Review: City of Dignity: Christianity, Liberalism, and the Making of Global Los Angeles, by Sean T. Dempsey

Abstract

Book Review| May 01 2023 Review: City of Dignity: Christianity, Liberalism, and the Making of Global Los Angeles, by Sean T. Dempsey City of Dignity: Christianity, Liberalism, and the Making of Global Los Angeles. By Sean T. Dempsey. ( University of Chicago Press, 2023. 224 pp.) Darren Dochuk Darren Dochuk University of Notre Dame Search for other works by this author on: This Site PubMed Google Scholar Pacific Historical Review (2023) 92 (2): 311–312. https://doi.org/10.1525/phr.2023.92.2.311 Views Icon Views Article contents Figures & tables Video Audio Supplementary Data Peer Review Share Icon Share Facebook Twitter LinkedIn MailTo Tools Icon Tools Get Permissions Cite Icon Cite Search Site Citation Darren Dochuk; Review: City of Dignity: Christianity, Liberalism, and the Making of Global Los Angeles, by Sean T. Dempsey. Pacific Historical Review 1 May 2023; 92 (2): 311–312. doi: https://doi.org/10.1525/phr.2023.92.2.311 Download citation file: Ris (Zotero) Reference Manager EasyBib Bookends Mendeley Papers EndNote RefWorks BibTex toolbar search Search Dropdown Menu toolbar search search input Search input auto suggest filter your search All ContentPacific Historical Review Search Los Angeles has always been a hothouse of religious and political extremes, one that historians have painted in every hue. While cognizant of this, Sean Dempsey prompts readers to recognize its generous side as well, particularly the regenerative Christian spirit that has long inspired its citizenry. Accordingly, he opens his book with the Los Angeles uprising of May 1992, not just as an illustration of a broken city, but as testament to the dynamic ecumenism of a life-giving place. In the wake of the ruling that acquitted four LAPD officers of beating Rodney King, a multiracial phalanx of parishioners gathered in pews to “call for the recognition of the essential human dignity of all Los Angeles’ denizens” (p. 1). In six chapters that unfold chronologically from World War II to the new millennium, Dempsey surveys the work of liberal Protestant and Catholic leaders who sought to transform Los Angeles according... You do not currently have access to this content.