Creation is more than an accident of dead matter. It's a romance. It has purpose. It sings of the Living God. It bears his signature.

We're Catholics before we're Democrats. We're Catholics before we're Republicans. We're even Catholics before we're Americans, because we know that God has a demand on us prior to any government demand on us. And this has been the story of the martyrs through the centuries.

I want to stress again the importance of really living what we claim to believe. That needs to be a priority-not just in our personal and family lives but in our churches, our political choices, our business dealings, our treatment of the poor in other words, in everything we do.

Epic: A Journey Through Church History fills an urgent need for adult Catholics to recover their history as a believing community, debunk false criticisms of their Church, and understand the Christian underpinnings of the modern world. This is a vivid, thorough and engaging program. I heartily recommend it.