The history of the Catholic Church is much more than just a sidebar to the history of the world for the past two thousand years. The history of the world has been shaped by the Church and the attacks against the Church. Civilization spread with Christian evangelization. Learning survived barbarian rampages through the offices of the monasteries. Art and music flourished under the patronage of the Church. Empires were built on the foundation of Christendom. European nations thrived when Islam was thawarted by united forces of Christendom. Political alliances were made to defend or to subdue the Church and its popes. The face of the western world was changed through the Protestant Revolt with its subsequent wars and Henry VIII's declaring himself the head of the Church in England.  Evangelization spurred exploration and colonization of the New World. The twientieth century saw the great evils of Nazism and communism focus much of their venom on attempting to destroy the Church.

Fr. John Laux's Church History is our favorite text on this subject. It is thorough and very interestingly written.  Each chapter contains a famous writing of the era which sheds light upon the Church's endeavors of that time. Unfortunately since the book was written in the 1940's the most recent sixty years of turmoil in the Church are not recounted.  The Catholic Church: The First 2000 Years, however, brings us up to date although the major emphasis is not on the most recent years.The Rhine Flows into the Tiber: A History of Vatican II is an excellent introduction to the turbulent years of the Council..Pontiffs: Popes Who Shaped History