Traditionalist take on "Pierced By A Sword"?

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Peter_J

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Spoilers alert!

I’m curious what Traditionalists think of the novel “Pierced By A Sword”? The reason I ask is that in the novel, a situation arises in which the man who generally believed to be the Pope, actually isn’t. (The real Pope is believed to be dead, so a new “Pope” is elected.)
 
This book was absolutely instrumental in my becoming a very serious Catholic. I suppose if I had to label myself I would wear the label of Traditionalist - I had no problem with a fictional plot line such as this.

I love this book - I dreamed for years of being surrounded by good solid Catholic friends as these characters are, and living my life so fully embraced by my Faith. My ex told me I lived in a fairy tale world and such situations just don’t happen. Well ------ I’m so very happy to say that I proved him wrong. 😃 I live a wonderful Faith filled life now, I have an amazing Faithful Catholic husband and friends, and even my own father has come back to the Faith in such a way that I never imagined.

I prayed for years over this book - it may seem silly, but it was a picture of how I wanted to live my life from a relationships and Faith perspective. God heard my prayers and has blessed me abundantly.

Yep - I’m a Pierced By a Sword fan you could say. 👍

~Liza
 
I just got the book so started it, it does read fast. That is ok you can spoil it for me as I read along. I will borrow it to my family.
 
I read Pierced by the Sword several years ago. While the story line was interesting, I don’t think that with one or two exceptions, I have ever known any Catholics who might have been stand-ins for the main characters.
I recently read a novel by a Jerome German called “One Like US.” Its kind of a Science Fiction story, but well laced with believable Catholic characters and Catholic teachings. In my opinion quite well done. I bought it from Amazon.com in soft cover. 🙂
 
rwoehmke said:
I read Pierced by the Sword several years ago. While the story line was interesting, I don’t think that with one or two exceptions, I have ever known any Catholics who might have been stand-ins for the main characters.
I recently read a novel by a Jerome German called “One Like US.” Its kind of a Science Fiction story, but well laced with believable Catholic characters and Catholic teachings. In my opinion quite well done. I bought it from Amazon.com in soft cover. 🙂
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it sounds interesting. Thanks for the recommendation.
 
I love Liza’s comments! Yes, it would be wonderful to live a Catholic life surrounded by people such as the characters in the book. I read it years ago and “could hardly put it down”. Sure, it’s fiction, but it’s fascinating and thought provoking. (I had previously read Peretti’s “This Present Darkness”, which made the invisible spiritual activity around us so real.)
 
If by “Traditionalist” you mean believe everything in the CCC and follow it to the best of my abilities given my fallen, sinful nature, then I am a “Traditionalist” who loved this book. I am not sure of the true meaning of “Traditionalist” so I am not trying to be a smarty pants, I promise. I am reading House of Gold right now and decided to take a quick break and jump on here. I have been yearning for companionship of other Catholics who desire to attend daily mass and talk about faith since reading this book. I am only attending daily mass on Saturday right now due to poor planning. I hate that I am usually the “baby” of the congregation. I dream of getting a group of us together and attending together and then going to have coffee and talk about the great classic Catholic book we are all reading. Silly, huh? I have one friend who loved the book too. She and another friend of hers are ordering a Scott Hahn Bible study and if we can work out he schedule, we may all meet to do this together. I pray it works out. Thanks to Bud McFarlane for this wonderful series of novels.
 
Glad to see my original thread is generating some discussion. I had asked about this book once before, several years ago, an don’t think I got many responses at all.

By the way–does the fact that Bud MacFarlane has divorced and sought an annulment since writing his novels mar for traditionalist Roman Catholics the stories he has written? And does anyone know what has since become of Bud MacFarlane–since his divorce he seems to have taken a low profile.
 
I haven’t read the book, but it sounds intriguing, so I might. 🙂

I personally don’t long for new Catholic friends per se–not that I’d chase any away. But I do long to see my existing Catholic friends and family continue grow and become more passionate about their faith.

Yeesh, Christ and His Church are all I can think about, lol!!! OK, I admit it!!! 🙂 So for me it’s a matter of not veering off to the extreme of becoming the religious zealot with family and friends, but rather knowing just how far I can push it in order to challenge my loved ones to go a little further into their Faith, ya know?
 
flameburns623 said:
Glad to see my original thread is generating some discussion. I had asked about this book once before, several years ago, an don’t think I got many responses at all.

