The popularity of Charles de Foucauld continues to spread around the globe as time goes on. Unknown during his lifetime as a solitary monk in the Sahara Desert, and assassinated by bandits in 1916, this former French playboy had a radical conversion to Christ that compelled him to live a deeply ascetical religious life that has had a great impact on the world since his death. This definitive biography by Jean-Jacques Antier, a renowned French author of more than 50 books, is the fruit of his exhaustive research on Foucauld''s life, writings and correspondence. He was given access to the complete archive on the life of Foucauld from the Congregation of the Saints compiled for his beatification process. Antier also interviewed numerous witnesses resulting in a powerful, inspiring biography of this holy, 20th century figure, a "personality of fire".  Illustrated. "In seeking the true and the good, our contemporaries tend to prefer authentic and modest witnesses, symbols of the salvation of the human family. That was the intuition which guided Charles de Foucauld, a great man of God, who sought to show the Gospel in a hidden, laborious way, in the silence which God signifies his presence as if it were a gentle breeze." —Pope John Paul II