What are we willing to die for? Michael Walsh restores the dignity of lost concepts like honor, duty, sacrifice and patriotism for our unheroic age in Last Stands...

The Society of Jesus - the Jesuits - is the largest religious order in the Roman Catholic Church. Distinguished by their obedience and their loyalty to the Holy See, they have never, during nearly five hundred years' history, produced a pope until now: Pope Francis is the first Jesuit Pope. Michael Walsh tells the story of the Society through the stories and exploits of its members over five hundred years, from Ignatius of Loyola to Pope Francis himself. He explores the Jesuits' commitment to humanist philosophy, which over the centuries has set it at odds with the Vatican, as well as the hostility towards the Jesuits both on the part of Protestants and also Roman Catholics - a hostility which led one pope to attempt to suppress the Society worldwide towards the end of the eighteenth century. Drawing on the author's extensive inside knowledge, this narrative history traces the Society's founding and growth, its impact on Catholic education, its missions especially in the Far East and Latin America, its progressive theology, its clashes with the Vatican, and the emergence of Jorge Bergoglio, the first Jesuit to become Pope. Finally, it reflects on the Society's present character and contemporary challenges.

In 1914 almost one quarter of the earth's surface was British. When the empire and its allies went to war in 1914 against the Central Powers, history's first global conflict was inevitable. It is the social and cultural reactions to that war and within those distant, often overlooked, societies which is the focus of this volume. From Singapore to Australia, Cyprus to Ireland, India to Iraq and around the rest of the British imperial world, further complexities and interlocking themes are addressed, offering new perspectives on imperial and colonial history and theory, as well as art, music, photography, propaganda, education, pacifism, gender, class, race and diplomacy at the end of the pax Britannica.

From the most basic terms to the structures and practices of the Church, this book offers a plain-speaking introduction to Roman Catholicism. Now in a second edition, it contains new sections on relations with other faiths, coverage of recent controversies in the Church and an expanded section on social teaching. It covers: Roman Catholic beliefs and traditions practices and devotional life - rituals, prayer, mass Church structures and authorities - from Vatican to parish church Church hierarchies and people - from bishops to the laity the role of the Church in society. With a glossary, further reading sections and reference to official documents of the Church, this is the perfect guide for students approaching the study of Roman Catholicism for the first time.

This book argues for a durational cinema that is distinct from slow cinema, and outlines the history of its three main waves: the New York avant-garde of the 1960s, the European art cinema in the years after 1968, and the international cinema of gallery spaces as well as film festivals since the 1990s. Figures studied include Andy Warhol, Ken Jacobs, Chantal Akerman, Marguerite Duras, Claude Lanzmann, James Benning, Kevin Jerome Everson, Lav Diaz, and Wang Bing.Durational cinema is predominantly minimal, but has from the beginning also included a more encompassing or encyclopedic kind of filmmaking. Durational cinema is characteristically representational, and converges on certain topics (the Holocaust, deindustrialization, the experience of the working class and other marginalized people), but has no one meaning, signifying differently at different moments and in different hands. Warhol's durational cinema of subtraction is quite different from Jacobs's durational cinema of social disgust, while Lav Diaz' durational sublime is quite different from Kevin Jerome Everson's unblinking studies of African-American working people.

Much more than a collection of essays by eminent writers, Against the Great Reset is intended to kick off the intellectual resistance to the sweeping restructuring of the western world by globalist elites. In June 2020, prominent business and political leaders gathered for the 50th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, under the rubric of "The Great Reset." In the words of WEF founder Klaus Schwab, the Great Reset is a "unique window of opportunity" afforded by the worldwide COVID-19 panic to build "a new social contract" ushering in a utopian era of economic, social, and environmental justice. But beneath their lofty and inspiring words, what are their actual plans? In this timely and necessary book, Michael Walsh has gathered trenchant critical perspectives on the Great Reset from eighteen eminent writers and journalists from around the world. Victor Davis Hanson places the WEF's prescriptions and goals in historical context and shows how American politicians justify destructive policies. Michael Anton explains the socialist history of woke capitalism. James Poulos looks at how Big Tech acts as informal government censors. John Tierney lays out the lack of accountability for the unjustified panic over the virus. David Goldman confronts the WEF's ideas for a fourth industrial revolution with China's commitment to being the leader of a post-western world. And there are many more. These writers see the goal of the Great Reset as not just a world without racism, disease, economic inequality, or fossil fuels-but rather, a world with no individual autonomy and power in which our betters rig the system for their own purposes. Find out what the Great Resetters ultimately have in store for you, and join the intellectual resistance-before it's too late. Featuring Essays by: Michael Anton Salvatore Babones Conrad Black Jeremy Black Angelo Codevilla Janice Fiamengo Richard Fernandez David P. Goldman Victor Davis Hanson Martin Hutchinson Roger Kimball Alberto Mingardi Douglas Murray James Poulos Harry Stein John Tierney Michael Walsh

