Broken We Kneel: Reflections on Faith and Citizenship [Hardcover]

Diana Butler Bass (Author), Jim Wallis (Foreword)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 30, 2004

Drawing on her personal experience as well as her knowledge of religious history, Diana Butler Bass examines the contours of the uniquely American relationship between church and state, Christian identity and patriotism, citizenship and congregational life. Broken We Kneel attempts to answer the central question that so many are struggling with in this age of terror: "To whom do Christians owe their deepest allegiance? God or country?" In writing both impassioned and historically informed, Bass, who lives outside of Washington, D.C., reflects on current events, personal experiences, and political questions that have sharpened the tensions between serious faith and national imperatives. This book incorporates the author's own rich experience of faith, her vocation as a writer and teacher, and her roles as wife, mother, and churchgoer into a larger conversation with Christian practice and contemporary political issues. Broken We Kneel is a call to remember that the core of Christian identity is not always compatible with national political policies.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

After the attacks of September 11, 2001, American cars, homes and churches were suddenly covered with flags and the phrase "United We Stand." Bass (Strength for the Journey) gives eloquent expression to the discomfort such patriotism caused among Christians who, like her, find themselves "resident aliens" in an America once again steeped in civil religion. The book's title is Bass's faith-based answer to "United We Stand," and she weaves a series of reflections around her conflicted reactions to the patriotism of her parish at the time: Christ Church of Alexandria, Va., four miles from the Pentagon, heir to a long military tradition and dominated by memorials to both George Washington and Robert E. Lee. Drawing on Augustine, Bass argues that American Christians have become so enamored of "the City of Man" that they have forgotten their true citizenship in the "City of God." She deftly explores the history of "God Bless America" and "Amazing Grace," the two songs that defined post-September 11 religiosity, contending that neither provides adequate guidance for Christian citizenship. Bass's prose is often lyrical, and readers troubled by America's combination of military might and professed faith will find this book refreshing. But Bass displays so little sympathy for her former fellow worshippers at Christ Church, and delves so little into the rich variety of Christian reflection on civic responsibility, that others will be frustrated by her seemingly impermeable idealism.
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From Booklist

In this timely and quite personal book, Bass explores post-9/11 America and, in particular, the often volatile, confusing relationship between Christian belief and U.S. citizenship. Unlike many in and out of government, she doesn't see good and evil in stark black and white, and she has no patience for the simplistic, with-us-or-against-us stance that disguises itself as public policy. She makes an anguished appeal for self-reflection, sprung from an ecumenical approach, and a spiritual lament of sorts acknowledging that, in a world of increasingly righteous patriotism, some use religion for their own agendas. Looking for the revival of civic religion in the public sphere, she notes that Americans are once again talking, and often passionately arguing, about the role of faith in national life. Thoughtful readers are sure to be moved by the tension Bass descries and personally feels between loyalty to the nation and loyalty to the teachings of the Gospels. June Sawyers
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 160 pages
• Publisher: Jossey-Bass; 1 edition (April 30, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0787972843
• ISBN-13: 978-0787972844
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.7 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.9 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,434,344 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Diana Butler Bass was born in Baltimore, Maryland and grew up in Scottsdale, Arizona. For as long as she can remember, she's been interested in religion, history, and politics--the passions she intertwines in her books and writing. She holds a Ph.D. in American religious history from Duke University. After a dozen years teaching undergraduates, she became a full-time writer, lecturer, educator and consultant. Her work has been cited in the national media, including USA TODAY and the Washington Post, and she has appeared on CNN, FOX, PBS, and on Air America and NPR. For five years, she wrote a weekly feature on American religion for the New York Times syndicate. She currently blogs for Beliefnet at Progressive Revival and is a contributing editor at Sojourners magazine.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Faithful, Challenging, and Very Readable, April 25, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Broken We Kneel: Reflections on Faith and Citizenship (Hardcover)

This is a moving and informative book. For those of us who have read Strength for the Journey, we get to catch up on Diana Butler Bass's life since the end of that book. In her distinctive style, she combines history, theology, and her own story in a way that transcends characterization but is extraordinarily readable. The starting point this time is September 11, 2001--the events of that day had a profound impact on her life in the Washington area. But this is not a book about September 11, or the war in Iraq, or any other current event so much as the record of a Christian trying to be true to the gospel when it seems so many misunderstand, misapply, or ignore it. The church, it is said, missed an opportunity when attendance rose dramatically following the terrorist attacks. It is never too late. Bass's prophetic voice against the conflation of church and state provides a helpful example of how a Christian can live with integrity in these difficult times.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Broken we walk, May 8, 2004

By 

Jaye Heighton (Tempe, AZ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Broken We Kneel: Reflections on Faith and Citizenship (Hardcover)

Diana Butler Bass writes for the many Christians whose horror at the attacks on September 11 was compounded by the abduction of Christian terms for nationalist, militarist, and imperialist goals, and the enthusiastic unquestioning enrollment of innumerable congregations and church leaders in a neo-medieval crusade.

A meditation framed on the experience of conflict with the Washington D.C. congregation on whose pastoral staff she was serving at the time, the chapters will call to mind the works which indelibly marked the path of Christianity in the 20th century, whether theatrical, like 'Murder in the Cathedral' or 'A Man for All Seasons', confessional like Merton's letters and meditations on the American war against Vietnam; but the language is not the language of the polemic or the theatre or even autobiography, but the language of lament, of exile, even of excommunication. There is no ease in such language, and there are no simplifications in the book, which opens with the author's confession to her (Episcopal) priest that she had removed the United We Stand sign from the church entryway, because it was a call to vengeance and to a national crusade. When the priest informs her that the church belongs to the congregation, she responds that it's God's church, and from there, travels from the powerful political congregation which dedicates its faith to nation to the celebration of Easter some 20 months later in an inner city church three blocks from the White House.

Those who seek the company of the suffering servant of which the gospels speak, rather than the Nordic warrior messiah that stands at the center of the American war cult as much as he did at the heart of the German Church of the Third Reich, will find a familiar voice & a kindred heart in 'Broken We Kneel'.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A timely book of true hope and courage, May 14, 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Broken We Kneel: Reflections on Faith and Citizenship (Hardcover)

Diana Butler Bass shares hope with the church, and all who care deeply about the role of faith in our national life. Bass dares to speak boldly of the hope with in her, and of our challenge to be members of an alternative intentional community, the Church within the Empire. Her words give courage to all whose hearts ache for another way to be both Christians and patriots, to humbly tell out from our souls the greatness of the Lord. Bass' text is a welcome antidote to the myopic zealotry that has been so prevalent in our national landscape after September 11th. I pray that from the hope renewed in reading this significant little book many, "proud hearts and stubborn wills are put to flight, the hungry fed, the humble lifted high." An engaging and inspiring read for all concerned about faith in America. Share this book with your friends, your pastor, grandmother, and reading groups. Would be an excellent springboard for parish discussion groups.