In searching, sensitive, and stunningly thorough essay, supplemented with case studies and poetry, and drawing lucidly on important psychological theorists, Capps portrays hope as the fundamental nucleus and engine of human experience. He wants to remind pastors that fueling this hope is their distinctive and distinctively Christian calling. James Dittes, Yale University Don Capps has written a lucid and persuasive account of the one task unique to the ministry: to be an agent of hope. His eschatological imagination pops up repeatedly in his case studies and phenomenology of hoping, translating into concrete terms the promise of a God of hope for people in the most hopeless of situations. A book rich in insights and a pleasure to read. Robert A. Johnson, Wellesley College This book is an intelligent reclamation of the theological virtue of hope, which goes to the very heart of the psychology and spirituality of pastoral ministry. Patricia Howery Davis, Perkins School of Theology Southern Methodist University