Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith: Religion in American War and Diplomacy

Abstract

In Sword of the Spirit, Shield of Faith Andrew Preston draws attention to the important role that religious ideas and institutions have played in shaping America's relationship with the world. More than simply a synthesis of existing scholarship, this work is based on an immense amount of archival research, drawing on the holdings of several presidential libraries, theological schools, and the papers of several religious denominations. The publisher should be commended for putting out a reasonably priced book of this length (613 pages of text) that includes extensive endnotes and a comprehensive bibliography. Preston's readable account starts with the founding of British North America in the early 1600s and ends with President Barack Obama accepting the Nobel Peace Prize in 2009. The most interesting sections of this work examine World War II and the Cold War. Reinhold Niebuhr and the Christian realists loom large in the debates over how to respond to the threat of Nazi Germany and later the Soviet Union. To understand Franklin D. Roosevelt, Preston insists that one must take into account his Christian faith and his firm belief in protecting religious liberty and promoting interfaith tolerance. To Roosevelt, the Nazis transcended American national security, threatening the very existence of religion in the world. One of the most significant wartime legacies of World War II would be the efforts of the Commission on a Just and Durable Peace established by the Federal Council of Churches to lay the groundwork for public acceptance of the United Nations in 1945.