Virtue Magazine

Imagine yourself at a banquet surrounded by the most mouth-watering array of food you have ever experienced in your life. There’s a catch, however: you can only have a small taste of each dish; then you have to move on to the next one.

Readers will find themselves in an equivelant situation while browsing through Charles Colson’s book Burden of Truth: Defending Truth in an Age of Unbelief. Written in 1997, the book contains roughly 150 short essays that cover a wide variety of topics dealing essentially with Biblical and moral truth. Each essay is only about two pages long, but Colson uses his wonderfully concise and delightful style of writing to pack each essay full of powerful arguments, observations and thoughts.

Needless to say, Burden of Truth is just as relevant now as it was when first published nearly a decade ago.

First, a little history about the author of the book. Charles Colson served as the chief council for President Richord Nixon, where he gained a reputation as the president’s “hatchet man.” Colson once went so far as to say, “I’d walk over my own grandmother to re-elect Richard Nixon.”

Like others in the Nixon administration, Colson ran into trouble with the law, eventually serving seven months in a correctional facililty in Alabama. It was during this time that Colson converted to evangelical Christianity.

Once out of prison, Colson founded Prison Fellowship, an organization dedicated to bringing the Gospel to those behind bars. He became an avid defender of a Biblical worldview, and a harsh critic of evolution, Darwinism and secularism. In 1993, Colson was awarded the Templeton Prize for “Progress in Religion.”

Burden of Truth provides further evidence of Colson’s political, philosophical and religious rebirth. He writes about—among other things—the “war of worldviews” in today’s society, our current state of education, liberal distortions, crime and culture, art, religion, the church, virtue, and morality.

Colson is a wonderful writer, and he draws the reader in with his warm and friendly manner. While he occasionally levels heavy criticism at certain segments of the political and social arena, in most essays he takes on the role of an adept storyteller who invites the reader in for a short conversation. It is truly amazing how much detail and thought Colson puts into each short essay, and how much of an impact each essay can have on the reader.

In his essay “Park Your Brains at the Door,” Colson examines some of the content that children are subjected to in public schools, and how parents are (mis)treated when they actually have the temerity to question this objectionable content. In another essay, Colson recalls how a British schoolteacher once refused to let her students attend Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet because the play is “too heterosexual.”

Colson fills his essays with these type of interesting and often eye-opening incidents. Read about Beverly Schnell, who was fined $8,000 dollars for a newspaper ad in which she advertised for a “mature Christian handyman.” Schnell, a Christian, was looking for a tenant to help remodel her home in return for lower rent, and wanted to give the task to a fellow believer.

Or read about how on Valentine’s Day one year, a group of women from the organization “Lesbian Avengers” stood in the hallways of a Massechusetts elementary school, handing out candy and leaflets that said, “Lesbians are everywhere! . . . Girls who love girls and women who love women are OK Happy Valentine’s Day.”

Of course, there’s also the story of a young mother who could not afford an abortion, but was so desperate for one that she shot herself in the stomach. The woman went into premature labor three months early, and the two-pound baby girl survived for two weeks before dieing. According to Colson, while the incident “sparked a storm of political debate” between pro-life and pro-abortion groups, one aspect of the story was seemingly forgotten: the woman, originally desperate for an abortion, was later heartbroken when the little girl died. “I’ve never had nothing hurt so bad,” she said after the baby’s death.

Writes Colson: “What almost no one has picked up is the other side to this story: the change in [the mother] herself. Once she actually saw her tiny baby and held her in her arms, Kawana was overwhelmed with a deep love. She gave her baby a name—Brittany—and reportedly told her family that she hoped desperately the baby would survive. At the baby’s funeral, she wept openly . . .”

This is powerful stuff, and Colson narrates story after story like this, appealing to both conservative and liberal readers alike. It’s a startling change of pace from the normal harsh spectrum of politics, but it is a welcome change.

As Colson himself notes, “the lesson for you and me is to look behind the headlines, which often treat only the political and economic dimensions of current events.”

Certainly some people may not like the fact that the essays in Burden of Truth are so short, and unfortunately there are very few footnotes or references cited in the book. However, the quality of the essays more than makes up for their lack of length, and Colson’s attempt to look at issues from a more personal standpoint makes for an interesting, though provoking, and at times even emotional read.

Burden of Truth: Defending Truth in an Age of Unbelief
by Charles Colson with Anne Morse
Published in 1997 by Tyndale House Publishers
310 pages

Rating: 4 1/2 out of 5 stars