Hope in Hard Times

...new, a detailed portrait of the current attachment to apparently every conceivnuclear disarmament movement...

...she notices, distinguishes between litYanov Torah should have read as fol- In another essay, "The Bishop as eral and other kinds of meanings, belows: A Torah, smuggled piece-by- Healer: Churchmen Challenge the tween various literary forms and piece into a Nazi work camp in Poland, Status Quo," Ohanneson quotes scvis later rescued and brought to sources, and between different strands America by an amigra...

...identify with as civilized beings is nary Heroes...

...Speaking now as a method, with its predictable range of fence.- participant himself, Loeb asks, in effect, people and places, is by now something - Paul Rogat Locb where should -we go from here and how of a journalistic cliche, the method re Hope in Hard Times should we get there...

...Women Today...

...Loeb quotes a the attention Loeb gives it.- whether or decision and particular event to other sales executive who hopes "we'll soon not one shares his conviction that "un- people's private decisions and other have Plumbers Against Nuclear War as less ordinary citizens act and continue to events around the country - all without well...

...action against the Trident submarine near tip, startled, and ex('laitn, 'Son of a This analysis is in the genre of moveSeattle...

...Women questions for movement activists to be The best known feminist theoloconsidering, and Loeb presents them gians have been unanimous in their doing theology with the authority of someone long famil- claim that women's experience of the iar with the literature of the intellectual past has been ignored, denigrated, or left...

...He has a gift Chorus, Ground Zero Center for Nonviothe way of weapons transport, to go to for capturing people's characteristic lent Action, Interfaith Center to Reverse jail...

...a now teach to enthusiastic response a private choices are the inner life of the Southern minister on his town's long class on "Chi-toying Our Future: antinuclear movement...

...a Boston teacher and groups, and the Junior League, she called "Obstacles and Visions," foreschool children on their struggles to think decided she c ofildn't just stay in the ground and background change places...

...In a Gender and Gad: Love and Desire in clear power industry...

...Today the of editorial work...

...Cowley, $7.95, 142 pp...

...That book and Christian Spirituality, by Rachel Grace Mojtabai's Blessed Assurance pair of essays-"Where Have Women Been...

...ence and power within women, we object to certain actions of the antinu- apologize to them and we seek the clear movement, he dismisses their ob- munal criticism...

...A "critical" reading, land as $21.95...

...liam D. Borders, Charles A. Buswell, hand label "peace movement," appar- All but one of the books reviewed and Maurice Dingman...

...about nuclear war and feel capable of antiseptic avorld of giving lectures, Theoretical concerns become Loeb's preventing it...

...The personal style of Spirit's forgiveness...

...But, to be fair, Loeb Gabriel Award in 1979 for a TV show keys from biblical texts) and two condevoted a previous book Nuclear Cul- on "Women's Gifts," Joan Ohanne- temporary ones (genetic imprint and ture, to listening sympathetically to the son combines a narrative thread with gravity...

...Commonweal: 694...

...Concerned Scientists, Women Against tend their first peace rally, to carry peti- The method is redeemed also just be- Military Madness, the Peace Child tions door to door, to place their bodies in cause Loeb is so good at it...

...The result is that his writing actually tiveness behind the prolific production of from its peril...

...paper...

...Other Mary Gerhart I worry, though, that in speaking from authors have begun to publish refleca position so firmly within the move- tions on women's experience - usu- eral bishops who have spoken out on ment, Loeb makes it hard for outsiders, ally their own - in ways that make it behalf of justice for women: Bishops especially critics, to listen to him...

...systematically misunderstood...

...Another major source, not so positive vision of the future the move- well recognized and perhaps less unment should project...

...Loeb manages to deeply heartened by what he has seen and the best vehicle for telling the story...

...So he discusses such deems itself here because it does seem questions as: whether legislative lobby26 December 1986: 693 ing or civil disobedience has more impact...

...a Rambo and the Nuclear Age...

...sire in Christian Spirituality, Rachel shut out those who had something else to A writer and producer of audio- Hosmer organizes material around say...

...the international crew of and was arrested a third tune at main focus, while the characters we've sailors, blue-collar workers, and reli- Honeywell...

...I think this is a shame, because it visual materials on the elderly and, three classical analogies (the chariot might restrict his readership to the al- women in society and winner of the from Plato's Phaedrus, the net and the ready converted...

...The book is jection as "backlash" or "resistance...

...the "personal narrative" method to sold their $600,000 house so she Loeb provides us, in Part One, with an focus on representative conversion could volunte er jail time at Inte rjaith accurate and comprehensive picture of stories...

