Donald W. Shriver Jr. has been selected for the coveted prize, which honors creative ideas illuminating the relationship between human beings and the divine, and how that relationship might empower people and communities.
Shriver, president emeritus of Union Theological Seminary in New York City, was chosen for his book, Honest Patriots: Loving a Country Enough to Remember Its Misdeeds, published in 2005 by Oxford University Press.
The award, named for H. Charles Grawemeyer, comes with a $200,000 prize and is given jointly by Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary and the University of Louisville. Other Grawemeyer awards recognize excellence in music composition, education, ideas improving world order, and psychology.
“My astonishment was exceeded only by my gratitude,” Shriver said shortly after learning of his selection. “It is an honor to be in the company of such distinguished past recipients,” he said.
The Religion award was first presented in 1990, and the most recent winners include Margaret Farley (2008), Timothy Tyson (2007), Marilynne Robinson (2006), and George M. Marsden (2005).
Shriver, who was nominated by his editor at Oxford University Press, was chosen after an extensive selection process that lasted about 10 months.
“We look for works that are creative, and that treat important topics with clarity and power,” said Susan R. Garrett, professor of New Testament at Louisville Seminary and coordinator of the Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion. This year’s winner is a “great example” of such a work.
In Garrett’s recommendation of Shriver, she said, “The premise of Donald W. Shriver’s book is that both gratitude and contrition are necessary for honest patriotism.”
“Uncritical love of country – love that refuses to see and publicly acknowledge past errors – is destructive to the social fabric and permits continuing misdeeds,” she said. “By contrast, Shriver shows that public recognition and collective repentance for wrongs done promote mending of that fabric and open the way to a better future for all.”
Shriver contends that the United States particularly needs to acknowledge and repent of its historical treatment of African- and Native-Americans, and then try to repair and repay the debt for those past wrongs in public ways. He spotlights the efforts of Germany and South Africa to foster and express collective repentance.
“We like to acknowledge our virtues from the past; we do not like to acknowledge our vices,” he said. America believes any flaws it has are in the process of being improved, but a flaw cannot be improved “until you rightly remember it.”
An honest confession is good for the soul, “and I believe that includes the soul of the nation,” Shriver said. He noted that Honest Patriots is a sequel to his earlier book, An Ethic for Enemies: Forgiveness in Politics, published by Oxford University Press in 1995.
Shriver will accept his award and speak on the winning publication on March 4, 2009, at Louisville Seminary.