The saga of The Silver Coin continues as the cursed token is spent again and again. First, a haunted arcade cabinet twists the dreams of a young boy. Then, the coin finds its way to a street magician who's lost his way amongst the opulence of a desperate city. Follow the money-across decades, centuries-and the nature of a curse will be revealed. Eisner-winning artist MICHAEL WALSH (Star Wars, Black Hammer/Justice League) teams with all-star collaborators JOSH WILLIAMSON (NAILBITER, BATMAN/SUPERMAN), RAM V (SWAMP THING, BLUE IN GREEN), MATTHEW ROSENBERG (HAWKEYE, 4 KIDS WALK INTO A BANK), and VITA AYALA (NEW MUTANTS, THE WILDS) on this new ongoing horror anthology series for mature readers. Collects THE SILVER COIN #6-10

This book is an interdisciplinary exploration of the intertwining impact of violent trauma, culture, and power through case studies of two ministries serving in different demographic contexts within the United States. Mass shootings continue to rise in the United States, including in religious and school contexts, and the U.S. also is ground zero for the now international Black Lives Matter movement. The author shows how all forms of violent trauma impact more than individuals -devastating communal relationships and practices of religious or spiritual meaning-making in the aftermath, and assesses how these impacts differ according to lived experiences with culture and power. Looking at the two ministries, an urban grassroots lay ministry organization that serves surviving family members in the aftermath of homicide, and a denominational ministry that served a church in the aftermath of a political and religiously motivated shooting, the author develops trauma-specific interdisciplinary tools for lived religion studies. "This book powerfully utilizes an intersectional lens to highlight the inter-interconnections to be found for those working in faith communities, as well as mental health. Walsh provides the reader with an opportunity to explore and develop theoretical and practice perspectives that include: race and ethnicity, religion and spirituality, social class and ability, sexual orientation, immigration and refugee status, and explores the impact that oppression and discrimination have on our communities and society. I highly recommend this book for those who are engaged in working to combat domination at the local, national and global levels." - Gary Bailey, Simmons College, USA

China's constitution explicitly refers to its sovereign domain as "sacred territory." Why does an avowedly secular state make such a claim, and what does this suggest about the relations between religion and the nation-state? Focusing primarily on China, Stating the Sacred offers a novel approach to nation-state formation, arguing that its most critical element is how the state sacralizes the nation. Michael J. Walsh explores the religious and political dimensions of Chinese state ideology, making the case that the sacred is a constitutive part of modern China. He examines the structural connection among texts (constitutions, legal codes, national histories), ostensibly universal and normative categories (race, religion, citizenship, freedom, human rights), and territoriality (the integrity of sovereignty and control over resources and people), showing how they are bound together by the sacred. Considering a variety of what he refers to as theopolitical techniques, Walsh argues that nation-states undertake sacralization in order to legitimate the violence of establishing and expanding their sovereignty. Ultimately, territorialization is a form of sacralization, and the foundational role of the sacred makes all nation-states religious states. Stating the Sacred offers new ways of understanding China's approach to legality, control of the populace, religious freedom, human rights, and the structuring of international relations, and it raises existential questions about the fundamental nature of the nation-state.

What is heroism? What are its moral components - altruism, love, self-sacrifice? Why was it once celebrated, and now often dismissed as anachronistic? In this dramatic and readable account of last stands in history - famous or otherwise - Walsh explores the stakes that led men at very different times and places to face overwhelming odds and certain death for the sake of family, home and country. In Last Stands, Walsh writes about battles in which a small group faced overwhelming odds, and all too often died to the last man - battles like Thermopylae, the Ronceveaux Pass, the Alamo, the siege of Malta, Little Big Horn, Stalingrad, Rorke's Drift, and the Warsaw Ghetto - explaining why they were fought, what their ultimate outcome was, and their afterlife in history, myth and culture.

