God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It

San Francisco, CA: HarperSanFrancisco, 2005. First Edition [stated]. Seventh printing [stated]. Hardcover. Very good/very good. First edition. Sewn binding. Cloth over boards. xxvi, [2], 384 pages. Notes. DJ has slight wear and soiling. A leading voice of Christians in this country offers a prophetic indictment against America's pursuit of individual spiritualities to the exclusion of any social responsibility for the common good, as well as the lack of political options for believers who want to link their personal ethics to social justice. From Wikipedia: "Jim Wallis (born June 4, 1948) is a Christian writer and political activist. He is best known as the founder and editor of Sojourners magazine and as the founder of the Washington, D.C.-based Christian community of the same name. Wallis is well known for his advocacy on issues of peace and social justice. Although Wallis actively eschews political labels, he describes himself as an evangelical and is often associated with the evangelical left and the wider Christian left. He works as a spiritual advisor to President Barack Obama. He is married to the Rev. Joy Carroll, who was one of the first female priests in the Church of England. He is also a leader in the Red-Letter Christian movement. Born in Detroit, Michigan, and raised in a traditional evangelical Plymouth Brethren family, as a young man Wallis became active in Students for a Democratic Society and the civil rights movement. Wallis graduated from Michigan State University and attended Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in Illinois, where he joined with other young seminarians in establishing the community that eventually became Sojourners. The journal Sojourners originated in Deerfield, Illinois as The Post American in 1971. Wallis wrote in 1974 that, "The new evangelical consciousness is most characterized by a return to biblical Christianity and the desire to apply biblical insights to the need for new forms of sociopolitical engagement." Wallis was invited by Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) to give the Democrats' weekly radio address on Saturday, December 2, 2006. He spoke about the importance of moral leadership in Washington, and touched on a variety of social concerns. In February 2007 he wrote in Time about the post-Religious Right era and the resurgence of mainstream Christianity, with evangelicals "deserting the Religious Right in droves". Wallis has served on the Advisory Council to President Barack Obama's Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships. He serves as a spiritual adviser to President Obama. In addition to President Obama, Wallis has developed personal friendships with former British Prime Minister Gordon Brown and former Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd. In 2010, Wallis admitted to accepting money for Sojourners from philanthropist George Soros after initially denying having done so. When conservative writer Marvin Olasky pointed this out, and that Soros also financed groups supporting abortion, atheism, and same-sex marriage, in a WORLD magazine column, Wallis said Olasky "lies for a living"; he subsequently apologized to Olasky for the comments. In 2011, Wallis acknowledged that Sojourners had received another $150,000.00 from Soros' Open Society Foundation. In 2010, expressing concern about the growing polarization in American politics, Wallis and other Christian leaders agreed to a document entitled "A Covenant for Civility." Wallis has been arrested 22 times for acts of civil disobedience. He was involved in antiwar activism during the Vietnam War, and wrote in 1974 that it was a "brutal, criminal war." Wallis has received criticism for calling the United States "a fallen nation" in his 1976 book Agenda for Biblical People. Wallis' writings are regularly published as op-eds in major media outlets. He is also the convener of Call to Renewal, an interfaith effort to end poverty. He has written a wide variety of books including The Great Awakening. Reviving Faith & Politics in a Post-Religious Right America (2008), God's Politics: Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It (2005), and Faith Works: How Faith Based Organizations Are Changing Lives, Neighborhoods, and America (2000).