Christian life, a culture steeped in the blood of the Lamb, saints must rise up to seed it. Only the witness of sanctity can save us now. More than ever, we need heroic men of God like St. Ignatius of Antioch, bishop and martyr of the early Church, whose life and letters Dr. Regis Martin illuminates in these stirring pages.

No other writer of the Apostolic Age has expressed with such passion, such blazing intensity, an ardent thirst for God as St. Ignatius, traveling in chains across Asia Minor toward the Colosseum. In his fervor, St. Ignatius wrote, "I am God's wheat, and I am being ground by the teeth of wild beasts to make a pure loaf for Christ." He urgently dispatched poignant letters to the faithful along the way from Antioch to Rome, a journey marked by travail but ending in triumph.

In these precious testaments, you will discover:

• St. Ignatius's burning desire for holiness, the secret to true and lasting freedom and happiness
• The source of the bishop's zeal and his encouragement to the besieged Christians of the early Church
• The saint's fiery exhortation to the persecuted Church in Rome, where he met his death
• Three universal themes found in St. Ignatius's letters -- and how they apply to us today

Dr. Martin brilliantly weaves the wisdom of spiritual authors -- from saints to literary, philosophical, and contemporary witnesses -- with his own potent reflections. This book proves that St. Ignatius's faith was no "bourgeois faith," with its sniveling insistence on keeping comfort zones undisturbed. Nor was it the mediocre faith of the complacent. Rather, St. Ignatius stood steadfast, like a hard, gemlike flame set ablaze by Christ alone. "Any Christian who is not a hero," Leon Bloy reminds us, "is a pig." St. Ignatius was no pig. So where does that leave us?