The Great Awakening: Reviving Faith and Politics in a Post-Religious Right America

by Jim Wallis

Book Overview

What will it take to solve the biggest issues of our time: extreme and needless poverty, global warming and environmental degradation, terrorism and the endless cycle of violence, racism, human trafficking, health care and education, and other pressing problems? While Washington offers only the politics of blame and fear, Jim Wallis, the man who changed the conversation about faith and politics, has traveled the country and found a nation hungry for...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060558296
• ISBN13: 9780060558291
• Release Date: February 2008
• Publisher: HarperOne
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.30 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.0" x 9.0"

Customer Reviews

For those hoping for change

"God is not Republican"... a phrase in this book still reverberating in my mind, even though I have never declared myself in the GOP ranks. As a citizen not only of the US, but of the planet, I have always had issues with conservative america's approach to global warming, fair trade, poverty reduction, etc; issues widely overlooked and even aggressively resisted. Yet, if we claim to know and fear a "just" God, why must I give my vote to those who care nothing for these principles. Enter "The Great Awakening", a book confronting not only economic and social poverty abroad, but bringing it home to American soil as well. The poverty many fellow Americans live in, as exposed in hurricane Katrina's aftermath, prevalent racism and sexism still rooted in our society and the passive attitude the body of Christ has had towards these, are but a few of the issues raised. Social justice is a term that is not widely taught in Sunday church around the country. Yet it is something many Americans are beginning to come to terms with and which Wallis drives deep into the reader's conscience. He helps us realize that it is in God's own heart to see us take responsibility for helping those less fortunate, for proper stewardship of the planet and its resources and becoming increasingly aware of the world as a whole. Our God is personal, but not individual. This is a Christian book, written by a Christian man. Yet I recommend it to all as a call to a higher level as citizens of the most privileged country on the planet.

Read this book

Jim Wallis' most recent previous effort, "God's Politics", was a manifesto for the faithful and downtrodden of the Bush years. It called us to endure, remembering that it is God we worship, and not his all too self appointed emmissaries of the "Moral Majority". This book is less a lamentation of what has fallen apart in America. Instead, it is a call to action. Wallis reminds us of so much that has happened in the last 2 years, and re-focuses the reader in the belief that there is a new age dawning for the faithful in America. We are no longer badgered to see faithfulness as a vacuous commitment to nationalism, anti-gay, and anti-abortion politics. Instead, we're asked to bear witness to, and indeed to join, the enormous outflow of activism that is occurring in our country. This, "Awakening", Wallis assures us, places AIDS, the environment, poverty, and human dignity on the very same platform that the narrowly held focus of the religious right dominated for a decade and more. The Great Awakening is a call to wake up and smell the coffee, better yet, to stand up and be part of the revolution of truly holy service that has begun in our land. Amen, so be it.

WOW what a timely wondeful book

This wonderful book is so timely. It seeks and succeeds in large part, in trying to bring all sides together to refocus on the important lessons Christ taught and to remind all of us that God is neither Republican or Democrat. And as someone who is a registered Republican and somewhat conservative in some ways, I find myself agreeing with what the author writes. One need only step back and see how many Christians from all walks of life, work with groups like Habitat For Humanity, local food banks, homeless shelters, unwed mothers to see we have more in common than we realize. And we can do even better. We have in the past as the author reminds us, and we can do so again. And I agree with the author (using my words not his) that Christ has been hijacked by radicals who have sadly also turned many people off of church, and even God because they simply don't want to get sucked into the hate talk and divisiveness. What I think this book can do, is remind all sides that we are all in this together and that there are some serious concerns that need dealing with. Be it divorce, abortion, war, unemployment, stressed out families, forgotten elders, and a general decline in real quality of living for all of us.

A Complaint and an Acclomade

"Political Junkie's" statement is unsubstantiated, namely that Jim Wallis is indifferent to the concerns of those who identify themselves as 'pro-life'. If he or she should have actually read Wallis' book, they would have discovered that Wallis unashamedly declares that "from a moral and religious standpoint, I believe that abortion is wrong, almost always indefensible." He takes a more balanced approach to this issue, by saying that although he has a strong bias toward ensuring every conceivable protection be provided the unborn, he doesn't want to see abortion criminalized as to thrust women into the dangerous and deleterious situation of back-alley, do-it-yourself abortions, either. He's trying to widen the dialogue that people like "Political Junkie" insist on choking. I have been very inspired by Mr. Wallis' even-handed treatment of many of the topics found in his book, and am surprised that he puts many of my own thoughts to paper, as though he lifted them away from me in my sleep or something. He seeks balance and compromise among conflicting parties and ideologies without sacrificing his strong sense of Biblical morality. His whole notion of a "conservative radical" is exactly what I have been trying to articulate myself as being to others, and Mr. Wallis has coined a useful term. His profuse quotations of John Howard Yoder, Jacques Ellul and others, whom I enjoy very much, reassures me that my Christian-political views are not fringe, but gaining ascendancy in the mainstream as evangelicals search for meaningful alternatives to the polarized debate on religion that has occurring throughout the last twenty years. Congratulations: this is your best book yet, Jim.

An interesting call from one long thought in the wilderness

For too long Jim Wallis has been a sort of preacher in the wilderness, calling people of faith to reengage in the public square, not as members of a particular partisan party, but instead to serve as messengers and workers on behalf of our fellow human beings. While it may be too early to say that Mr. Wallis is being at last heard, there are some early indications. With this book "The Great Awakening: Reviving Faith in a post-Religious Right America" Mr. Wallis reminds readers that, while religion has been all over the map in conflicts since the beginning of history, it has also provided the vanguard in the great ethical crusades of our nation's past. From Abolition, to Worker's Rights, to Civil Rights, people of faith marched and preached, and agitated. Listening to many of those who imagine themselves as "religious leaders" of the current time, one might think that Moses descended Sinai with Tablets demanding reduced corporate regulation and Jesus on the Cross opined over the need to reduce the capital gains rate. Yet these individuals and their ability to crowd out other people of faith remain aberrant. Wallis writes eloquently about those common principles which bind all faiths: caring for the weak and the poor, protecting human dignity, reminding everyone of our common value. Perhaps, if Wallis is correct, there is a great awakening bubbling up in America; if that is the case, one can only hope that a better, healthier nation will arise, a thing for which all people of faith can pray.