Reviews of The Sword of the Lord

Review posted on BaptistBoard.com. A friend on the BB wrote and asked if I knew anything about the latest book on Fundamentalism, The Sword of the Lord: The Roots of Fundamentalism in an American Family by Andrew Himes. So I thought I'd better review it here. 

Like so many of us who were raised in the hypocrisies of a doctrine driven faith, Andrew Himes left his church behind by the time he was out of high school. But as the oldest grandson of John R. Rice, one of America’s most famous Christian fundamentalists, his “born again” narrative would haunt him for more than three decades. “The Sword of the Lord – The Roots of Fundamentalism in an American Family” is Himes’ attempt to understand the religious values that shaped his early life and how those same forces have carved up the American political landscape that we occupy today.

“Fundamentalist” has been a dirty word for much of American Christianity of the few decades of my experience. Speak the 14 letter F-word and you instantly color someone as judgmental and close-minded. But how did Fundamentalism happen, and more importantly, why? If it’s safe to assume those who started the Fundamentalist movement didn’t set out to be judgmental and close-minded, what did they set out to do? And how, as the Church in America, do we find healing for both sides from the religious culture wars of the last century?