Last Crusade

The Twentieth Century's War for the Sake of the Cross

By: Warren H. Carroll

Narrated by: Matthew Arnold

Spain 1936...

“Crusade” means a war for the sake of the Cross, a war to protect Christian people from persecution and death on account of their faith in Jesus Christ. Everyone has heard of the crusades of the Middle Ages. But few know of the crusade fought for this same purpose in Spain during the early twentieth century.

In just six months of the year 1936, thirteen bishops and nearly seven thousand priests, seminarians, monks, and nuns were martyred in Spain by enemies of Christianity. It was the greatest clerical bloodletting in so short a span of time since the persecutions of the Church by the ancient Roman emperors. Already Pope John Paul II has beatified some two hundred of these martyrs. Tens of thousands of churches, chapels, and shrines in Spain were pillaged or destroyed. In response, faithful Spanish Catholics proclaimed a crusade. Against all odds the crusaders triumphed, and the Church and the Faith in Spain were saved.

This is the story of that crusade, now honored in no other book in the English language. Most people who know of the Spanish Civil war do not understand why it was fought or how it was really won. This book will tell you. There is no story like it in the history of the twentieth century.

©2025 Christendom Press (P)2025 Sophia Institute Press

Spanish civil war

This really opened my eyes about the recent history of Spain … having visited so many of the cities mentioned I was stunned to learn their stories.