Pope Francis’ papacy was not yet a year old in January 2014 when the Roman street artist Maupal depicted the pontiff as a superhero in a graffito in the Borgo Pio neighborhood near the Vatican. The image was quickly scrubbed away by local authorities (if only they cleared the Eternal City’s trash as efficiently), but not before it went viral. It was the perfect illustration of that heady time of great expectations for the Catholic Church, fueled by Francis’ soaring popularity, which in turn stemmed from his accessible approach and easygoing, pastoral style.

“Disappointing” is a continual refrain in Karen Johnson’s history of Catholic inter-racialism in Chicago from the 1930s to the 1960s. At every turn in her narrative, Catholic bishops, priests and laypeople — including women religious — come up short in their commitment to racial justice.

One of the many consequences of the conflicts we are living through in this country and also the church is that many hopeful, nourishing voices are getting lost in the din.

A Chicago Catholic newspaper at Christmas may not be the obvious place for a review of a science fiction story set in Africa in a future so distant they have no record of our present day.

Most biblical commentaries traffic in scriptural analysis dense to the point of being unreadable for the average Catholic, and also often irrelevant. It’s great to know the proper translation of this or that Greek word or the inside joke being made in the early chapters of Genesis, but when it comes right down to it, so what? Why should we care?

The unexpected papacy of Jorge Bergoglio has reinvigorated the Catholic Church. The past five years have seen the pope grace the pages of major newspapers and magazines (including People!), deliver a TED Talk and generally become a media sensation not seen since the early years of the pontificate of John Paul II.

“Civil war.” Ross Douthat first uses the term nine lines in to his new book, “To Change the Church: Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism.” But readers might be surprised by the identity of the primary driver of the strife that could lead to schism. His subject is Pope Francis.

When teaching U.S. history at the University of Notre Dame, historian Jay Dolan used to ask his students to identify the significance of three dates: 1607, 1608 and 1610.

In “History and Presence,” religion scholar Robert Orsi tells the history of “real presence” — a claim with doctrinally significant meanings for both Catholics and Protestants — by examining stories of “abundant presence” in the lives of ordinary people.

The secular world clings to the idea that the Catholic Church is unchanging. Catholics know better. Pressed to say how, we turn to describing our parish. Perhaps seeing the church in one parish is like seeing the world in a grain of sand. But “Catholic Parishes of the 21st Century,” looks at the big picture, reporting important data and details about parishes, parishioners and parish staffs.