Catherine Booth

Synopsis: Catherine Booth's achievements--as a revivalist, social reformer, champion of women's rights, and, with her husband William Booth, co-founder of The Salvation Army--were widely recognized in her lifetime. However, Catherine Booth's life and work has since been largely neglected. This neglect has extended to her theological ideas, even though they were critical to the formation of Salvationism, the spirituality of the movement she cofounded. This book examines the implicit theology that undergirds Catherine Booth's Salvationist spirituality and reveals the ethical concerns at the heart of her soteriology and the integral relationship between the social and evangelical aspects of Christian mission in her thought. Catherine Booth emerges as a significant figure from the Victorian era, a British theologian and church leader with a rare if not unique intellectual and theological perspective: that of a woman. Endorsements: "Catherine Booth is rightly honored for the crucial role she played in shaping the Salvation Army and for her contribution to social reform and women's rights in the second half of the nineteenth century. Despite that recognition, in-depth, academic studies of her life and work have been thin. So, John Read's scholarly and eminently readable book is a very welcome volume. It deserves to be widely read." --Chick Yuill, author of Moving in the Right Circles "Many books describe Catherine Booth the person, but no one has demonstrated her pivotal role in shaping the spirituality of the Salvation Army better than Read. His penetrating reading of primary sources identifies the core evangelical and theological convictions that underpin her spirituality. Booth was not only the theological founder of the Army; she was a far more important practical theologian than many have imagined. Read's book is lively and persuasive." --Kent Brower, Senior Research Fellow, Nazarene Theological College "John Read has produced an outstanding study of Catherine Booth's theology, which he argues underlies her Salvationist spirituality. . . . Read shows convincingly how Catherine shaped Army self-understanding and was its leading apologist. He offers important new perspectives on the intellectual development of a radical Christian movement." --Ian Randall, Senior Research Fellow, International Baptist Theological Seminary Author Biography: John Read is a Salvation Army officer currently serving as the Army's ecumenical officer for the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland.