The Prisoner’s Cross. Peter B. Unger

The saving grace of God in Christ as a liberating experience of faith lies at the heart of The Prisoner's Cross. The message is timeless and has its source in Jesus's ministry and mission. Both Jop, a former POW, and Don, a graduate student, at different times and in different ways are in desperate need of this liberation. Jop serves as a witness to the power that grace has to liberate one from the worst possible tragedies and trauma they can experience in life. Don serves as one who desperately needs to hear this message. Don stands in for many Christians and spiritual seekers in our time. Like them, Don finds himself grappling with the lasting issues of injustice, suffering, and evil. Shaped by the influences of modern secularism and repulsed by the idolatry of church institutionalism, Don feels he has had the rug of a vital and relevant faith pulled out from underneath him. Like many, Don feels an unresolved anger, even rage, over the senseless injustices in his life that neither the institutional Christianity he encounters, or the secular culture that marginalizes and pervades it, have an antidote for.