Family Conscience: A Memoir of Four Generations

This memoir explores the role of conscience in four generations during a century of family history. It begins with the suicide of Barbour's maternal grandfather and the impact of this traumatic event. Later chapters describe his interactions with other grandparents, parents, two uncles, siblings, a former spouse, and two sons. Family Conscience depicts the values and patterns of self-assessment that members of this family share and also the ways their differing moral views have been influenced by interactions with one another. Barbour interprets how he and family members have understood work and vocation, religious commitments, political and economic values, choices about marriage and raising children, conflicts within the family, and other situations and issues. This thematic family memoir blends the genres of biography, oral interview, autobiography, essay, and cultural history as Barbour depicts how conscience was transmitted and transformed through the generations.

Author: John D. Barbour
Publisher: Cascade Books
Published: 06/17/2025
Pages: 304
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.91lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.69d
ISBN13: 9781532636370
ISBN10: 1532636377
BISAC Categories:
- Biography & Autobiography | Educators
- Biography & Autobiography | Religious

About the Author
John D. Barbour is professor of religion emeritus at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota, where he taught from 1982 to 2018 and served as Martin Marty Chair of Religion and the Academy and Boldt Chair in the Humanities. He wrote five scholarly books, most recently Journeys of Transformation (2022), as well as Renunciation: A Novel (Resource Publications, 2013).