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Many years ago Forbes accepted a call to ministry even though he had studied to become a medical doctor at Howard University. In retirement he is now hoping to specialize in a new type of healing. He has founded the Healing of the Nations Foundation. The foundation’s ministry was inspired by a verse in Revelation: fand the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations” (22:2).

“We are called upon to be the leaves of the tree,” Forbes asserts. Healing takes place within each of us, through the immune system; Forbes calls for us also to help to heal the body politic, and to heal others around us.

“What would be your diagnosis, Dr. Forbes, of where we are and what we need to go forward?” asks Dean Lloyd. In leading up to his answer, Forbes recounts a mysterious event that happened in New York shortly after the attacks of September 11, 2001. One Sunday morning, a white pigeon flew out of rubble that had been thought to contain no life. Forbes viewed this incident as an answer to the prayer, “God bless America, land that we love.”

Forbes speaks of the role of mammon—money—as the ruling power in modern America. “Money is not a measure of all things,” Forbes says. “If we could overcome the materialism, we would be well on the way” to healing.

Forbes asks us to consider whether the purpose of religion is to use God to attain what we desire, or to discern God’s will for ourselves and others. “It’s possible to get stuck in…self-aggrandizing impact,” he warns. Feeling protected by God is what he calls “first-semester religion,” whereas God wants to go further, to send us out to help others.

“Whatever you receive, pass it on,” Forbes summarizes. He challenges everyone to combat poverty, seek health care for all in the United States, and to place less emphasis on “wedge issues.”

“What can be done to give poverty a voice in America?” asks Lloyd. Forbes describes campaigns today as a “luxury item” that can be owned by people with access to large amounts of money, and wonders aloud what a “poverty lobby” would look like. He reiterates, “You can’t serve God and mammon. We ought to do a campaign to see if we could get people to conscientiously commit to serving God rather than mammon.”

About the Guest

The Rev. Dr. James A. Forbes, Jr. is senior minister emeritus of The Riverside Church in New York City and president of the Healing of the Nations Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to the spiritual revitalization of America. An internationally renowned preacher and social activist, he was also host of “The Time Is Now“ national radio program on the Air America network.

• More about James A. Forbes, Jr..

• Visit the Healing of the Nations Foundation.
• Visit “The Time Is Now” program website and read about Dr. Forbes’ conversations with newsmakers and religious leaders.
• Read Dr. Forbes’ blog postings on The Washington Post/Newsweek online forum, On Faith:.
• Read the transcript of a 2003 PBS “Now with Bill Moyers” profile of Dr. Forbes and access resources on the social gospel movement.