MOTHER ANGELICA
Author: Raymond Arroyo. 384 pgs. Paperback.
The extraordinary saga of Mother Angelica, founder of the multimillion-dollar Eternal Word Television Network and “the most influential Catholic woman in America” according to Time magazine
In 1981, the year after Ted Turner founded CNN, a simple nun, using merely her entrepreneurial instincts and $200, launched what would become the world’s largest religious media empire in the garage of a Birmingham, Alabama, monastery. Under her guidance, the Eternal Word Television Network grew at a staggering pace, both in viewership and in influence, to where it now reaches over a hundred million viewers in hundreds of countries around the globe.
Born Rita Rizzo in Canton, Ohio, in 1923, Mother Angelica was abandoned by her father and raised in poverty by a mother who suffered from suicidal depressions. As a young woman, Rita developed severe abdominal pain that doctors dismissed as a “nervous condition,” but when she sought the prayers of a local mystic, her symptoms disappeared. Awakened to the power of prayer, she vowed to dedicate her life to God and became a cloistered nun, expecting to spend her life hidden from the world. But Rita’s faith soon compelled her to unlikely endeavors, from establishing a monastery in Alabama to starting the world’s first Catholic cable network. Relying solely on “God’s providence,” Mother Angelica built an empire without concern for budgets or fund-raising campaigns, achieving what even the highest levels of the Church had been unable or unwilling to do.
Raymond Arroyo combines his journalist’s objectivity and eye for detail with more than five years of exclusive interviews with Mother Angelica. He traces Mother Angelica’s tortured rise to success and exposes for the first time the fierce opposition she faced from the American hierarchy and the dissenters they coddled. Their vindictiveness and jealousy is exposed by this long-suffering woman of faith who rightly compared them to the Pharisees who opposed Our Lord. Also detailed is Mother's Angelica's struggle to live with severe physical disabilities that wracked her body with crippling pain. Just like Pope John Paul II, she is a living witness to the sanctity of human life in all its stages. This is an inspiring story of courage and survival - proof that faith can move more than mountains.
Also available in Spanish
Also available as Audiobook
The extraordinary saga of Mother Angelica, founder of the multimillion-dollar Eternal Word Television Network and “the most influential Catholic woman in America” according to Time magazine
In 1981, the year after Ted Turner founded CNN, a simple nun, using merely her entrepreneurial instincts and $200, launched what would become the world’s largest religious media empire in the garage of a Birmingham, Alabama, monastery. Under her guidance, the Eternal Word Television Network grew at a staggering pace, both in viewership and in influence, to where it now reaches over a hundred million viewers in hundreds of countries around the globe.
Born Rita Rizzo in Canton, Ohio, in 1923, Mother Angelica was abandoned by her father and raised in poverty by a mother who suffered from suicidal depressions. As a young woman, Rita developed severe abdominal pain that doctors dismissed as a “nervous condition,” but when she sought the prayers of a local mystic, her symptoms disappeared. Awakened to the power of prayer, she vowed to dedicate her life to God and became a cloistered nun, expecting to spend her life hidden from the world. But Rita’s faith soon compelled her to unlikely endeavors, from establishing a monastery in Alabama to starting the world’s first Catholic cable network. Relying solely on “God’s providence,” Mother Angelica built an empire without concern for budgets or fund-raising campaigns, achieving what even the highest levels of the Church had been unable or unwilling to do.
Raymond Arroyo combines his journalist’s objectivity and eye for detail with more than five years of exclusive interviews with Mother Angelica. He traces Mother Angelica’s tortured rise to success and exposes for the first time the fierce opposition she faced from the American hierarchy and the dissenters they coddled. Their vindictiveness and jealousy is exposed by this long-suffering woman of faith who rightly compared them to the Pharisees who opposed Our Lord. Also detailed is Mother's Angelica's struggle to live with severe physical disabilities that wracked her body with crippling pain. Just like Pope John Paul II, she is a living witness to the sanctity of human life in all its stages. This is an inspiring story of courage and survival - proof that faith can move more than mountains.
Also available in Spanish
Also available as Audiobook
