Besides recounting the exemplary life of Monsignor John Joseph Egan, An Alley in Chicago briefs us on the firebrand priests and lay people who radiated the power and elan that made Catholics across the country look to the heartland, to Chicago's Catholic moment. They sought leadership in marriage education, in neighborhood empowerment, in urban ministries, in ecuminism, in race relations, in community organizing, from these indefatigable Chicago leaders-and they got it.

Terrorists and peacemakers may grow up in the same community and adhere to the same religious tradition. The killing carried out by one and the reconciliation fostered by the other indicate the range of dramatic and contradictory responses to human suffering by religious actors. Yet religion's ability to inspire violence is intimately related to its equally impressive power as a force for peace, especially in the growing number of conflicts around the world that involve religious claims and religiously inspired combatants. This book explains what religious terrorists and religious peacemakers...