{
	"slug": "the-divine-plan-of-the-church",
	"url": "https://manualistpress.com/books/the-divine-plan-of-the-church/",
	"title": "The Divine Plan of the Church",
	"subtitle": "Where Realised, and Where Not",
	"fullTitle": "The Divine Plan of the Church: Where Realised, and Where Not",
	"status": "published",
	"contributors": [
		{
			"name": "Fr. John MacLaughlin",
			"role": "author",
			"url": "https://manualistpress.com/authors/john-maclaughlin/"
		}
	],
	"summary": "One argument for the Catholic Church that does not depend on winning a point of history, written for ordinary readers and without sarcasm.",
	"description": "Arguments about which church is the true one tend to drift into history and get lost there. Fr. John MacLaughlin keeps his out of it. He begins with the second of the Thirty-nine Articles, which Anglican clergy subscribe: Jesus Christ is very God. A God who gave Noah the ark's measurements down to the pitch did not leave his Church to be built by guesswork. Private judgment could have no place in such a plan; he calls the idea a square circle. Nor could the plan allow a Church that goes wrong after six centuries, an ark built to sink on the sixth day of the flood. From there the steps are short, and they end at one teacher who cannot err. Once that teacher is found, he says, all controversy may cease.\n\nThe second half turns to the Church of England and lets her own people describe her: the historian Green, Bishop Warburton, Sir William Harcourt, the Duke of Argyll, The Times. MacLaughlin keeps the odd documents too, such as the license by which Edward VI let Archbishop Cranmer eat meat in Lent, and Elizabeth's command that the fasting days be enforced, with the frank explanation that it was to set men fishing for the good of the navy. An appendix answers the three cases left standing against papal infallibility, Liberius, Honorius, and Galileo.\n\nHe wrote for ordinary readers rather than scholars, he says, and without irony or sarcasm, and it reads that way. If you want one argument for the Church that you can carry in your head, this is where to get it.",
	"categories": [
		"Theology and Doctrine"
	],
	"cover": {
		"url": "https://manualistpress.com/_astro/cover.BloWSpPZ_ZQ52o8.jpg",
		"alt": "Cover of The Divine Plan of the Church, showing Delivery of the Keys to Saint Peter by Pietro Perugino"
	},
	"sourceEdition": {
		"title": "The Divine Plan of the Church: Where Realised, and Where Not",
		"year": 1901,
		"publisher": "R. & T. Washbourne",
		"place": "London",
		"language": "English",
		"note": "Set from the R. & T. Washbourne edition, London, 1901, with Cardinal Vaughan's preface."
	},
	"historicalApprovals": [],
	"published": "2026-09-11",
	"updated": "2026-10-22",
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			"label": "Paperback",
			"url": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HJHF6CDG",
			"asin": "B0HJHF6CDG",
			"isbn13": "9798173433978",
			"pages": 196,
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			"label": "Hardcover",
			"url": "https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0HJLHDMZG",
			"asin": "B0HJLHDMZG",
			"isbn13": "9798173435033",
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	"readOnline": "https://manualistpress.com/books/the-divine-plan-of-the-church/read/"
}