Habemus Papam!: Pope Benedict XVI by Regina Doman, Illustrated by Sean Lam

Goodreads: Habemus Papam!

Series: None

Published: 2012

Source: Borrowed

Summary: Growing up in Bavaria, Josef Ratzinger finds his faith tested daily as the Nazis shut down schools, force the young men into the army, and persecute Christians and Jews.  However, he places his trust in God and fulfills his dream of becoming a priest.  Josef enjoys his new life teaching and longs to spend his days as a scholar, but God still calls and His plan is larger than anything Josef could have imagined.

Review: Doman and Lam’s manga presents a biography of the pope in a manner both fun and accessible.  Benedict  XVI, or, as he was known before receiving the call to lead the Catholic Church as the Vicar of Christ, Josef Ratzinger, comes to life on the page, no distant figure waving from a balcony, but a flesh-and-blood man who faced terrible opposition in  his journey to become a priest but never lost his faith.  Readers will not only learn interesting facts about the pope (for instance, he loves cats) but will also feel themselves inspired by the example of man who placed all his trust in God, even when he feared the road God might set him on.

I have never read manga before, so I can only judge Habemus Papam! on its own merits.  I thought the illustrations were very well done.  Some beautiful Catholic architecture made appearances and the level of detail (for example, a glimpse of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel) gave the story a sense of realism.  The range of emotion exhibited by the characters also helped draw me into the story.  I especially enjoyed the young Josef—there is an adorable picture of him sitting with his teddy bear—and found myself marveling that the pope was ever a child who got into trouble and fought with his siblings.  The fact that the pope likes cats became a sort of recurring theme, so it was fun to pick out all the cats in the pictures. 

Enjoyable as the illustrations were, however, I never felt that they were integral to the telling of the story.  I got the impression that the creators of the book designed it more as a marketing tool to reach young people and make the faith seem cool.  Doman conceivably could have written the same story, fleshed out with some description, and made it into a short biography.  Enough action and suspense occurs that readers will keep the pages turning.  

Despite this criticism, I do not mean to suggest that the book seems didactic.  Rather, it presents itself a a loving portrayal of a man whose dedication to God and desire to spread His message cannot fail to move readers.  The struggles he faces as he tries to accept God's will for him make him seem so delightfully human, but the fearlessness he exhibits as he searches out truth makes him seem like the obvious pick to lead the Church in the modern era.  Readers should close the book with one message: those who seek the truth will always find it.