THE GREAT REFORMER: Francis and the Making of a Radical Pope

This biography of Pope Francis will describe how this revolutionary thinker became who he is, and how he will use the power of his position to challenge and redirect one of the world's most formidable religions.

Since his surprise appointment in March of 2013, Pope Francis has emerged as the most talked-about and most revolutionary pope in living memory. He has become a subject of fascination, conversation, and headlines not only to the 1.2 billion Catholics in the world, but to virtually everyone. An expansive and deeply contextual work, at its heart this book is about the intersection of faith and politics—the tension between the pope's innovative vision for the Church and the obstacles he faces in an institution still strongly defined by its conservative past. Based on extensive interviews in Argentina and years of study of the Catholic Church, Ivereigh tells the story not only of Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the remarkable man whose background and total commitment to the discernment of God's will transformed him into Pope Francis—but the story of why the Catholic Church chose him as their leader. With the Francis Revolution just beginning, this biography will provide never-before-explained context on how one man's ambitious program began—and how it will likely end—through an investigation of Francis's youth growing up in Buenos Aires and the dramatic events during the Perón era that shaped his beliefs; his ongoing conflicts and disillusionment with the ensuing doctrines of an authoritarian and militaristic government in the 1970s; how his Jesuit training in Argentina and Chile gave him a unique understanding and advocacy for a "Church of the Poor"; and his rise from Cardinal to the papacy. Though there have been a few "insta-biographies" of Pope Francis, no one has gone as far contextually as Ivereigh will to dig into Francis's past in Argentina, not only to explain why he is who he is, but to predict who he will be in the coming years. Austin Ivereigh has been immersed in the study of Catholicism for his entire career and wrote his master's thesis on "Catholicism & Politics in Argentina." With his erudite commentary on British TV and his institutional knowledge of the subject, there's no one better qualified to write this book. Austen Ivereigh is a British writer, journalist, and commentator on religious and political affairs who holds a PhD from Oxford University. His work appears regularly in the Jesuit magazine America and in many other periodicals. He is well known on British media, especially on the BBC, Sky, ITV and Al-Jazeera, as a Catholic commentator.