The Hounds of Rome: Mystery of a Fugitive Priest

Father Steve Murphy a Roman Catholic priest pastor of a parish in an affluent suburb of Washington DC revered by his parishioners believes he is about to be elevated to Monsignor. But out of the blue he is transferred without explanation to a temporary university teaching post. Shortly after he is ordered to a prison-like correctional monastery deep in the Sonora Desert of Arizona. Murphy knows that he has been a devout priest and he is puzzled and angry that he has been thrown in with the derelicts of the Catholic clergy. At the monastery he finds that he has been cast among the pedophiles alcoholics embezzlers and other serious offenders who the church hierarchy is pressuring to resign or be defrocked. After being tortured convinced that God wants him to continue his ministry he escapes. Murphy is now a fugitive pursued by monks from the monastery who are little more than thugs with orders to do whatever it takes to stop him and return him to the monastery or even kill him if necessary. Why Steve Murphy asks himself is his church doing this to him?