Setting the stage for its interview with author Sharon Brous, Religion News Service called her 2024 book, The Amen Effect, “an extended meditation on the importance of showing up—in good times and bad.” In it, she urges readers to “lean in to other people’s pain and suffering, and to view heartfelt encounters as a sacred act.”
This prominent rabbi calls “our universal, human longing for connection the ‘amen effect’,” the Jewish Book Council explains. The word “amen,” it adds, “serves as an acknowledgement of the other.” As Brous observes, “[A]ffirming each others’ humanity will help us heal.”
“Deeply rooted in the wisdom of the Jewish tradition”—this is how Suzanne Shanahan, executive director of the Institute for Social Concerns, describes Brous. The Presbyterian Outlook agrees: “Her voice is shaped by a deep and abiding love for the tradition she stewards, and is grounded in practical pastoral realities.” Writing for Spirituality & Practice, Jon Sweeney mentions, “Her sermons are said to be extraordinary.”
“The book focuses on how to build” what The Christian Century calls “a beloved community,” adding, “In fewer than 200 pages of text, she distills 20 years of pulpit experience,” and tells “how to practice what she preaches.”
The Amen Effect: Ancient Wisdom to Mend Our Broken Hearts and World
By Sharon Brous
Avery [an imprint of Penguin Random House], 2024