Along with Fulton J. Sheen, James Gillis may have been one of the best-known Catholic priests in America during the 194Os and early 195Os. Gillis was a charismatic preacher who often appeared on The Catholic Hour, broadcast on radio by NBC. This life of Gillis views him against the background of his tumultuous era that spanned the depression, the New Deal, World War II and the immediate postwar years. It identifies the consonance between Gillis's vocation as a Catholic missionary and his desire to save America from the twin perils of materialism and atheistic communism. Most of all, it breathes new life into one of the more unappreciated figures of midcentury America.