Third Edition of "Unpopular Catholic Truths" Now Available

The third edition of my book Unpopular Catholic Truths is now available for $9.50 at Lulu.com publishers at this link. A free preview is available at the publisher site. The link is also in the side margin of the Catholic Analysis blog. The third edition includes an essay on the Pope's book Salt of the Earth, which he wrote as Cardinal Ratzinger. The long section on abortion will be relevant to the upcoming 2008 election.

Although in the past I have called it an apologetics book, I really don't view myself as an apologist. Most apologetic writings I have seen focus on trying to disprove specific arguments by non-Catholics and so have a defensive tone or an excessively polemical and argumentative approach. My own approach is not so much to disprove what non-Catholics believe as to state and describe Catholic teachings and perspectives in a positive, accurate, persuasive, and hopefully original way. I would characterize my own writing as expository Catholic commentary. For these reasons, I prefer the label "Catholic commentator" rather than Catholic apologist. Hence, in the future, I will refer to my books as Catholic commentary.