Rich in humor and culture, passion and love for the cause of God and of man, Milestones is the autobiography of one of the most influential men in the Catholic Church, a protagonist of ecclesial life at the turn of the millennium. In his famous Apologia, Cardinal Newman explained to the Anglicans his conversion to Catholicism. In this autobiography, which in certain respects recalls the English masterpiece, Ratzinger tells of his family life, the years of the Nazi oppression and of the war, his intellectual and spiritual formation, and his participation in the second Vatican Council.

"Here is Cardinal Ratzinger at his most surprising. Who imagines him a teenager risking his life escaping a Nazi forced-labor camp? Or a doctoral candidate shattered by rejection of his dissertation? Or a priest telling of 'the sufferings necessary for the priestly ministry... those dark nights that alone can give full shape to the radical assent a priest must give'? Milestones, rich with theological insights as are all his works, gives us finally Ratzinger the person. He is a joy to meet."
John Cardinal O'Connor
Archbishop of New York

Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger is the Prefect of the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. He is a highly regarded theologian who has been a university professor and is the author of over twenty books.