Photograph by Aaron Burden via Unsplash
Nathan Perrin
This is the first time I’ve reviewed a book written by someone I was arrested with. Ruth Goring and I have been good friends for two and a half years, ever since the formation of Mennonite Action Chicago. Ruth’s name is frequently mentioned as a writer in the Mennonite world, but meeting her was a truly special experience.
Ruth’s latest book, “The Authority of Hunger,” is a poetry collection written from the perspective of someone who has traveled widely. Ruth has spent a large portion of her life in Colombia, a country I also share a deep love for because of my work with Community Peacemaker Teams. This isn’t a book of fond travel memories, however. It’s a book that reckons with all these experiences to reveal injustices and struggles globally. Using vivid imagery, Ruth conveys deeply uncomfortable and unjust memories across cultures.
In her poem “The airport smells of urine,” she writes:
In a crowded building, a three-year-old has wet herself.
On Facebook people with Nigerian names
declare the US president is God’s anointed.
Dear God, what brand of oil
did you use for that?
And is that sulfur floating over our cities?[i]
In such a short stanza, Ruth is able to translate multiple cultural and social tensions at once in a grand narrative and then turns the event into a spiritual lament. The demands and questions this book asks are blunt, and can be found in the first poem, “Raging.”
The wind asked questions of my heart.
What is the world you want? (My arteries
coiled like vines.) For what will you bleed?[ii]
Many of her ponderings and convictions felt like the many nights I spent with fellow activists and human rights workers who reflected on their beautiful, and frankly nightmarish, calling. We are called to bear witness to the absolute worst cruelties the world has to offer, and somehow maintain our humanity and faith. These experiences affect every facet of our relationships and lives.
My first experiences with both Kenya and Iraqi Kurdistan forever altered the way I process and think about social justice issues, but it also revealed to me that most Americans are unaware of the impact of their actions. It’s a profoundly strange feeling having to reconcile these experiences while knowing the truth that the reason we have a comfortable American culture is because of systemic oppression and injustice that is linked globally.
The beauty of the Gospel is that God suffers alongside us when we bear witness.
Ruth’s work encourages us to think globally, and not just about what’s in our own backyard. She also encourages us to see the beauty, resilience, and God moments that come with justice work. In her poem “Conscious,” she writes:
because the default of your soul is sadness
hour by hour you must choose.[iii]
That’s exactly what the secret to sustainability is when we become painfully aware of the realities of the world. Every moment is a choice to find happiness in the things we can, while committing ourselves to live prophetically in this current polycrisis.
Besides the overt Colombian imagery and Spanish language, the themes also reminded me of my time spent with the Community Peacemaker Team in Bogota. We were ending our journey together, after visiting rural villages and organizations dealing with the aftereffects of war and trauma. The atmosphere was still heavy. We were having lunch on a delegation, when a friend brought up clown noses for all of us.
In his past, he would bring clown noses to people to cheer them up. He found it an effective method of peacemaking – to introduce humor into whatever situation we find ourselves in. A day or two before that, we visited a house that was torn down illegally by paramilitaries. On the wall, written in Spanish, were the words God is love.
When my friend presented the clown noses, I was reminded of that sharp contrast. Somehow, in the destruction, we find a Gospel of hope worth clinging to – whether that’s in the form of a Bible verse partially spray-painted onto a demolished house or a clown nose given at an unexpected moment. While God expects us to look at the harsh realities of the world, he also calls us to recognize his grace and work in everyday moments.
The beauty of the Gospel is that God suffers alongside us when we bear witness. And, like the poem “Raging” says, he points to all that is happening and says: “What is the world you want… for what will you bleed?”
Nathan Perrin (he/him/his) is a writer and Anabaptist pastor in Chicagoland. He holds an MA in Quaker Studies and is a doctoral student studying Christian Community Development at Northern Seminary. His doctorate work centers on creating a writing program for nonprofits and churches to use to help under-resourced communities process trauma. His work has been published in the Dillydoun Review, Bangalore Review, Collateral Journal, Esoterica Magazine, etc. His novella Memories of Green Rivers was published in 2026 by Running Wild Press. He is also a screenwriter. For more information, visit www.nathanperrinwriter.com
The views expressed are those of the author and not necessarily those of American Baptist Home Mission Societies.
Note: Ruth Goring has given the author permission to quote fragments of her poems in this article.
[i] Ruth Goring, “The airport smells like urine,” in The Authority of Hunger (Fernwood Press, 2026), pg.79.
[ii] Ibid., “Raging,” pg. 11.
[iii] Ibid, “Conscious,” pg. 96.
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