Fr. Stephen Chinlund's Review of Salvation Boulevard

I have ready your Salvation Boulevard with great interest; could not put it down. It is a super piece of work on many levels:

a tale of suspense and intrigue,
an exploration of character in a world gone mad,
a taxonomy of temptation, especially the lust for power,
a wrenching apocalypse of the distortions of faith.
And it all works! Remarkable tour de force.

I am moved to say that it was a painful read for me. As a guy who believes in Jesus, who feels that I am with Him every day and night, even when I am not being very faithful to all that He means. For me, He is all about peace and reconciliation. He is always calling me to do more. Even after a million hours of therapy, that call is still there in the most gentle, tender and persuasive way. When guys like the one in your book hijack Jesus, even for the most commendable projects, and when they say who is in and who is out, and speak with the most obscene certainty, I want to scream. In fact I have had repeated fantasies of standing up in the middle of a congregation and scolding the preacher if I were stuck in a fundamentalist sermon. That has never happened and if it did, no one would be better than you to write the script of the reply: "The devil is so clever that he can even use ordained ministers who seem to be nice guys to further his sulphurous schemes. etc"

That the church has capitulated to the lust for certainty is one of the big heartbreaks of my life. You have nailed it in your explicit and narrative exposure of that driving passion. Your guys are more extreme than the ones I have had to deal with, but the problems are the same. If you go to do a reading at Barnes and Noble or elsewhere and you want a guy in a collar to make it more of a dialogue, I am available.

Fr. Stephen Chinlund, Episcopal minister