The Rhetorical Leadership of Fulton J. Sheen, Norman Vincent Peale, and Billy Graham in the Age of Extremes by Timothy H. Sherwood (review)

Timothy H. Sherwood, a priest of the Diocese of St. Petersburg, Florida, views the post–World War II era as one of extremes, stretching the “emotional limits of the human psyche” (p. 3). The postwar era, following the Great Depression and more than five years of conflict in Europe, the Pacific, and North Africa, had taken its toll. Americans, enjoying the flight to the suburbs, increasing affluence, and the good life in general, into which the baby boomers were born, just as quickly, were confronted with the nuclear arms race, the cold war, and rising religious indifference. Citing Life magazine as a source, the author notes the publication’s choice of three religious leaders who rose in defense: Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen, Dr. Billy Graham, and Dr. Norman Vincent Peale.

Peale made people feel good about themselves; Graham preached an evangelical conversion bringing people to Christ; and Sheen served as an intellectual apologist, whose powers of reason confronted movements and individuals who threatened religious faith, democracy, and the American way of life. Each had his own particular audience, but all, according to Sherwood, answered the fundamental fears weighing on American hearts.

Such is not to say that the pastor of New York City’s Marble Collegiate Church, America’s itinerant minister, and the then-auxiliary bishop of New York and national director of the Society for the Propagation of the Faith had volumes in common; take, for example, Peale’s famous 1960 petition highly questioning the suitability of one professing the Roman Catholic faith to occupy the presidential office or the statement of Graham in his autobiography, Just As I Am (San Francisco, 1997), that his admiration for much of Catholicism did not preclude his disagreements with many of its doctrines. Nonetheless, each used his rhetorical ability to a similar end as far as modern culture was concerned, and it is the author’s contention that in this vein, all three made great strides in calming fears and strengthening character.

Sherwood’s argument is an interesting one, and he well substantiates his premises. Whether it be a voice of reason, an evangelical fervor, or a fiery populism, America was surely covered in the face of adversity.