Living Into Hope: A Call to Spiritual Action for Such a Time as This

Ordained in both the Disciples of Christ and American Baptist churches, Campbell's career was forged in the civil rights movement and thrust her upward to be the first woman to govern the National Council of Churches, the first woman to direct the U.S. office of the World Council of Churches, and the first woman to lead the Department of Religion at the ecumenical Chautauqua Institution. In this collection, based on Campbell's best sermons, she secures her status as an American "pulpit prince" in the lineage of great liberal Protestant preachers. But, as this first book reveals, Campbell's life experiences, told in a voice both warm and clear, bear out the courage of her convictions. Her stories report from conflict zones around the world, including Belgrade under NATO attack, Palestine, South Africa, and post-9/11 New York. Drawing on her role in reuniting youthful Cuban refugee Elian Gonzalez with his father and on her friendship with atheist astrophysicist Carl Sagan, Campbell brings fresh insight to gospel parables. Well-suited for study groups, with reflection prompts and prayers in each chapter, Campbell poses the ever contemporary and always controversial question: Who is my neighbor? (Nov.)