On a Wing and a Prayer
A Message of Faith and Hope
By Katharine Jefferts Schori
Morehouse Publishing
160 pages

Reviewed by Neva Rae Fox

When the Rt. Rev. Katharine Jefferts Schori was elected the 26th Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church at General Convention in June 2006, there was a universal desire to get to know her better. Her first book as Presiding Bishop – On a Wing and a Prayer – is a wonderful glimpse into the life and thinking of our new Presiding Bishop.

The title and the book’s cover photo refer to the fact that PB Jefferts Schori is a twin-engine airplane pilot and a priest who also has a Ph.D. in oceanography.

The book is a collection of essays. Or, as she notes, “The essays that follow started out as sermons – my own attempt to boldly proclaim the ways I’ve seen the spirit moving in communities as diverse as those on the coast of Oregon and the deserts of the Southwest and the mountain ranges of the Appalachians. The essays look at my dream for the Church and the reckless, abundant love of the God we serve.”

In the introduction, she talks about Spirit and the wonderful meaning of that word, which includes life’s ups and downs and everything in between that we encounter along our way.

I found these topics she explored particularly interesting in light of 2007 and the state of our Episcopal Church. She looks into connectiveness, how we are all connected through the Body of Christ. About leadership in our church, she boldy states: “We don’t need prima donnas, who need to be the center of ecclesiastical attention. The last time I checked, the Body of Christ already has a head, and it’s not you or me or the rector down the street….We need people who know how to give themselves and their ministries away.”

I was particularly taken with the essay, Who’s Got a Hold on You, in which she shares vignettes of people who “got a hold” on her, and talks of the Samaritan woman at the well as having a hold on Our Lord. “Who’s got a hold on you?” she challenges. “Who has a claim on you? Whose cries do you hear?” I thought about this essay for a long time after reading it.

Part Two of On a Wing and a Prayer focuses on Shalom, more than just a word that PB Jefferts Schori introduced in her investiture sermon on November 2006. “The word ‘shalom’ is usually translated as ‘peace”, but it’s a far richer and deeper understanding of peace that we usually recognize,” she explains. “Shalom is a vision of the city of God on earth, a community where people are at peace with each other because each one has enough to eat, adequate shelter, medical care, and meaningful work.

Part Three, A Billion People, A Dollar A Day, delves into work for justice and peace in which she poses thoughts on such topics as Millenium Development Goals, racism, and our post-Katrina country. “Will we respect the dignity of every human being? she queries. “Will we strive for justice and peace? Will we seek and serve Christ in all persons?”

Part Four, Funny Purple Shirts: The Church in the New Millennium, includes Finding God in the Differences, an essay about meeting God in our everyday encounters and in the people we pass by. “There are all kinds of ways we meet God,” she writes. “There are all kinds of ways we understand God.” Amen to that!

In an essay titled Lab Report, she looks at reconciliation, our church in the new millennium and how to go forward. Insightful, meaningful and visual.

Then there’s Part Five, Dream A Little Dream; Part Six, Reckless Love; Part Seven, God & Me; and Part Eight, Taking Flight.

The book concludes with the sermons she delivered at her investiture on November 4 and at her seating in the National Cathedral on November 5.

I wish the essays had been dated so to get a feel for when she wrote them. Despite that minor detail, I enjoyed On a Wing and a Prayer on many levels. I found it stimulating and challenging while it provided an opportunity to get to know my new Presiding Bishop. The book offers insights into her life – her likes (hiking for one), her family (husband, daughter, one of four siblings, mother), her unceasing prayers, her meaning of mission. Here’s a hint – if you have the occasion to cook a meal for Presiding Bishop Jefferts Schori, you won’t go wrong by serving fish.

The Faith Club
By Ranya Idliby, Suzanne Oliver, and Priscilla Warner
Simon & Schuster, 308 pages

Reviewed by Bishop Catherine Roskam

The Faith Club chronicles the conversations and deepening relationships of three women of the Abrahamic faiths, Ranya Idliby, Suzanne Oliver, and Priscilla Warner, Muslim, Christian and Jewish respectively.

The book starts off slowly as the women begin their weekly meetings ostensibly to work on a children’s book explaining their faith traditions in the aftermath of 9/11. Their story takes off, however, in Chapter 5, when the three drop the original task, as they opt to pursue a deeper, more spiritual path by sharing their traditions in a more personal and authentic way.