By the way–does the fact that Bud MacFarlane has divorced and sought an annulment since writing his novels mar for traditionalist Roman Catholics the stories he has written? And does anyone know what has since become of Bud MacFarlane–since his divorce he seems to have taken a low profile.
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WOW!! Are you kidding me?! When did this happen??
 
flameburns623 said:
Glad to see my original thread is generating some discussion. I had asked about this book once before, several years ago, an don’t think I got many responses at all.

By the way–does the fact that Bud MacFarlane has divorced and sought an annulment since writing his novels mar for traditionalist Roman Catholics the stories he has written? And does anyone know what has since become of Bud MacFarlane–since his divorce he seems to have taken a low profile.
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My husband made me aware of this and it is disturbing. House of Gold is about the Millenium bug and from what my husband has read, Bud McFarlane was one of the people who thought the worse could happen. I wonder what impact this had on his family. His last book was published in 1999. His wife does not want the divorce and has web site about this. This is all speculation and hearsay, so please do not quote me.
 
I read the book years ago. It made me want to run to confession!

While the story line was interesting, I didn’t think the writing was all that good.
 
flameburns623 said:
By the way–does the fact that Bud MacFarlane has divorced and sought an annulment since writing his novels mar for traditionalist Roman Catholics the stories he has written? And does anyone know what has since become of Bud MacFarlane–since his divorce he seems to have taken a low profile.
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From what I remember, Bud MacFarlane is one of the founding members (or founders I think) of the Militia Immaculata chapter at the University of Notre Dame (which is where I also made my consecration to Our Lady). In a meeting this past school year Father O’Connor, the priest who helped found the MI at Notre Dame and one who knew Bud very well, mentioned his divorce and merely asked us to pray for him.

I think that’s what we should all do. Perhaps Bud is going through a much more difficult time than we can ever imagine. I don’t condone divorce in anyway - I just think our prayers are certainly needed! :gopray2: He is a man who is highly devoted to the Blessed Mother so if enough of us are praying for him she can’t ignore us! :yup:
 
Ad_Deum said:
In a meeting this past school year Father O’Connor, the priest who helped found the MI at Notre Dame and one who knew Bud very well, mentioned his divorce and merely asked us to pray for him.

I think that’s what we should all do.
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Yes, good advice. In fact, good advice in any such situation, regardless of whether the person in question is a popular author, or the founder of a chapter of something.
 
Peter_J said:
Spoilers alert!

I’m curious what Traditionalists think of the novel “Pierced By A Sword”? The reason I ask is that in the novel, a situation arises in which the man who generally believed to be the Pope, actually isn’t. (The real Pope is believed to be dead, so a new “Pope” is elected.)
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I read all three and I liked them a lot. I do consider myself a traditionalist Catholic
 
Several posts in this thread seem to indicate that their are people out there who have an interest in their Church beyond Sunday Mass and daily prayer; a longing for someone to talk to face to face about Faith things. I will start a thread titled “Longing for Dialogue” rather than hijack this one. 🙂
 
JPUSC said:
WOW!! Are you kidding me?! When did this happen??
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Several years ago now. You can get a pretty good feel for what happened doing a search and looking at the pro-marriage site Mary’s Advocates which was created for/with Bai’s cooperation.

Speaking as someone who had to use the legal system to be able to even see my kids after my ex left (and wound up with custody), based only on how the civil legal proceedings were premeditated, initiated, and pushed to the maximum possible advantage by Bud, I lost all respect for him.

Further, in a blow to thier editorial credibility, CatholiCity deleted most of the supportive articles Bud had written about homeschooling or expressing what a capable parent Bai was (going years back in the purge), presumably because those article were a liability in his legal efforts to paint Bai as an unfit mother). CatholiCity has also given unreasonably evasive answers as to what exactly his current role is in the management of that resource and its content.
 
Ray_Scheel said:
Several years ago now. You can get a pretty good feel for what happened doing a search and looking at the pro-marriage site Mary’s Advocates which was created for/with Bai’s cooperation.
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Whoa!

I’m no expert on their situation; but the impression I’m getting from that website (and from what you posted) is that Bud (the one who wanted the divorce in the first place) got custody of the kids.

Am I just jumping to a false conclusion here?
 
Yes, because Bai fought his push for the older kids to be put in public school, Bud got custody of them, including their then ~1y.o. who was still nursing.

As a clarification to my earlier post, I was the one who wound up with custody of my kids once the courts got involved, but I took the minimum legal action possible to try to preserve what I could of stability and familiar surrounding in our kids lifestyles and pursued reconciliation far beyond the point anyone else considered reasonable. In comparison, from what I have seen of the civil proceedings and other hints about this case, in looks like Bud went out of his way to destroy any semblance of the life Bai and the kids had before he left.
 
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