncharted waters of human frailty were his Resolutions, a pact between himself and God. 

His first resolution was total conformity to the will of God and his total obedience to his superiors. We often make resolutions and break them; Gerard made them and kept them. 

He found the will of God as a tailor, a gardener, a sacristan and a doorkeeper. 

He wore the coat of obedience exactly and absolutely and, through his penances and prayers, a soul committed to God gradually emerged. 

There followed the great virtues of Faith, Hope and Charity. Faith, displayed by the marvellous miracles he won from God; Hope, in the miraculous counsel he gave to men and women; and Charity in his commitment to poor and suffering souls.

St Gerard Majella: Your Way to Heaven is published by ST PAULS Publishing UK in 2020.

About the author: Gerard Eaton was educated at Stonyhurst College and commissioned into the Army from Sandhurst. He left the Army to try a vocation to the priesthood, but left St Edmonds after two years Philosophy. Married to Imelda, he has two sons and three daughters. Now retired, he is president of a charity for homeless young people.

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