...Ordinary people from the proverb- the drama of the spread of the antinuclear for Social Responsibility, Educators for ial all walks of life are being stirred, by movement in the 1980s, personal narra- Social Responsibility, Business Executhe immensity of the nuclear threat, to tives - in all their variety - are in fact tives for National Security, the Union of take extraordinary personal steps to at- where the action is...

...In bring in a good many of them: Physicians heard...

...And why not...

...She also ently unaware that the movement's equa- here are special examples of the genre quotes at length the 1979 Pastoral Lettion of nuclear disarmament and peace is of testimonial--special because they ter of seven Minnesota bishops, strongly resented, even scorned, by those have been written in the light of com- which ends with an apology, unprecewho believe that our nuclear deterrent munal experience and reflect com- dented as far as I know: "If we, as has kept and is keeping peace...

...Though the personal narrative bitch...

...Augustine, Dante's Beatrice, and JuTorah will live forever...

...what ture...

...The description of The...

...Simply as a historic phenomenon, lines, for placing them in the context of a the Arms Race, United Campuses this popular protest movement deserves key event, and for linking each personal Against Nuclear War...

...occasionally comes across people who 204 pp...

...I sometimes smile act on an unprecedented level, our slackening the pace of the central narra- at what seems a spirit of comic invenspecies has little chance of emerging tive...

...The author conveys the voices of people who work for the nu- apt comments and questions in Woman: Survivor in the Church...

...charity, honesty and accountability...

...This was a last-minute come to know slip back to serve as congious activists on their civil disobedience decision, and prompted Tony to look crete reference points for the analysis...

...For more possible to do theology inclusive Leo T. Maher, Carroll T. Dozier, Wilinstance, he repeatedly uses the short- of women's experience...

...what religious and secular activists ONE of the recognized-even can learn from each other...

...So we hear a Minneapolis subur- Center, they remained in their local how these groups are interconnected ban housewife on her decision to risk Presbyterian congregation, and through the individuals whose difficult arrest blockading a weapons plant...

...Interested in what moves threatened by nuclear war, and so all people to make radical choices, risking these identifications are legitimate reatheir jobs or reputations or more, he uses Afier Martv and Bob Coleman sons for protest...

...Along the way, preparation for its first peace march...

...And leaders of local churches, have ever Woman: Survivor in the Church, by when, in the course of his narrative, he closed ourselves to the Spirit's presJoan Ohanneson, Winston, $6.95...

...These are important derstood, is human experience...

...how the canonized-sources of theolog- Religious booknotes movement can more effectively engage ical reflection is biblical literablue-collar workers and also blacks...

...and "Where Are Hinmer...

...he also touches lightly on background wealthy California businessman on his Although Erica Bouza speaks two points of theoretical interest that add successful fundraising for the 1982 nights a week to Shriners, Kiivanis depth to character or event...

...one woman is commonsense importance of techniCORRECTION quoted as asking, "Why am 1 able to cal terms - for example, "critical," The featured listing of "Human Family" receive more equity in civil society, in meaning "to distinguish," over books in our November 21st issue the pagan marketplace, than in the against "fundamentalist" and should have listed the price of Ellis Is- church that speaks to me of justice and "literalist...

...dramatizes his main metaphor for the antinuclear groups, but I think the sheer Loeb's attitude toward his subject is movement: that it is a chain of linked excess is significant: everything that we clear from the title of Part One, "Ordi- individual choices...

...the author is apparent in each case, wide-ranging and heuristic, carrying In his excitement at hearing so many and the book is informed by others as within itself the changes it promotes...

...In Part Two, Freeze campaign...

...Paul Peggy Rosenthal able public identity that humans can Loeb traveled around the country for four have, is surely something new in Ameriyears interviewing participants, and he is can social history...

...Times offers something refreshingly Paul Rogat Loeb The diversity of these groups, with their Lexington Books, $10.95, 303 pp...

...Hosmer's readings author, Rabbi Herman, carries it "from MARY GERHART reaches hermeneutics, of the Genesis creation story, pastemple to temple, from place to place," religion, and literature at Hobart and sages from the Gospels, Phaedrus, as an example that, "although millions William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New Gregory of Nyssa's Life of Marrina, of Jews have been murdered, our York...

...There goes my wife over the ment self-reflection...

...voices around the country calling for a well as the author's personal experi- In Gender and God: Love and Dehalt to the arms race, Leob seems to have ence...

...Books: BETWEEN HEAVEN & EARTH AMONG recent books stimulated by the HOPE IN HARD TIMES The larger links in the chain are the nuclear arms race, which seem to be AMERICA'S PEACE MOVEMENT various "peace groups," local and naproliferating almost as fast as the AND THE REAGAN ERA tional, with which anyone moving into weapons themselves, Hope in Hard antinuclear action eventually hooks up...