Paul L. Williams (author)
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Paul L. Williams (born 1944) is an American
author An author is the writer of a book, article, play, mostly written work. A broader definition of the word "author" states: "''An author is "the person who originated or gave existence to anything" and whose authorship determines responsibility f ...
,
journalist A journalist is an individual that collects/gathers information in form of text, audio, or pictures, processes them into a news-worthy form, and disseminates it to the public. The act or process mainly done by the journalist is called journalism ...
, and
consultant A consultant (from la, consultare "to deliberate") is a professional (also known as ''expert'', ''specialist'', see variations of meaning below) who provides advice and other purposeful activities in an area of specialization. Consulting servic ...
. He has penned articles for major news outlets, including ''
USA Today ''USA Today'' (stylized in all uppercase) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth on September 15, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headquarters in Tysons, Virgini ...
'', ''
The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'', and ''
National Review ''National Review'' is an American conservative editorial magazine, focusing on news and commentary pieces on political, social, and cultural affairs. The magazine was founded by the author William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955. Its editor-in-chief i ...
''. He has appeared on
Fox News The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is owne ...
,
NPR National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from other ...
, and
MSNBC MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and political ...
, and penned articles concerning Islamic paramilitary compounds that he claims have been established throughout the country. He was also an adjunct
professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who pr ...
of
humanities Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human society and culture. In the Renaissance, the term contrasted with divinity and referred to what is now called classics, the main area of secular study in universities at the t ...
and
philosophy Philosophy (from , ) is the systematized study of general and fundamental questions, such as those about existence, reason, knowledge, values, mind, and language. Such questions are often posed as problems to be studied or resolved. Some ...
at
Wilkes University Wilkes University is a private university in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. It has over 2,200 undergraduates and over 2,200 graduate students (both full and part-time). Wilkes was founded in 1933 as a satellite campus of Bucknell University, and bec ...
and
The University of Scranton The University of Scranton is a private Jesuit university in Scranton, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1888 by William O'Hara, the first Bishop of Scranton, as St. Thomas College. In 1938, the college was elevated to university status and took ...
.


Career

Born and raised a
Roman Catholic Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...
, Williams is a descendant of a family of Irish coal miners in
Scranton, Pennsylvania Scranton is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania, Lackawanna County. With a population of 76,328 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 U ...
. Williams received a
Bachelor of Arts Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four years ...
degree in English from
Wilkes University Wilkes University is a private university in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. It has over 2,200 undergraduates and over 2,200 graduate students (both full and part-time). Wilkes was founded in 1933 as a satellite campus of Bucknell University, and bec ...
, a
Master of Divinity For graduate-level theological institutions, the Master of Divinity (MDiv, ''magister divinitatis'' in Latin) is the first professional degree of the pastoral profession in North America. It is the most common academic degree in seminaries and divi ...
degree from
Drew University Drew University is a private university in Madison, New Jersey. Drew has been nicknamed the "University in the Forest" because of its wooded campus. As of fall 2020, more than 2,200 students were pursuing degrees at the university's three scho ...
, and a
Doctor of Philosophy A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common Academic degree, degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields ...
degree also from Drew. His dissertation, based on Latin texts, was on the moral philosophy of
Peter Abelard Peter Abelard (; french: link=no, Pierre Abélard; la, Petrus Abaelardus or ''Abailardus''; 21 April 1142) was a medieval French scholastic philosopher, leading logician, theologian, poet, composer and musician. This source has a detailed desc ...
. He began his career by writing articles on Catholicism for ''
National Review ''National Review'' is an American conservative editorial magazine, focusing on news and commentary pieces on political, social, and cultural affairs. The magazine was founded by the author William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955. Its editor-in-chief i ...
'' and serving as the senior editor for The Fellowship of Catholic Scholars. His first book, ''Everything You Always Wanted To Know about the Catholic Church But Were Afraid to Ask for Fear of Excommunication'' was published by Doubleday in 1989. ''The Vatican Exposed'', published in 2003, became the subject of a documentary for the
Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...
. In ''The Day of Islam: The Annihilation of America and the Western World'' ( Prometheus Books, 2007), he expands on the "American Hiroshima" scenario he believes to be imminent, in which simultaneous nuclear attacks on seven to ten American cities would create havoc in American society. ''Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance between the Vatican, the CIA, and the Mafia'', published in 2014, was optioned for background information for a possible mini-series for
American Movie Classics AMC is an American multinational basic cable television channel that is the flagship property of AMC Networks. The channel's programming primarily consists of theatrically released films, along with a limited amount of original programming. ...
. that was never developed. His most recent work, ''Among the Ruins: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Catholic Church'', was published in 2017. Williams is the only journalist to capture three first-place
Keystone Press Award The Keystone Press Awards are a prominent series of awards presented by the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association to Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the ...
s in three different categories in the same year.


