Excellent book - ideas for all who want to understand the Bible from the point of view of Liberation Theology - a gospel for the poor and oppressed. Book is quite technical and very researched but may be difficult for those who do not have Scriptural backgound and higher studies. I was very impressed and felt that many new insights were attainted. I have read the book three times.

At the end of his preface, Ched Myers writes, "I pray that this study might help Mark to speak, and the reader to have 'ears to hear', the good news that promises yet to overthrow the structures of tion in our world." Although he is nobody's seasoned Greek scholar, the author lives up to his end of the bargain. Myers serves up, in this reading of the earliest gospel, a much-needed focus of radical discipleship -- i.e., Jesus as exemplar of nonviolent resistance to the powers-that-be in his day, and ergo in ours. Myers wrote this groundbreaking work not in the effete ivory tower of liberal intellectualism, but while living in seven intentional faith communities over the course of several years ... and yet, it's a remarkable piece of scholarship. Finally: a serious application of the socio-literary approach to a book of scripture, by an author who beckons us not to worship and adore a tall-steeple bourgeois Jesus, but to follow the itinerant rabbi he really was!

I recently obtained a copy of "Uncommon Prayer: A Book of Psalms" by Daniel Berrigan. I have never read a book quite like it. I am glad I did...it is a book with the power to change lives. I pray it has changed mine...and that it may change yours.

"Uncommon Prayer" is composed essentially of three elements. The first of the elements are the poems Berrigan wrote after reflection upon selected Psalms--they form the beginning of each chapter. Each chapter also contains a reflection written by Berrigan on his poem. The third element (and an indispensable one) that makes up the book are the stunning illustrations by Robert McGovern. Some of his illustrations throttled my soul.

Much of the reflection in "Uncommon Prayer" centers on human suffering and its relation to God. Subjects like life in prison and other horrors of the modern world are covered. Berrigan takes the Psalmist's ancient cries of anguish and suffering and appropriates them for our modern age.

Berrigan's personal involvement with many of the areas he describes gives this book an added power. The man who writes about how horrible prison is does so because he has been there (and not "just visiting" mind you).

The book was written when America was in a time of political upheaval. However, it does not, at least for me, "date itself." Instead, Berrigan's righteous passion and fervor for the oppressed and threatened stirs within me a sense of holy anger at my own quiet complacency when it comes to social justice.

The most powerful chapter for me was the reflection on Psalm 130. Berrigan reflects at length on "crying out from the depths." It is a powerful statement about the God we can cry out to...especially from the depths. I won't say more. You MUST read it for yourself.

I highly recommend this book.

Don't get me wrong, there is some good insight in this book. However, you have to wonder if this commentary is really "spiritual" as in the Christian tradition, or if he's just a burned out hippie-protestor.

This book seems to have been written by somebody who is still living in the 60's and 70's war mentality. It seems somebody forgot to tell Berrigan we are living in the post-cold-war and post-vietnam days.

Granted, this book has probably become a little more relevant in it's message since the events of 9/11, but still, seems that all the time Berrigan has spent in prison for his activities in protest has left him a little out of touch with reality.

Also, Berrigan seems a little "liberal." I come from a "christian fundamentalist pentecostal" belief, and it seems to me that Berrigan supports the "homosexual lifestyle," which is well, not biblical. However, I do agree with him that we should not pinpoint homosexuals, and make them objects of wrath and such.

While Berrigan does a decent job at showing an understanding of what Jeremiah probably went through, and what God was saying to the people that had turned their faces away from Him, he takes an extreme "poetic license" when it comes to quoting large sections of scripture. Berrigan really cuts out a lot of words out of the mouth of Jeremiah, and makes him sound as if He is suffering from schizophrina. He does this in an attempt to amplify a few key words, but well, seems to leave out all the other words that actually make a sentence intelligible. Also, the hack job on the words of Jeremiah seem to be to make what Jeremiah says more poetic.

The way he quotes passages might make sense if you are use to that coffee shope mentality, where you have somebody playing the drums really fast before a poet reads a broken up verse, with candels burning in the background, strobe lights of many colors composing a backdrop, and Isaac Hayes lightly playing the theme song for "Shaft" in the background. Or in otherwords, if you enjoy smoke and mirrors, with superficial meaning behind the words, then this will all be ok with you.

Also, just a warning: plan to read this commentary with a Oxford dictionary at your side. Berrigan uses a lot of "big words," which will lose many people. Keep in mind, I say this as a sophmore in college.

This book will probably also lose you half way through, because eventually, "you get the drill." Granted, it's not a heavy read, and it's surely not very long. Just do yourself a favor, leave this book in the warehouse at amazon.com. Eventually it'll collect enough dust that they will have to remove it because it becomes a fire hazard.

Jeremiah: The World, the Wound of God,is another In daniel Berrigans'series on "old Testament" prophets. His exegesis is not limited to Biblical times, as he attempts [with great success] to connect Jeremiahs' time with ours. Weapons of mass destruction,,aids,poverty,dicrimination are all still with us, despite what another reviewer wrote,and Fr.Berrigan shows us Jeremiahs reaction to like minded situations, and by default, ours. The book is an indictment of apathy,of governments and churches and NGO's ,etc. and corpoartions athat watch idly by ,wringing their collective hands, as innocents suffer.And Die. If you are willing to be challenged,to be unsettled,to look at things differently,then buy this book and savor it.Highly recommended,even more so in the present climate.

I'm usually fairly open minded about stuff and give writers lots of space to engage in what might is obviously their particular discourse of interest. However, the movie The Mission and this companion journal by Daniel Berrigan fall into the same trap that they are setting out to either make apologies about or to reverse.

From reading this book, it is clear that the center of the movie is not an examination of the missions but the examination of the Mendoza/Gabriel duo and the whole Jesuit discourse. What is absent in this book is a lucid examination of the effect that the Jesuits had on that and just about every part of the world.

Where is the examination of the Guarani as a subject with agency and voice? As in the movie, virtually absent. As an examination of a Jesuit take on things - this reads like the manual. Berrigan is the poster boy of Liberation Theology for a reason - his blind adherence to a discourse that was full of contradiction, self interest, and politics as opposed to the amorphous agape they purport to preach. The Jesuits really need to take a long hard look inside and see that movies like The Mission, Black Robe, etc. do more harm to their image - when actually examined.

As a research tool, I give it the thumbs up. It is full of insight on what Berrigan whishes to expound on but it is not a full and comprehensive analysis of the movie. Since the mechanism of truth creation is a factor of who says what and Berrigan does carry a lot of weight as an "ex-activist". The Mission: A Film Journal reads like a travel diary a naive and inexperienced writer would even consider publishing or is it a monument of narcissism. You be the judge.

Miguel Llora