The Faith of 50 Million features essays by religion scholars who analyze the relationship between baseball and theology in American culture. Topics include the sense of national identity, baseball and civil religion, "saints and sinners," baseball and the American Dream with regard to racial integration, women and baseball, baseball as metaphor, and baseball as spiritual autobiography. Readers will love this fascinating intersection of baseball, race, American civil religion, and contemporary sports culture.

Scholars are agreed that the central metaphor in Jesus' proclamation was the kingdom of God. But what did that phrase mean in the first-century Palestinian world of Jesus? Since it is a political metaphor, what did Jesus envision as the political import of his message? Since this is tied to the political economy, how was that structured in Jesus' day? How is the violence of Jesus' Mediterranean world addressed in the kingdom? And how does "self-denial" fit into Jesus' agenda?

Malina tackles these questions in a very accessible way, providing a social-scientific analysis, meaning that he...