Michael Walsh's poetry collection Creep Love explores a family contending with a complex and ongoing crisis, the aftermath of which creates a shockwave that reverberates through these poems. Stories, half-truths, and lies combine into disturbing fable: A young pregnant woman flees her abusive boyfriend only to discover with terror that he is focused on her younger sister. When her younger sister later gives birth to her abusive ex's other sons, the unsettling presence of the child's father becomes unavoidable, and the family soon forces the first son to become a family secret. We come to find out that the father carries a secret of his own. As tensions rise, attacks within the family escalate and finally culminate in an attempted murder. In Creep Love, Walsh captures the terror of this event, and these poems take us through the surprising outcomes. Near death, rather than floating into light due to hypoxia-a temporary release from the grip of compounding trauma-the speaker sinks into all-encompassing darkness. The anxiety of this moment returns him to his body from the edge of death. These poems give witness to the fallout, demonstrating how love can be charged with something ultimately unknowable.

An anthology of queer nature poetry spanning three centuries.   This anthology amplifies and centers LGBTQIA+ voices and perspectives in a collection of contemporary nature poetry. Showcasing over two hundred queer writers from the nineteenth to the twenty-first century, Queer Nature offers a new context for and expands upon the canon of nature poetry while also offering new lenses through which to view queerness and the natural world.    In the introduction, editor Michael Walsh writes that the anthology is “concerned with poems that speak to and about nature as the term is applied in everyday language to queer and trans bodies and identities . . . Queer Nature remains interested in elements, flora, fauna, habitats, homes, and natural forces—literary aspects of the work that allow queer and trans people to speak within their specific cultural and literary histories of the abnormal, the animal, the elemental, and the unnatural.� The anthology features poets including Elizabeth Bishop, Richard Blanco, Kay Ryan, Jericho Brown, Allen Ginsberg, Natalie Diaz, and June Jordan, as well as emerging voices such as Jari Bradley, Alicia Mountain, Eric Tran, and Jim Whiteside.  

Soldiers stranded in the snowy Alps. The wicked games of a familiar firefighter. A couple struggling through the most difficult year. The Silver Coin passes from one pocket of time to the next. Whoever finds it may feel it's their lucky day. But it can purchase only ruin. Eisner-winning artist MICHAEL WALSH (STAR WARS, BLACK HAMMER/JUSTICE LEAGUE) teams with a new lineup of all-star collaborators, as JAMES TYNION IV (DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH, BATMAN), STEPHANIE PHILLIPS (HARLEY QUINN, THE BUTCHER OF PARIS), JOHNNIE CHRISTMAS (TARTARUS, FIREBUG) and PORNSAK PICHETSHOTE (THE GOOD ASIAN, INFIDEL) join the critically-acclaimed ongoing horror anthology for mature readers. Collects THE SILVER COIN #11-15.

In 1914 almost one quarter of the earth's surface was British. When the empire and its allies went to war in 1914 against the Central Powers, history's first global conflict was inevitable. It is the social and cultural reactions to that war and within those distant, often overlooked, societies which is the focus of this volume. From Singapore to Australia, Cyprus to Ireland, India to Iraq and around the rest of the British imperial world, further complexities and interlocking themes are addressed, offering new perspectives on imperial and colonial history and theory, as well as art, music, photography, propaganda, education, pacifism, gender, class, race and diplomacy at the end of the pax Britannica.

China's constitution explicitly refers to its sovereign domain as "sacred territory." Why does an avowedly secular state make such a claim, and what does this suggest about the relations between religion and the nation-state? Focusing primarily on China, Stating the Sacred offers a novel approach to nation-state formation, arguing that its most critical element is how the state sacralizes the nation. Michael J. Walsh explores the religious and political dimensions of Chinese state ideology, making the case that the sacred is a constitutive part of modern China. He examines the structural connection among texts (constitutions, legal codes, national histories), ostensibly universal and normative categories (race, religion, citizenship, freedom, human rights), and territoriality (the integrity of sovereignty and control over resources and people), showing how they are bound together by the sacred. Considering a variety of what he refers to as theopolitical techniques, Walsh argues that nation-states undertake sacralization in order to legitimate the violence of establishing and expanding their sovereignty. Ultimately, territorialization is a form of sacralization, and the foundational role of the sacred makes all nation-states religious states. Stating the Sacred offers new ways of understanding China's approach to legality, control of the populace, religious freedom, human rights, and the structuring of international relations, and it raises existential questions about the fundamental nature of the nation-state.