Then the book becomes a page turner, as they, in a context of mutual trust, respect and affection, explore taboo territory of stereotyping and cultural mythology. The book fairly sizzles when Priscilla and Ranya discuss the Israeli-Paliestinian conflict and its origins. Yet on this and other hot topics, the women voice opinions and thoughts we all have or are exposed to but would never consider safe to speak about in a “P.C” climate. In so doing, they demonstrate that it is precisely in speaking the unspeakable with an attitude of humility and listening in an undefended posture that a way forward can be found. (Anglicans would do well to follow its example in having conversations marked by respect, honesty and affection around the current tensions in the communion with regard to human sexuality!)

Ultimately, however, this is not a political book with pretensions about spirituality. It is a spiritual book that rightly recognizes the political ramifications of religion.

As the conversations continue over a period of years, the reader is privileged to listen in on the deepening faith journeys as the women meet the challenges posed not only by their faith club encounters, but also by the life challenges of illness, sorrow, and loss. Their conversations illuminate but it s their friendship that sustains. And it is the book’s paradox, that as they face their differences together and share their traditions with one another, their spiritual journeys are deepened within their own faith traditions.

This is an honest, courageous, and helpful work. At the back are directions for how to start your own faith club and an abundance of questions to get you started or to use as a study guide for a book club response. One of the blurbs on the book jacket expresses the hope that the book will be read in every women’s groups and book club in America. I share that hope, and yet the blurb inadvertently identifies one of the book’s limitations. Unfortunately, it will most likely not be read widely by men. The picture of the three women on the cover seems to signal it is a woman’s book, and women may be more comfortable with a conversation among women. But men would do well to read this work as well, because it contains a way of going forward for both sexes in this contentious world.

The second limitation is that these conversations work because all three women come from liberal traditions whose starting point is an open-mindedness not found in more fundamentalist traditions. Priscilla is a Reform Jew, Suzanne is an Episcopalian, and Ranya practices Islam privately, at least at the outset.

Still, even given these limitations, the book holds great promise for transformation to all who read it and are courageous enough to put its principles to practice in their own lives. If enough people undertake this process, the fabric of our common life could be strengthened and our spiritual journeys deepened. It is certainly worth a try.

Faith in their Own Color
By The Rev. Craig D. Townsend
Columbia University Press
241 pages

Reviewed by the Rev. Canon Patricia S. Mitchell

It still comes as a surprise to some to learn that slavery existed in New York City from the early 17th century until it was abolished in New York State in 1827. Slavery and the racism upon which it was founded and which continued after its abolition form the backdrop of Faith In Their Own Color, the story of St. Philip’s Church, the first African-American congregation in the Episcopal Diocese of New York. The Rev. Dr. Craig D. Townsend, Associate Rector at St. James’ Church, Manhattan, has transformed his doctoral dissertation into an informative, compelling and disturbing account of the decades-long struggle of a black Episcopal congregation to gain acceptance as a parish in the Diocese of New York.

St. Philip’s origins can be traced to the year 1809, Trinity Church and a group of African Americans worshipping there separately, who wished to become an independent entity. After a decade of hard work, the group managed to build and consecrate a church building and incorporate as an Episcopal congregation, taking the name St. Philip’s Church. They also raised up one of their own members for ordination who became the first black priest in the Diocese of New York. Despite these efforts, St. Philip’s was not to be admitted as a parish in the diocese for more than 4 decades. The book chronicles the refusal of successive 19th century New York bishops and diocesan conventions to engage the issues of slavery and discrimination against blacks in general much less to address their own discriminatory and patronizing treatment of St. Philip’s and clergymen of color in particular. Year after year, diocesan convention kept St. Philip’s at arm’s length, denying it admission, thereby disenfranchising it, as its petition was either ignored completely, tabled or sent to committee for further review. Time and time again, men raised up by St. Philip’s for Holy Orders or identified as desirable spiritual leaders for the congregation encountered obstacles to attending seminary, to ordination or to deployment. It was not until1853, a full 44 years after its founding, that St. Philip’s was finally recognized and admitted as a parish in the Diocese of New York.

St. Philip’s struggle for acceptance was long and hard. As the words of the book’s closing paragraph state, “…the efforts of the people of this parish to assert a religious identity were ultimately entwined most firmly with their efforts to establish their identities as Americans and as African Americans. No such difficulties existed for white Episcopalians of the period: for them, the choosing of their faith and its expression was simply another aspect of their American identity. For the people of St. Philip’s, making such a choice was just as fraught with oppression, negotiation, compromise and self-pride as was asserting their rights and abilities to be Americans.” Combining meticulous research with thoughtful commentary and unflinching analysis, Faith In Their Own Color paints a vivid picture of the racial and ecclesial tensions of 19th century New York City and illuminates a shameful period in the history of the Episcopal Church’s treatment of African Americans in this part of God’s vineyard.