Phantom Warrior

June 25, 2007
Singlehandedly repulsing a Japanese attack in 1945, Pvt. John McKinney won the Medal of Honor for one of America's most heroic wartime feats, and here Johnson (Hour of Redemption
) presents the event as a docudrama. Private McKinney was the nearly illiterate son of a Georgia sharecropper who served quietly throughout the New Guinea and Philippine campaigns. With victory assured in the Philippines, his unit was sent to defend a remote spit of land far from the fighting, where no one expected the attack when it came. Recovering from his surprise, McKinney recaptured a machine gun from the Japanese, firing until it jammed, then fought on alone with his rifle (he was a crack shot) and bayonet. Afterward, witnesses counted over 100 enemy dead—so many that superiors wanted a lower number before submitting their report. McKinney died in 1997, leaving no personal papers, so the author relies on interviews and official documents, and also on his imagination. The lurid invented dialogue accompanied by his hero's thoughts (“His mouth went dry, his muscles tightened, his heart beat slow and steady...â€) will leave history buffs gnashing their teeth.

July 1, 2007

Edwin B. Burgess, a longtime LJ reviewer, is director of the U.S. Army Combined Arms Research Lib., Fort Leavenworth, KSself-helpBy Deborah Bigelow, Director, Leonia P.L., NJ Spiritual Living By Graham Christian Up-to-date Beliefs

We all want to be modern, even in the oratories and meditation centers; this season, "Library Journal" has seen an unusually insistent emphasis on the ultracontemporary, from a Protestant, everyday take on Ignatius of Loyola through the tangles of the web for contemporary Christian parents. We've come to terms with a pagan spirituality that negotiates a dozen traditions for the modern practitioner, as well as the reinvention of the Christian wisdom tradition for a 21st century and global outlook; we've seen the face of God in the crass cleverness of "Family Guy", read a philosopher's bloggings, and found redemption with Katharine Hepburn. With these latest titles, we find Joan Chittister as rewarding as always; among the newer authors, Greg Garrett and Bruno Barnhart prove to be especially worth watching. Barnhart, Bruno. The Future of Wisdom: Toward a Rebirth of Sapiential Christianity. Continuum. 2007. c.218p. ISBN 978-0-8264-1932-3. pap. $29.95. REL

Barnhart ("The Good Wine; Second Simplicity") is also a monk of the New Camaldoli Hermitage in Big Sur, CA. His new book, a substantial contribution toward the renewal of Christian spirituality, is rather more controversial than it might first appear, given Barnhart's good Catholic background. Barnhart seeks and desires no less than a wholehearted rediscovery and reinvigoration of the mystical wisdom tradition that was once a powerful component of Christian spirituality, both Western and Eastern. As he rightly points out, this tradition, which he allies with Aldous Huxley's "philosophia perennis", went into decline hand in hand with the overall decline of monastic orders, as Christianity became more public and congregational in its focus. He sees this moment of history as the "new dawn" of the wisdom tradition within Christianity; whether he is correct, and what role his learned and passionate advocacy will have, only time will tell. For most collections.

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