Othering: The Beautiful Life of John Woolman

How spiritual formation breaks the grip of self-absorption

If you Google the word “abolitionist,” you will immediately find entries about Frederick Douglas, Harriet Beecher Stowe, William Lloyd Garrison, the Underground Railroad, and in England, William Wilberforce. John Woolman (1720--1772) preceded them all.

Sometimes called the American saint—definitely an American original—Woolman was the original spiritual…