Doing Justice: Congregations and Community Organizing

Things have gotten so bad in 2018 (or write in your year of choice) that many can no longer stomach listening to the news. We can bury our heads, hearts and souls, or we can come together for change. Don't know how or even why? Dennis A. Jacobsen's "Doing Justice: Congregations and Community Organizing" provides roadmaps that go directly to the point with stirring clarity. Rooted in the wisdom of the Abrahamic traditions and the efficacy of the best resistance movements, "Doing Justice" offers an anti-toxin for despair. It moves us from apathy to care and from care to action, as this quote from page 12 demonstrates. "Martin Luther King, Jr., with reference to Paul Tillich, observed that although power without love is tyranny, love without power is sentimentality." United we stand.

The author, Dennis A. Jacobsen, gives tremendous incite on how to impact your community through congregational community organizing. He breaks down Urban Ministry in a way that is clear and effective. He does not limit congregational-community organizing to direct services but raises it to what it should be (empowering the people). I would recommend this book to many who would like to transform their community through faith-based initiatives.

Thank you for getting this book out when you promised. I needed it to teach a class and you delivered it when promised.

This is an easy to read book. I am reading this book for class. The author uses stories from her/his own experience a lot.

I bought this book for reference, so haven't completed reading it. It seems solid on all of the concepts covered.

By far the BEST book that I have ever read on the subject. It has provided me with a whole new way of thinking!

Inspiring.

I think I speak for many people -- clergy and lay, organizers and the organized -- in decrying the dearth of good, digestible faith-focused written resources for organizing. We scrounge through magazines and periodicals; we "cut-and-paste" from other disciplines (theology, sociology, political science, history, psychology, etc.); we listen to big-name and not-so-big name speakers as they expound with (or without) competence on related topics; and we mutter, "Why doesn't someone write a book?" I am a Catholic priest who's been in parish ministry for the past twenty years, and these have been some of my frustrations. I know from conversations with many colleagues that I am not alone.So, thank you Dennis Jacobsen! "Doing Justice" is the best book of its type to hit the press in those twenty years! Sure, there've been biographies ("Let Them Call Me Rebel"), case studies ("Streets of Hope", "Upon This Rock"), populist analyses ("Who Will Tell The People?", "You Can't Be Neutral On A Moving Train"), and much more that has been truly inspirational. But not since Gregory Pierce's "Activism That Makes Sense" (1984) and "Confident & Competent" (1987) has it all been put so neatly, compactly and engagingly under one cover. Not only that, but Jacobsen goes beyond Pierce in integrating what I regard to be both a welcomed and appropriate degree of theological consideration into his discussion.I have heard Dennis Jacobsen speak on several of the topics covered in "Doing Justice" both in Milwaukee and in the context of Gamaliel Foundation activities. But reading those pieces together with his new (at least, to me!) material is really exciting! I was particularly moved by his handling of "Self-Interest" (Chapter 6), "Building and Sustaining Organizations" (Chapter 10), and "Community" (Chapter 11). In each of these sections, he weaves a profound message that incorporates organizing principles, theological challenge, and psycho-historico-political realism.Rick Deines's "Studies Guide" as an appendix is pure bonus!!! Even without it, "Doing Justice" would be an excellent primer in organizing for seminarians, judicatorial and/or denominational clergy groups, ecumenical ministerial associations and alliances, and groups within congregations that are either already involved in or considering becoming involved in a community organization. It is also just plain good, refreshing reading for those of us who have been "in the trenches" (or in a rut!) for a while!!!There are some parts of the picture that are still missing, though. Such related topics as "money", enemies (i.e., adversaries, or "the opposition") and the role of Foundations in the survival and success of the kind of organizing Jacobsen describes could well be the subject of what I truly hope will be his sequel to "Doing Justice."