Pope Francis’ U.S. Visit -- 2015

A Guide For The Curious

By: Anura Guruge

Narrated by: Virtual Voice

Length: 6 hrs and 55 mins

Publisher's summary

This is a book for those, whether Catholic or not, who would like to know much more about Pope Francis’ September 2015 visit to the U.S., than they can readily find on the Web or can gleam from TV reports. This is a book as the title claims for ‘the curious’. It is for those that will enjoy learning about the little known, but intriguing, aspects of this papal trip and how it relates to the other nine papal visits to the U.S. by three different popes (and for that matter three future-popes). It is a book that goes way beyond just listing the pope’s itinerary. It is a book that fills in the gaps left in Web posts, newspaper articles and media reports. A search of the Web will show that it is difficult, if not impossible, to actually find any accounts as to where Pope Francis will be staying while he is in Washington D.C., New York City and Philadelphia. Well, you can find this information in Chapter I of this book, as well as background as to their history and other popes who have stayed there. It will even talk about a ‘dark connection’ that Pope Francis will confront, from his days in Argentina, while residing in D.C. That is an insight unlikely to be found anywhere else. And that basically was the premise for this (fairly long and detailed) book, viz. to share insights as well as trivia about this papal trip with those that yearn for facts, numbers, perspectives, statistics and background. This book puts Pope Francis’ trip to the U.S. in context, talks about the ‘firsts’, looks at it against the backdrop of prior papal visits and even includes a guide on how to read what the pope is saying. This is Anura Guruge’s 10th book on popes (all of them available on Amazon, worldwide). As the reviews for these books tend to mention a hallmark of his work is “unusual and remarkable research”. And that is also true when it comes to this book. Considerable research went into its creation. That is why it will tell you why Pope John Paul II’s very first words upon arriving in Washington D.C., in 1979, for his very first visit to the Nation’s Capital had to do with ‘two scrambled eggs’. Of late the author has been writing a series of “101 Facts & Trivia” books. This book in many ways is also a “101 Facts & Trivia” book, though it does not say so in the title. In addition to the facts, and there certainly will be more than 101 of those, forty items of trivia are explicitly included – some of it to do with Catholicism in the U.S. The book consists of 5 chapters: i.e., I. The Itinerary, II. Significance of Trip, III. Pope Francis – The Biography, IV. Catholicism in the U.S.A. & V. Trying To Read Pope Francis. This book, as with all of his other books on Amazon, offers the free, ‘Look Inside’ feature. Readers are encouraged to make use of this capability to peruse some of the book. That should show the nature and quality (not to mention the quantity) of the information that can be found in this book – for example the composition of the pope’s entourage. During the pope’s visit a tall, lean priest, with a soft, kindly face, will appear to be glued to the pope’s elbow, often softly whispering in the pope’s ear. Chapter I of this book will tell you who he is, his background and what his function is relative to the pope. In Chapter III you will learn why the pope wears the shoes he does and the type of pet he had while a seminarian. The bottom line is that this is a book, like his other 9 papal books, for those that crave value-added information about popes and papal history. In his other books Anura Guruge has tackled the names of the popes, papal conclaves, the College of Cardinals, Ecumenical Councils and the fascinating life of Pope John XXIII. In this book he turns his attention to papal visits to the U.S. using Pope Francis’ trip as the focal point. The Kindle version has less images than the printed version. The formatting is also different, the printed version tightly formatted per the author's 'trademark' style.