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The Wedding of Magdeburg

The Wedding of Magdeburg is no ordinary wedding. Germany, 1631: a world turned upside down by the Reformation. In the Free Imperial City of Magdeburg, one young bride is jilted on the eve of her nuptials, but as she waits for her groom to return, an even darker cloud looms: the Holy Roman Empire stands at the gates, ready to take the Protestant city as its own political “bride”. Will Magdeburg accept the proposal for the sake of peace, or will she rebel—and risk losing the battle altogether?

This masterpiece by Nobel Prize nominee Gertrud von le Fort, elegantly translated by Chase Faucheux, has never before appeared in English. At once a love story, a political thriller, and a historical study of war in the seventeenth century, it follows the Sack of Magdeburg, the tragic battle now considered one of the greatest massacres of the Thirty Years’ War.

Le Fort, acclaimed author of The Song at the Scaffold, takes a magnifying glass to the line that runs through every human heart—whether Protestant or Catholic, winning or losing, conquered or conquering. How do we find hope in the midst of destruction? How do we find freedom in total surrender?

With wisdom, riveting storytelling, and incredible psychological subtlety, The Wedding of Magdeburg tabulates the spiritual cost of war and shows how grace can dramatically imbue even the darkest moments of history.

John Henry Newman: A Life Sacrificed

This unparalleled introduction to St. John Henry Newman—mind, heart, soul, and personality—brings the great cardinal to life before our eyes, and with him the charged air of nineteenth-century England. Drawing from his letters, writings, and journal entries with precision and poetic flair, the book is one of Ida Friederike Görres’ masterworks. 

While famous for his brilliance, Cardinal Newman did not hide in an ivory tower. His life was one of risk, sacrifice, and immense charity. His sharp turn to Catholicism rocked the University of Oxford, costing him his friendships, his livelihood, and his identity. Through failures and disappointments, over and over again, Newman let himself be recreated by God. 

This work, in Görres’ words, is a portrait of “the boy, puzzled, who was startled and overwhelmed by God; the active, creative young prophet of his church in crisis; the hermit, who he was and wanted to be all his life; and the fighter, who he was with and against his will: the saint of the Church and the saint of humility, the one perfected in sacrifice”. 

With an in-depth introduction by Ratzinger Prize winner Hanna-Barbara Gerl-Falkovitz, an extensive commentary by translator Jennifer S. Bryson, and a detailed index, the book introduces readers not only to St. John Henry Newman, but to Görres, one of the greatest hagiographers of the twentieth century, whose spiritual writings have only recently been discovered by the English-speaking world.

Click here for a free downloadable Discussion Guide for this title.