From the most basic terms to the structures and practices of the Church, this book offers a plain-speaking introduction to Roman Catholicism. Now in a second edition, it contains new sections on relations with other faiths, coverage of recent controversies in the Church and an expanded section on social teaching. It covers: Roman Catholic beliefs and traditions practices and devotional life - rituals, prayer, mass Church structures and authorities - from Vatican to parish church Church hierarchies and people - from bishops to the laity the role of the Church in society. With a glossary, further reading sections and reference to official documents of the Church, this is the perfect guide for students approaching the study of Roman Catholicism for the first time.

Exiting war explores a particular 1918-20 'moment' in the British Empire's history, between the First World War's armistices of 1918, and the peace treaties of 1919 and 1920. That moment, we argue, was a challenging and transformative time for the Empire. While British authorities successfully answered some of the post-war tests they faced, such as demobilisation, repatriation, and fighting the widespread effects of the Spanish flu, the racial, social, political and economic hallmarks of their imperialism set the scene for a wide range of expressions of loyalties and disloyalties, and anticolonial movements. The book documents and conceptualises this 1918-20 'moment' and its characteristics as a crucial three-year period of transformation for and within the Empire, examining these years for the significant shifts in the imperial relationship that occurred and as laying the foundation for later change in the imperial system. -- .

To refer to the private life of Charles II is to abuse the adjective. His personal life was anything but private. His amorous liaisons were largely conducted in royal palaces surrounded by friends, courtiers and literally hundreds of servants and soldiers. Gossip radiated throughout the kingdom. Charles spent most of his wealth and his intellect on gaining and keeping the company of women, from the lowest sections of society such as the actress Nell Gwyn to the aristocratic Louise de Kerouaille. Some of Charles' women played their part in the affairs of state, colouring the way the nation was run. Don Jordan and Michael Walsh take us inside Charles' palace, where we will meet court favourites, amusing confidants, advisors jockeying for political power, mistresses past and present as well as key figures in his inner circle such as his 'pimpmasters' and his personal pox doctor. The astonishing private life of Charles II reveals much about the man he was and why he lived and ruled as he did. The King's Bed tells the compelling story of a king ruled by his passion.

After the Oates family moves to Newfoundland, a dark creature kidnaps Beth, the youngest child. To find her, Beth's siblings Ben and Lynn venture into a mystical world called the Elphyne. The Oates family moves to their ancestral home in Newfoundland following a pair of tragedies.They arrive at their grandmother's house, where they reunite with their orphaned cousin. Shortly after arriving, Beth, the youngest sibling, is kidnapped by a dark, monstrous creature. Her older siblings set out to find her and bring her back, finding themselves in the Elphyne-a magical world that exists between the ordinary world and the afterlife, where the imagination of children has the power to shape everything around them. The Oates, along with some new allies, must travel through the Elphyne to confront The Dark King, a mysterious being whose arrival has started to corrupt the Elphyne in frightening and unexpected ways. For Ages 10+

White Cargo is the forgotten story of the thousands of Britons who lived and died in bondage in Britain's American colonies. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, more than 300,000 white people were shipped to America as slaves. Urchins were swept up from London's streets to labor in the tobacco fields, where life expectancy was no more than two years. Brothels were raided to provide breeders for Virginia. Hopeful migrants were duped into signing as indentured servants, unaware they would become personal property who could be bought, sold, and even gambled away. Transported convicts were paraded for sale like livestock. Drawing on letters crying for help, diaries, and court and government archives, Don Jordan and Michael Walsh demonstrate that the brutalities usually associated with black slavery alone were perpetrated on whites throughout British rule. The trade ended with American independence, but the British still tried to sell convicts in their former colonies, which prompted one of the most audacious plots in Anglo-American history. This is a saga of exploration and cruelty spanning 170 years that has been submerged under the overwhelming memory of black slavery. White Cargo brings the brutal, uncomfortable story to the surface.