Regarded by many as Graham Greene's masterpiece, The Power and the Glory follows an alcoholic priest in Mexico during the late 1920's - a time when religion was outlawed in Mexico.
Outlawed you say? Yes, known as the Cristiada, the "violent atheist" President Plutarco Elías Calles decreed that Christianity was the ultimate socialist mechanism and artifact of Spanish colonization and ordered parishes be desecrated and priests found performing any type of sacraments or services be killed. Add to that our Priest's need for alcohol, which was also illegal at the time, summated to an interesting journey of struggle and ideological conflict.
The story follows the exiled "Whiskey Priest" as he flees his ultimate captors through a desolate and uninviting Mexican landscape, balancing requests for his religious services with his own survival.
"When he was gone it would be as if God in all this space between the sea and the mountains ceased to exist. Wasn't it his duty to stay, even if they despised him, even if they were murdered for his sake? even if they were corrupted by his example?"
One might ask, "can a priest be SCORP"? By Graham Greene's account most certainly ‘yes'.
1. He boozes
2. He is an outlaw (though unjustly)
3. He knocks up a member of his church
4. His nickname is "The Whiskey Priest"
Add to that a man hunt, brutal living conditions and ultimate glory through martyrdom and you have a SCORP worth book.
Scorp read... Scorp approved.