"For two thousand years, the Catholic Church has housed an unruly family of saints, sinners and ordinary folks. Its history is a record of a boisterous lot of people--inspiring, infuriating, sometimes frustratingly dull and often engagingly charming." - from the Introduction With rich storytelling and a reader-friendly style, Father Al McBride spans twenty-one centuries of church history, highlighting peak moments from a human perspective that responds to a question increasingly on the Catholic mind: How did we get here from there--and where are we heading next? Far from dry facts and figures, Father McBride delves into the human drama of church history, from the stories of the early martyrs to the continuing unfolding of the changes of Vatican II and the church in the new millennium. Updated and reformatted with new chapters, sidebars, bibliography and index, The Story of the Church is ideal for classroom use, small groups or individual study. "The study of Church history offers natural evidence for the Church's durability and continuity and supports our supernatural belief that Jesus abides with us all days. It is our faith that he will not let the gates of hell prevail against us, that he has sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in our midst." - from the Introduction