THE CATHOLIC CHURCH IN THE MODERN AGE

The "modern age" in this course's title is modern in the historical sense. While he eventually gets to the present, Professor Madden begins his fourteen-lecture series about four hundred years ago. He examines the church as a social and political institution, usually by discussing an individual social movement and how the church responded to it. Lecture 3, for example, shows how the church adapted to the age of the absolute monarch. While the lectures are all well organized, most of the earlier lectures are delivered with little emotional involvement. It's only in the last few lectures, when he's discussing modern events and figures like Vatican II and John Paul II, that Madden seems to connect emotionally with his subject matter. G.T.B. © AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine [Published: JUNE 2008]