Word: oxnam
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Back in 1990, Robert Oxnam was on top of the world. He had parlayed an academic career as a China scholar into the presidency of the prestigious Asia Society, the leading sponsor of cultural, educational and artistic contact between the U.S. and Asia. And because the late '80s were a time of increasing political unrest in China--culminating in the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre--Oxnam, now 62, was frequently tapped by political leaders to help them figure out how to deal with the Chinese. He even accompanied former President George H.W. Bush as an on-the-ground adviser...
...same time, however, Oxnam's private life was falling apart. He suffered from alcoholism and bulimia and flew into frequent, irrational rages. Several nights a week, as he admits in his courageous new memoir, A Fractured Mind (Hyperion; 285 pages), he performed what he calls his addiction ritual. "It required," he writes, "two packs of cigarettes, Polish sausage, a gallon of ice cream, a two-pound bag of peanuts, a bottle of scotch, and a pornographic movie...
...former president of the World Methodist Council; in New York City. A staunch ecumenist, Parlin was the first American layman to be named to the six-member presidium of the World Council of Churches, where he served from 1961 to 1968. A lawyer, he defended Methodist Bishop G. Bromley Oxnam when the House Un-American Activities Committee investigated charges in 1953 that Oxnam had a Communist Party affiliation...
There was a time early on in that memorable campaign when Methodist Bishop G. Bromley Oxnam of Washington harrumphed his displeasure at the thought of having a Catholic President. Kennedy acted as though his career had been shattered. He eagerly accepted an invitation to meet with a gathering of the Methodist church's hierarchy and then waited like a schoolboy for their report. When Methodism's judgment was still negative on Kennedy, he was chagrined and sought to ease the blow in the press with a touch of wit. "Careful," he said to reporters, "you may determine...
Methodist officials are understandably embarrassed by the situation, since they support Oxnam in his desire to improve the university but do not want the divinity school to lose its luster. Unfortunately, the atmosphere of distrust and discouragement at the seminary is such that there now seems to be no way to halt its decline-and Oxnam may find it difficult to hire qualified replacements for the men who have already quit...