The Kingdom Is Always But Coming: A Life of Walter Rauschenbusch (Library of Religious Biography Series)

Rating:
Summary: A Giant in the social gospel leading to Liberation Theology
Review: From the strong influence of his Father, Augustus to his first Seminary Prof, Augustus Strong and German Theologians, Albrecht Ritschl, Friedrich Schleiermacher, Adolph von Harnack, then to American influence of Charles Sheldon and Washington Gladden. It was his star-studded pathway into the forefront of the liberal, social gospel movement that led to Liberation Theology of the 20th Century! W R began his 4 yr sojourn as student in a German Gymnasium located in the small Westphalia city of Gutersloh. His father Augustus wished to expose him to German higher education. Then to mature him in the religious & cultural environment of his own theological orthydoxy of Lutheran Pietism. Years later W R commented on his education in Germany as bringing him to no outlook except soul-saving: "I had no outlook except a common evangelicalism!" He entered those years of 1876 to 1886 when Liberal Theology was influenced by Phillips Brooks, Henry Ward Beecher and Washington Gladden. They were strong influences upon the preaching, writings and teaching of Walter R.

Curiously his student writings lack references to the doctrine that became the cornerstone of later liberalism: The Kingdom of God. Many members of the Rochester Seminary were hostile to the theologian, Ritschl. W R would later embrace the persective of Ritschl and disciple, Adolph von Harnack, around the theme, The Kingdom of God. Even more revealing was the gradual maturity of his ambivalence toward the "institutional church." The model he and others sought to implement: "The institutional church is a necessary evil. Make social life healthy and you can simplify the work of the church. Let poverty and helplessness increase and you increase work of the church too."

In 1918 the faith of Walter was focused upon death. One of his most famous, oft used Prayers was given the title by his wife, Pauline, "The Little Gate to God." Reflecting the deep faith by which he confronted his early death at 56 of Colon Cancer, he penned this prayer beginning, "In the castle of my soul is a little postern gate, Whereat, when I enter, I am in the presence of God." Even Johns Hopkins Hospital could not uncover or give them any medical solution. His prayer captured the essence of Walter's understanding of the social gospel movement. He became one of the Giants of his day as an example of faithful living, inseparable from the reality of social struggle and inevitable consequence of social struggle was suffering and death!"

Christopher Evans, Prof of Church History at Colgate Rochester Cozer Divinity School has given us the definitive story of W.R. Called by Harvey Cox as a "timely and absorbing book" about the life of the most neglected yet outstanding person who stood at the beginning of Liberation Theology! Retired Chaplain Fred W Hood