Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
In this new century, born in hope but soon thereafter cloaked in terror, many see religion and politics as a volatile, if not deadly, mixture. For All Peoples and All Nations uncovers a remarkable time when that was not so; when together, those two entities gave rise to a new ideal: universal human rights.
John Nurser has given life to a history almost sadly forgotten, and introduces the reader to the brilliant and heroic people of many faiths who, out of the aftermath of World War II and in the face of cynicism, dismissive animosity, and even ridicule, forged one of the world's most important secular documents, the United Nations's Universal Declaration of Human Rights. These courageous, persistent, visionary individuals--notable among them an American Lutheran Seminary professor from Philadelphia, O. Frederick Nolde--created the Commission on Human Rights. Eventually headed by one of the world's greatest humanitarians, Eleanor Roosevelt, the Universal Declaration has become the touchstone for political legitimacy.
As David Little says in the foreword to this remarkable chronicle, "Both because of the large gap it fills in the story of the founding of the United Nations and the events surrounding the adoption of human rights, and because of the wider message it conveys about religion and peacebuilding, For All Peoples and All Nations is an immensely important contribution. We are all mightily in John Nurser's debt." If religion and politics could once find common ground in the interest of our shared humanity, there is hope that it may yet be found again.
Synopsis
This is the remarkable story of the early human rights movement, and of the influence of Christianity and the Christian churches on envisioning a post-WWII framework for international justice that ultimately resulted in the passing of the 1948 U.N. Declaration of Human Rights. In sum: When Hitler and Stalin were on the prowl, several ecumenical church leaders in the U.S. and Europe saw that not only must they be stopped by the use of military force, but that a non-territorial and non-coercive interpretation of Christian concern for justice and the welfare of the neighbor could help shape a new global order after the war. These church leaders, led by Frederick Nolde and Searle Bates, translated the deep insights of the Christian tradition into terms that could be endorsed on inter-faith, cross-cultural, and international bases. These leaders supplied the intellectual firepower and the zeal for the cause that tirelessly prodded the heads of states and leaders of diplomatic corps to think about the formation of institutions that could most likely prevent the barbarism of Fascism and Communism from terrorizing the post-war future. Supported by the World Council of Churches, they drafted the basic designs behind the most important institutions of today's system of international law--including the 1948 U.N. Declaration of Human Rights. The rest, as they say, is history. Social action inspired by Christian convictions has a mixed record in the modern world. Here is a case in which progressive stalwarts in the church, by articulating enduring theological principles that recognize the human dignity of each and every human being, got it right.