The Fifteenth Crusade: A Novel in the Future Church

Six year old Juan Diego Freeman, stripped of his heroic father by three point blank rounds from the gun of a drug addled youth survives a perilous childhood on Chicago's southwest side to rewrite the gridiron records for Northwestern University. The bullet from a Nigerian terrorist's weapon rips his shoulder but the wound doesn't curtail the speed, agility or drive that power his five years as a pro bowl tailback for the Bears. A career ending injury catapults him to a Congressional seat where he sets about creating a program to curtail the national agony of youthful drug addictions by helping "at risk" children to recognize the sanctity and purpose of their lives. His secular critics label "sanctity" as a code word for God and will have none of it. He funds his own successful program. Pain, loss and disappointment forge a deep emotional and spiritual character in Diego. But joy comes in the person of Jordan whose search for meaning in her life leads her to God and Diego. Their bliss at Jordan's pregnancy is shattered by evil. Diego seeks a new life in a new place, but he is called to a world and a role for which he feels unprepared and is reluctant to enter. He accepts his mission and initiates change which some attack with violence. Confined to a Lagos hospital bed, guarded by men with Uzis and attended by the pope's physician, he deliberates how to address The Fifteenth Crusade.