Publishing Portfolio

In 2016 I was upset by the presidential election when a populist rabble-rouser I will not name prevailed over Hillary Clinton. Sick with despair, I decided to sell my cozy little house for one and move to an intentional peace community for a return to the values of my youth. A Catholic sister whom I had advised on a book told me about a nearby community of RSCJ (Society of the Sacred Heart) sisters. We met, and after a period of mutual discernment they invited me to rent the house across the street from them, and they sent two young women from their waiting list. We called ourselves the Extended Kearny Street community in DC's "little Rome" neighborhood near Catholic University. The following year I helped them open Anne Montgomery House, named for an RSCJ antinuclear activist. Megan Rice, SHCJ was our neighbor at both houses, and she and I became good friends. She and Anne Montgomery had been so close that the latter inspired her in antinuclear action.

 

Megan and I found the book on the left that Liturgical Press had announced but not yet published. She was quite surprised (understatement) that the press had launched a book without telling her! I contacted them, and the very kind author graciously stepped back and allowed me to take over the book, with Megan advising me. Megan insisted that it be about all of the activists, not just her, so we reimagined it with her protest companions Greg Boertje-Obed and Michael Walli on the cover as well. I never would have presumed to launch a Plowshares book on my own, but we became convinced that this odd turn of events was a dynamic combination of the Holy Spirit and the great generosity of both the first author and the publisher.

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Here are links to this book, and also to my other work about Megan:

• Transform Now Plowshares: https://a.co/d/6qZtGfF

• Article about Megan for Politico: A Catholic Activist Who Saw Nuclear Weapons as a Social Injustice

• This article was published in newspapers worldwide: Nuns against nuclear weapons – Plowshares protesters have fought for disarmament for over 40 years, going to prison for peace (theconversation.com)

• Her New York Times obituary. I alerted them to her death (they had missed it), and I gave the reporter background from the book. He quoted me: Fierce Critic of U.S. Nuclear Arsenal Dies at 91