Spirit and Capital in an Age of Inequality

Robert P. Jones is the founding CEO of the nonpartisan Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI), based in Washington, DC. He previously served as Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Missouri State University, USA.Ted A. Smith is Associate Professor of Preaching and Ethics at Emory University’s Candler School of Theology, USA.

This remarkable, timely, and forward-looking collection is much more than a theoretical analysis of why religious ethics should be opposed to great wealth disparities. It offers an astute, fact-based, and fast-paced diagnosis of the often misunderstood factors that drive inequality in the U.S, including the global financial system, race, class, and gender. Authors not only respond with creative theological proposals, they identify practical and effective types of resistance available to religious activists, faith traditions, and faith-based organizations. This is a scholarly book, a hopeful one, and a sure inspiration to anyone seeking a progressive religious politics that can actually get the job done. Lisa Cahill, Boston College, USA. This volume is a true testament to Jon Gunnemann as it makes clear that our theologies and faith claims are morally consequential. The thinkers make clear that there is no neutral ground: our theological and faith traditions are implicated in fostering economic injustice and inequality even when they may compel us to advocate for a more just society. When I picked up this book I expected an academic treatment of the relationship between economic theories and theological doctrines. Instead, from the opening page I was at once indicted and inspired by a moral conversation concerning the inextricable relationship between theology and economic injustice as well as the absolute imperative for faith communities to do something about it. A book that I thought would be hard to read, was one I found hard to put down. Reverend Kelly Brown Douglas, Episcopal Divinity School at Union, USA.

• Contributors. Introduction. Robert P. Jones and Ted A. Smith. Thinking with Traditions. Chapter 1: The Little Commonwealth: The Family as Matrix of Markets and Morality in Early Protestantism. John Witte, Jr. and Justin J. Latterell. Chapter 2: When Ancient Teachings Meet Modern Problems: Jewish Approaches to Poverty, Inequality, and the Market. William A. Galston. Chapter 3: Election, Selection, and Distinction: Paradoxes of Grace, Clan, and Class. Timothy P. Jackson. Chapter 4: Pope Francis, Catholic Social Thought, and the Rejection of Fear. E.J. Dionne, Jr. Moral Sentiments. Chapter 5: More Than Enough: Contentment and the Dominance of the Economic Sphere. Christine D. Pohl. Chapter 6: Stress. Julie Meadows. Chapter 7: Riots and Rip-Offs in Baltimore: Toward a Theology of Hopelessness. Miguel A. De La Torre. For the Love of the World. Chapter 8: Wasting Human Lives: Hyper-Incarceration in the United States. Elizabeth M. Bounds. Chapter 9: Challenging a New Frontier of Market Morality: The Case of Sweatshop Economics. Keri Day. Chapter 10: Wage Against the Machine: Wage Activism, Worker Justice, and Disruptive Jesus in the Age of Advanced Capitalism. C. Melissa Snarr. Chapter 11: Speak Up, Judge Righteously, Stand with the Poor: The Jewish Imperative for Social Justice. Jonah Dov Pesner. Public Theology and the Common Good. Chapter 12: America, Land of the Free and Home of the Poor: Inequality as a Way of Life. Darryl M. Trimiew. Chapter 13: The Integrity of the Church in a Divided Society. Steven M. Tipton. Index.