Controversy

In Williams' 2006 book ''Dunces of Doomsday'', he claimed that
Adnan Shukrijumah Adnan Gulshair el Shukrijumah ( ar, عدنان شكري جمعة, ''ʿAdnān Shukrī Jumaʿah'') (4 August 1975 – 6 December 2014) was a citizen of Saudi Arabia and a senior member of Al-Qaeda. He was born in Saudi Arabia and grew up in the U ...
,
Amer el-Maati Amro Badr Eldin Abou el-Maati (born May 25, 1963 in Kuwait; also known as Amer el-Maati) is a Kuwaiti-Canadian alleged member of al-Qaeda. He is wanted for questioning by the FBI for having attended flight school and having discussed hijacking ...
, Jaber A. Elbaneh and
Anas al-Liby Nazih Abdul-Hamed Nabih al-Ruqai'i, ar, نزيه عبد الحميد نبيه الرقيعي  Libyan pronunciation: known by the alias Abu Anas al-Libi ( ; ar, ابو أنس الليبي  Libyan pronunciation: ; 30 March 1964; or 14 ...
had all been seen around
Hamilton, Ontario Hamilton is a port city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Hamilton has a population of 569,353, and its census metropolitan area, which includes Burlington and Grimsby, has a population of 785,184. The city is approximately southwest of T ...
the previous year, and that Shukrijumah had been seen at
McMaster University McMaster University (McMaster or Mac) is a public research university in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. The main McMaster campus is on of land near the residential neighbourhoods of Ainslie Wood and Westdale, adjacent to the Royal Botanical Ga ...
where he "wasted no time in gaining access to the
nuclear reactor A nuclear reactor is a device used to initiate and control a fission nuclear chain reaction or nuclear fusion reactions. Nuclear reactors are used at nuclear power plants for electricity generation and in nuclear marine propulsion. Heat from nu ...
and stealing more than 180 pounds of nuclear material for the creation of radiological bombs". He was subsequently sued by the university for
libel Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...
, with the lawyer representing the university in the case saying that, "Mr. Williams' allegations about McMaster reon a par with UFO reports and JFK conspiracy theories.... The notion that because there are people on faculty from Egypt that McMaster is then a haven for terrorism is not only logically offensive, it smacks of racism." The publisher later apologized for allowing Williams to print statements which "were without basis in fact"; Williams remained defiant saying, "I love them coming after us. At the end of the day these people are going to be bloodied because what I am saying is true. They are not going to walk away from this unscathed because I will proclaim what is going on at McMaster from the rooftops." In 2010, he was quoted as saying he had become "a pariah in the publishing world"; however, he remains a popular speaker on the Christian circuit.


Books

*''Everything You Wanted to know about the Catholic Church'' -
Doubleday Books Doubleday is an American publishing company. It was founded as the Doubleday & McClure Company in 1897 and was the largest in the United States by 1947. It published the work of mostly U.S. authors under a number of imprints and distributed th ...
, (1989) *''The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Crusades'', Penguin, (2001) *''The Complete Idiot's Guide to the Lives of the Saints'', Penguin, (2001) *''The Life and Work of Mother Teresa'', Alpha, (2001) *''Al Qaeda: Brotherhood of Terror'' -
Alpha Books Alpha Books, a member of Penguin Random House, is an American publisher best known for its Complete Idiot's Guides series. It began as a division of Macmillan. Pearson Education acquired Macmillan General Reference from Simon & Schuster in 1999. ...
(2002) *''The Vatican Exposed. Money, Murder, and the Mafia'' - Prometheus Books (2003) *''Osama's Revenge: The Next 9/11: What the Media and the Government Haven't Told You'', Prometheus Books, (2004) *''Al Qaeda Connection: International Terrorism, Organized Crime, and the Coming Apocalypse'', Prometheus Books, (2005) *''Dunces of Doomsday: 10 Blunders that Gave Rise to Radical Islam, Terrorist Regimes, and an American Hiroshima'',
WND Books ''WND'' (formerly ''WorldNetDaily'') is an American far-right fake news website. It is known for promoting falsehoods and conspiracy theories, including the false claim that former President Barack Obama was not born in the United States. T ...
, (2006) *''The Day of Islam: The Annihilation of America and the Western World'', Prometheus Books, (5 June 2007) *''Operation Gladio: The Unholy Alliance between the Vatican, the CIA, and the Mafia'', Prometheus Books, (2015) * ''Among the Ruins: The Decline and Fall of the Roman Catholic Church'' (2017)


Notes


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Paul L. American political writers American male non-fiction writers American traditionalist Catholics Traditionalist Catholic writers Traditionalist Catholic conspiracy theorists Living people 1944 births American conspiracy theorists