This passionate and powerfully argued book takes its title from President Bush’s inaugural speech, when he quoted 18C statesman John Page, who enquired if it were not ‘an angel who directed the storm’ within which America came into being.

Michael Northcott appraises two visions of religious freedom: the apocalyptic vision of George W. Bush and the Christian conservatives who back his policies, particularly in relation to Iraq and the so-called war on terror; and the peaceable vision of a Christian majority elsewhere who resist what they view as American neo-imperialism with an overlay of Christian apocalyptic rhetoric. Northcott suggests that Americans urgently need to recover a Christian critique of ‘Empire’ if their religion is to avoid the charge of idolatry.