St. Francis of America
How a Thirteenth-Century Friar Became America's Most Popular Saint
By Patricia Appelbaum
288 pp., 6.125 x 9.25, 15 halftones, appends., notes, bibl., index
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Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4696-2374-0
Published: October 2015 -
Paperback ISBN: 978-1-4696-6142-1
Published: August 2020 -
E-book EPUB ISBN: 978-1-4696-2375-7
Published: July 2015 -
E-book PDF ISBN: 979-8-8908-4451-4
Published: July 2015
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- Hardcover $36.00
- Paperback $29.95
- E-Book $19.99
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Awards & distinctions
Foreword Reviews 2015 INDIEFAB Book of the Year, Bronze Award, Religion (Adult Nonfiction)
Honorable Mention, Catholic Press Association Book Award in Popular Presentation of the Catholic Faith Category
Appelbaum traces popular depictions and interpretations of St. Francis from the time when non-Catholic Americans "discovered" him in the nineteenth century to the present. From poet to activist, 1960s hippie to twenty-first-century messenger to Islam, St. Francis has been envisioned in ways that might have surprised the saint himself. Exploring how each vision of St. Francis has been shaped by its own era, Appelbaum reveals how St. Francis has played a sometimes countercultural but always aspirational role in American culture. St. Francis's American story also displays the zest with which Americans borrow, lend, and share elements of their religious lives in everyday practice.
About the Author
Patricia Appelbaum, an independent scholar of religion and American culture, is author of Kingdom to Commune: Protestant Pacifist Culture between World War I and the Vietnam Era.
For more information about Patricia Appelbaum, visit
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Multimedia & Links
Check out the author's blog, St. Francis Sightings, for ongoing updates and commentary.
Listen: Appelbaum on LA Review of Books' Marginalia podcast. (10/6/2015, running time 21:53)
Watch: Appelbaum talks to Peggy Bendroth as part of the History Matters series at the Congregational Library and Archives. (4/24/2014, running time 5:11.)
Read: Q&A with Foreword Reviews. (10/8/2015)
Read: Appelbaum's article "Why blessing animals has become popular in recent decades" at The Christian Century's Then and Now blog. (10/28/2015)