Envoy finally gets a piece of the pie (for the second straight year).

Fiction 30: "Pope Pius XII was silent in the face of Nazi atrocities against the Jews during World War II, and that silence led to the deaths of many innocent people. If he had exercised his moral leadership and denounced Hitler, many lives would have been saved." Sorry to disappoint the foes of Pius XII, but the facts show otherwise.

I bring you tidings of great joy! Envoy Magazine won six awards at the 1999 Catholic Press Association awards competition, including the coveted 1st Place in the "General Interest Magazine" category. It was the second consecutive year that Envoy has taken top honors in this competitive category.

We also received first place honors in three other highly competitive magazine categories, including "Best Body of Work by an Individual" (awarded to Kinsey Caruth, Envoy’s creative director — go, Kinsey!), "Best Magazine Short Story" (awarded to author Michael O’Brien for his article "Three Views of the Future"), and "Best Special Issue" (awarded for our 1997-1998 Anniversary Double Issue). Envoy also dominated the "Best Illustration for a Magazine" category, taking second and third place for two different illustrations. New Covenant magazine won first place in that category (Go, New Covenant!).

It’s an honor to be recognized this way by our industry peers. There are many worthy and well-produced Catholic magazines who are in friendly competition with us for these CPA awards, so we’re pleased and grateful for the recognition and encouragement the Catholic Press Association has given Envoy. As you may recall, we also carried off several top honors in last year’s CPA awards.

If nothing else, these CPA awards are an added incentive for all of us on the Envoy team to work harder to make the magazine better and more enjoyable. The ultimate reward, though, comes from you, our reader. Knowing that you enjoy the magazine and are being helped by it as you grow in your love for Christ and knowledge of the Catholic Faith is incentive enough. We do this for you. Thanks for being an Envoy reader!

Every day I write the book

Many people have asked when my new book, Pope Fiction: Answers to 30 Myths and Misconceptions About the Papacy, will be available. The answer, I’m happy to say, is "soon." We hope to have it back from the printer and available to send you in late July.

My main focus is editing Envoy Magazine, so it was often difficult to find an extended block of time to sit down and write Pope Fiction. But even so, the manuscript took shape gradually, a process of working on it a little each day, followed by a burst of writing as the final draft was being finished up. There’s nothing like seeing the finish line in sight. And now we’ve crossed that line, and the book is safely in the hands of the typesetters.

Here are a few of the anti-papal arguments Pope Fiction addresses:

Fiction 4: In Galatians 2:11-14, Paul recounts a time when he publicly rebuked Peter for false teaching. If Peter were the pope, he would have been preserved from error and Paul would never have had the authority to rebuke him.

Fiction 6: In Revelation, the Whore of Babylon is described as the city that sits on "seven hills" (Revelation 17:9). The seven-hilled city is obviously Rome, headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church. It’s clear then, that the Whore is Catholicism!

Fiction 23: The Catholic Church is hypocritical. Popes, over the centuries, profited handsomely from slavery. Popes owned, bought and sold slaves, and condoned slavery, especially once European explorers "discovered" and began the wholesale plundering of the New World and its indigenous peoples.

Fiction 28: The papacy is vacant, and Pope John Paul II is an impostor. That’s what the sedavacantist (i.e. The empty chair) crowd of disaffected Catholics will have you believe. But don’t you believe it.

Fiction 30: Pope Pius XII was silent in the face of Nazi atrocities against the Jews during World War II, and that silence led to the deaths of many innocent people. If he, as pope, had exercised his moral leadership and denounced Hitler, many lives would have been saved. Sorry to disappoint the foes of Pius XII (and they are legion these days), but the facts show otherwise, as I show in the book.

All these and 25 other arguments that mythed the mark are answered in Pope Fiction. Be the first one on your block to get a copy — call Basilica Press at 888-396-2339.

Listen to what the man said

And for some related encouraging news from Great Britain. Under the headline "Churches agree Pope has overall authority," Oliver Poole wrote recently in the London Telegraph:

"The Pope was recognized as the overall authority in the Christian world by an Anglican and Roman Catholic commission yesterday which described him as a ‘gift to be received by all the Churches.’

"Disagreement about the extent of the Pope’s authority was one of the main causes of the English Reformation in the 16th century, and has been a constant stumbling block to the two Churches reuniting. However, yesterday’s statement, released at Lambeth Palace — which is not binding — accepted that if a new united Church was created it would be the Bishop of Rome who would exercise a universal primacy. Dr. George Carey, the Archbishop of Canterbury . . . said: ‘In a world torn apart by violence and division, Christians need urgently to be able to speak with a common voice, confident of the authority of the gospel of peace.’

"The 43-page document, The Gift of Authority, has been produced by the 18-member Anglican-Roman Catholic International Commission, after five years of debate. The commission concluded that the Bishop of Rome had a ‘specific ministry concerning the discernment of truth’ and accepted that only the Pope had the moral authority to unite the various Christian denominations. However, it did not go as far as to confirm the Pope’s infallibility. Instead, it said: ‘This form of authoritative teaching has no stronger guarantee from the Holy Spirit than have the solemn definition of ecumenical councils.’ The document does not specifically address the issues that divide the two Churches, such as the place of the Virgin Mary and women’s ministry . . .

"The proposals are expected to shock many Anglicans, particularly on the evangelical wing of the Church, which remains wary of an extension of the bishop of Rome’s authority. Mark Birchall, a member of the Church of England Evangelical council, said: ‘It speaks as if the Bishop of Rome has always been on the side of the angels while it is well known that for several centuries past the Bishop of Rome was certainly not.’ . . . The Rt. Rev. Mark Santer, the bishop of Birmingham and co-chairman of the body, said: ‘This is a serious piece of theological work and to understand our conclusions you have to follow how we got there. One faith was given by Christ and his apostles and what we are trying to do is rediscover that one common faith.’ The Rt. Rev. Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, Bishop of Arundel and Brighton and the other co-chairman, added: ‘The primacy of the Pope is a gift to be shared.’"

Maybe individual popes haven’t been personally on the side of the angels but, as Pope Fiction explains, bad popes notwithstanding, the angels have always been on the side of the papacy. And now, even Anglican clergymen are saying it publicly.

The wonder of it all, baby.

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