Unfettered Hope: A Call to Faithful Living in an Affluent Society

Anglican Theological Review, Spring 2004 by Sedgwick, Timothy F

Unfettered Hope: A Call to Faithful Living in an Affluent Society. By Marva J. Dawn. Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, 2003. xxii 216 pp. $18.95 (paper).

Dawn begins this book with consciousness-raising through a strident recitation of statistics that detail the great divide between the world's "haves" and "have-nots" as that is tied to injustice and violence. The cause of our consumerism a la Albert Borgmann (Technology and the Character of Contemporary Life [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984] and Crossing the Postmodern Divide [Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992]) is the Marxist critique of the break between labor and production which commodities products and alienates workers until "society is characterized by the proliferation of devices that produce an endless stream of commodities unrelated to any context and thereby leaving consumers without a world of relationships" (p. 57).

Following Borgmann, Dawn says that what is needed in order to be connected is the clearing of space for our "focal concerns," thereby limiting "technology and other consumerist products to their proper place" (p. 60). This means creating the space for "the love of God and the love of neighbor" (p. 76) given in "the arduous engagement of Bible study, prayer, meditation, worship, Sabbath keeping, generosity, service, home devotion, and the raising of children in faith" (p. 85).

After a critique of the church in its capitulation to commodification where worship, for example, becomes a device to attract and please, Dawn proclaims that the foundation of "unfettered hope" is given in a realist "metanarrative," a story that comprehends life from its beginning to end. That meta-narrative, she claims, is that given in Christian Scripture as a covenant theology of God's saving acts (pp. 111-139). This leads to short reflections on the Ten Commandments. In regard to the first commandments directed toward God, she focuses on how they direct us to "be immersed in a church community that teaches [us] the faith language and practices" (p. 155). Reflections on the commandments regarding love of neighbor include emphasis on fidelity, nonviolence, generosity in giving, gratitude, and compassion. She concludes with a coda on the main theme of "unfettered hope."

The book itself is less an argument then a fideistic confession of faith. The appeal to Scripture as meta-narrative precludes any criterion of credibility. The meaning of God's actions concluding in the redemption of suffering and affliction in the resurrection is assumed. The main terms of the argument are, however, offered without testing in terms of the different voices in Scripture, in the tradition, and outside of Christian faith altogether.

Dawn's audience is likely those already assimilated into the church and its language of faith. For priests, pastors, and preachers, Dawn fails to offer the critical perspectives of divergent voices as they hear the Word of God in the particularities of human life. It offers little more in terms of a critical account of the practices that form the Christian life.

TIMOTHY F. SEDGWICK

Virginia Theological Seminary

Alexandria, Virginia