They insist they are just a group of friends, yet they funnel millions of dollars through tax-free corporations. They claim to disdain politics, but congressmen of both parties describe them as the most influential religious organization in Washington. They say they are not Christians, but simply believers.

Behind the scenes at every National Prayer Breakfast since 1953 has been the Family, an elite network dedicated to a religion of power for the powerful. Their goal is "Jesus plus nothing." Their method is backroom diplomacy. "The Family" is the startling story of how their faith--part free-market fundamentalism, part imperial ambition--has come to be interwoven with the affairs of nations around the world.

Reviews

Verdict: Sharlet's storytelling is elegant, and his evocation of the mood of theologian Jonathan Edwards's work is one of the most compelling this reviewer has ever read. Further, his analysis of what such seemingly mundane details as the wording of prayers reveal about the mindset of his subjects is perceptive. Highly recommended for public and academic libraries. Background: Sharlet (editor & founder, www.killingthebuddha.com) has unearthed an occurrence that is all the more startling for its being hidden in plain view: the transformation of Jesus's teachings by a widespread network of powerful elites in American government, military, and industry into a gospel of laissez-faire capitalism, American imperialism, and control of the masses. In 2002, Sharlet infiltrated this elite fundamentalist network, known as The Family, and lived for weeks with several of its members. Here, he draws on that experience as well as on archival sources and interviews to trace the roots of fundamentalism, follow the mid-20th-century development of The Family by way of cell groups and prayer breakfasts, and explore the populist conversion of these concepts in the present-day setting of the Colorado Springs church of superpastor Ted Haggard.--Nancy E. Adams, Harrisburg Area Community Coll., PA Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.

"A brilliant marriage of investigative journalism and history, an unsettling story of how this small but powerful group shaped the faith of the nation in the 20th century and drives the politics of empire in the 21st. Anyone interested in circles of power will love this book."--Debby Applegate, author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Most Famous Man in America: The Biography of Henry Ward Beecher