Last Words: Final Thoughts of Catholic Saints and Sinners

The last words of the dying have long captured the popular imagination. Why this abiding interest in exit lines? Perhaps because these final words—spoken in hope or fear, joy or sorrow—provide a view from the border between this world and the next.

As this provocative and sometimes amusing collection illustrates, those who have gone before leave us with much more than helpful epigrams or witticisms. Paul Thigpen points out that their final words can actually "point us to fundamental reali…