Saving Paradise (ePub)

the U.S. and international contexts. As an active member of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Dr. Brock has served on its General Board and Administrative Committees and, from 1996-1998, was the first Chair of the Common Global Ministries Board, a joint venture of the United Church of Christ and the Disciples of Christ. In 1993, she represented the National Council of Churches on an ecumenical, international, high-level delegation to Guatemala and El Salvador to support the peace-making processes in both countries. She lives in Oakland, CA.

The Rev. Dr. Rebecca Ann Parker has been President of Starr King School for the Ministry since 1990 and Professor of Theology since 2001, the first woman to serve as the permanent head of an accredited theological school. An ordained United Methodist minister, Parker has dual fellowship with the United Methodist Church and the Unitarian Universalist Association. She is coauthor, with Rita Nakashima Brock, of Proverbs of Ashes: Violence, Redemptive Suffering and the Search for What Saves Us and Saving Paradise: How Christianity Traded Love for This World for Crucifixion and Empire. She is also coauthor, with John Buehrens, of A House for Hope: The Promise of Progressive Religion for the Twenty-first Century and coauthor, with Robert Hardies, of Blessing the World: What Can Save Us Now.

On her work as a theologian, Parker says "Legacies of violence, terror and trauma continue to bring anguish into the world. Now more than ever, people of conscience and love need to do the hard work of theological thinking that deconstructs religion that sanctions violence. We need to re-dedicate ourselves to the creation of life-giving theology and justice-making religious communities. This is the calling to which my life is devoted."

A frequent keynote speaker for conferences, Parker's work has also been published in the Union Seminary Quarterly Review; the American Academy of Religion series on Religion, Literature and the Arts; the Journal of Religion and Abuse, and Open Hands magazine. She has contributed chapters to numerous books, including Christianity, Patriarchy and Abuse (edited by Joanne Brown and Carolyn Bohn), Soul Work (edited by Marjorie Bowens Wheatley), and Walk in the Ways of Wisdom. Parker lives in the San Francisco area.