Through interviews and biographical profiles, Cloud of Witnesses introduces us to a company of modern witnesses-peacemakers, martyrs, saints-who have embodied the gospel challenge of our day. We meet Dorothy Day, founder of the Catholic Worker movement; Fannie Lou Hamer, champion of the freedom struggle in Mississippi; Thomas Merton, the Trappist monk and prophet of peace; and Martin Luther King, Jr. Some have endured persecution: Martin Niemoeller, the pastor who spent years as Hitler's prisoner; Jon Sobrino, who escaped the massacre of his Jesuit community in El Salvador; Brian Wilson, the peace activist whose legs were severed by a train carrying weapons to Central America. All of them - whether from Africa, Asia, Latin America, Europe, or the United States - give proof and inspiration that the gospel can be lived in our time.