Skip to content

Why Priests?: A Failed Tradition

Why Priests?: A Failed Tradition Paperback - 2013

by Wills, Garry

  • Used
  • very good
  • Paperback

Description

Paperback. Very Good.
Used - Very Good
NZ$10.09
NZ$18.05 Shipping to USA
Standard delivery: 7 to 40 days
More Shipping Options
Ships from World of Books Ltd (West Sussex, United Kingdom)
The BIBLIO Guarantee | Ask Seller a Question

Details

  • Title Why Priests?: A Failed Tradition
  • Author Wills, Garry
  • Binding Paperback
  • Edition 1st
  • Condition Used - Very Good
  • Pages 320
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Viking, USA
  • Date 2013-02-12
  • Bookseller's Inventory # GOR005288749
  • ISBN 9780670024872 / 0670024872
  • Weight 1.1 lbs (0.50 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.9 x 6.1 x 1.1 in (22.61 x 15.49 x 2.79 cm)
  • Library of Congress subjects Catholic Church - Doctrines, Priests
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 2012037034
  • Dewey Decimal Code 262.14

About World of Books Ltd West Sussex, United Kingdom

Biblio member since 2007
Seller rating: This seller has earned a 2 of 5 Stars rating from Biblio customers.

In 2002, World of Books Group was founded on an ethos to do good, protect the planet and support charities by enabling more goods to be reused. Since then, we've grown into to a global company pioneering the circular economy. Today, we drive the circular economy through three re-commerce brands: - Wob: Through Wob, we sell. We provide affordable, preloved books and media to customers all over the world. A book leaves our collection of over seven million titles and begins a new chapter every two seconds, enabling more goods to be reused. - Ziffit: Through Ziffit, we buy. We give people around the world the opportunity to contribute to the circular economy, earn money and protect the planet, by trading their unwanted books and media. - Shopiago: Through Shopiago, we help others. By sharing the technology that has grown World of Books Group into the business it is today, we're helping charities increase revenue and reduce waste through re-commerce.

Terms of Sale:

If you are not completely satisfied with your purchase for any reason, simply email customerservice@worldofbooks.com and we will quickly resolve any issues you may have. If you have any other queries about your order, please email customerservice@worldofbooks.com. Our goal is to deliver to our customers the best possible service and we hope your experience of dealing with us lives up to our promise. If for whatever reason we fail to meet your expectations then please let us know.

Browse books from World of Books Ltd

Summary

In his most provocative book yet, Pulitzer Prize­–winner Garry Wills asks the radical question: Why do we need priests?

Bestselling author of Papal Sin and Why I Am a Catholic, Garry Wills spent five years as a young man at a Jesuit seminary and nearly became a priest himself. But after a lifetime of study and reflection, he now poses some challenging questions: Why do we need priests at all? Why did the priesthood arise in a religion that began without it and opposed it? Would Christianity be stronger without the priesthood, as it was at its outset?

Meticulously researched, persuasively argued, and certain to spark debate, Why Priests? asserts that the anonymous Letter to Hebrews, a late addition to the New Testament canon, helped inject the priesthood into a Christianity where it did not exist, along with such concomitants as belief in an apostolic succession, the real presence in the Eucharist, the sacrificial interpretation of the Mass, and the ransom theory of redemption. But Wills does not expect the priesthood to fade entirely away. He just reminds us that Christianity did without it in the time of Peter and Paul with notable success.

Wills concludes with a powerful statement of his own beliefs in a book that will appeal to believers and nonbelievers alike and stand for years to come as a towering achievement.


From the publisher

Garry Wills has written many acclaimed and bestselling works, including What Jesus Meant, Papal Sin, and Why I Am a Catholic. His books have received many awards, including the Pulitzer Prize. A professor of history emeritus at Northwestern University, Wills is a frequent contributor to The New York Review of Books and other publications. He lives in Evanston, Illinois.

Categories

Media reviews

A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

Praise for Why Priests? by Garry Wills:
 
“Wills draws on his expertise in classical languages and his wide reading in ecclesiastical history to argue that the Catholic/Orthodox priesthood has been one long mistake.”
—The Washington Post

“Wills sets out to persuade his fellow-Catholics that the priesthood is both unnecessary and un-Christian. . . . Wills is not attempting to break with the Church or to dismantle it. Rather, he wants to assure the faithful that they can get by without priests. ‘If we need fellowship in belief,’ he writes, ‘we have each other.’”
—The New Yorker

“How. . .did priests become dominant and then essential in Catholic Christianity? And why, Wills asks, in this provocative [and] historically rich . . . book, does the Vatican continue to sustain such falsehoods? . . . Wills’s demolition of the many myths surrounding the origins of priestly status and function is in itself crucially informative and enlightening.”
—The New Republic 

“Pulitzer Prize winner Wills, a venerable voice on church history, thought and practice, provides a stunning critique of the Roman Catholic priesthood.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred)

“Using his linguistic skills and his impressive command of both secondary literature and patristic sources, Wills raises doubts aplenty about ‘the Melchizedek myth,’ and the priestly claims for Jesus in the ‘idiosyncratic’ Epistle to the Hebrews … His final chapter is a model of elegant simplicity, a contrast (intended or not) to the flummery often associated with his own church … ‘There is one God, and Jesus is one of his prophets,’ Wills concludes, ‘and I am one of his millions of followers.’ For those millions, scattered across time and space, that’s an affirmation worthy of celebration.”
—The New York Times Book Review

“Do we really need Catholic Priests? Wills, Pulitzer Prize winner and author of Why I Am a Catholic, dares to pose this controversial question[.] . . . One cannot help but be impressed with this brilliant work written by a scholar whose love for the Church compels him to make it better.”
—Publishers Weekly

“Clearly a thought-provoker destined to inspire debate.”
—Library Journal

“Wills’s . . . position is . . . original and insightful . . . [and his] task is a worthy one, namely to bring the institution of the priesthood under the gaze of historical and theological scrutiny. . . . Through his erudite scholarship and his compelling argumentation Wills has made an important contribution to this field of study and, in the process, has written a book that is thoroughly absorbing and engaging.”
—Irish Times
 
“[Wills] combin[es] historical and literary analysis with journalistic observations on the present Catholic church. . . . Why Priests? should be required of all seminarians.”
—National Catholic Reporter


 


 




 

About the author

Garry Wills has written many acclaimed and bestselling works, including "What Jesus Meant," "Papal Sin," and "Why I Am a Catholic." His books have received many awards, including the Pulitzer Prize. A professor of history emeritus at Northwestern University, Wills is a frequent contributor to "The New York Review of Books "and other publications. He lives in Evanston, Illinois.

Hang on… we’re fetching the requested page.