Catholic Resources on the Internet

The Last Crusade, Spain 1963

by Warrert H. Carroll, Christendom Press
£9.75, available from St Paul's Publications (0171 937 9591)

For many years I have wished that someone could explain the complicated and often contradictory accounts one hears of the Spanish Civil War. This is admirably done in The Last Crusade by Prof Warren Carroll, founder and first president of Christendom College, Virginia. This account carefully chronicles the onslaught against the Church, which claimed the lives of 11 bishops, 6,549 priests and 283 nuns. This greatest clerical blood letting since Roman times exceeds even the totals of the French Revolution and the Communist Revolution in Russia. Despite the fact that we live in the same century this is in danger of being completely forgotten. Do we realize that over 50% of Spanish churches were destroyed? This moving account is so powerful that many times I just had to stop and take a breath. Most poignant is the account of the immortal defence of the Alcazar and the citadel occupied by 1800 Loyalists in Republican-held Toledo. For months these men, women and children held out against the blockade of food and supplies, air raids from above and dynamite from below. The knowledge of these warriors and saints of our own century (many recently beatified) is imperative for young Catholics who face a more subtle and equally insidious enemy at the dawn of the 3rd Millennium. Read The Last Crusade and the courage of so many Catholics will move and inspire you in this most unforgettable testimony.

Fr Christopher Basden
St Bede's
Clapham