This book to fully examines the web of legal and ethical questions that arise when criminal prosecutions are mounted against parents whose children die as a result of religion-based medical neglect. It explores efforts to balance judicial protections for the religious liberty of faith-healers against the state's obligation to the rights of children.

Relying on religious traditions that are as old as their faith itself, many devout Christians turn to prayer rather than medicine when their children fall victim to illness or injury. Faith healers claim that their practices are effective in restoring health - more effective, they say, than modern medicine. But, over the past century, hundreds of children have died after being denied the basic medical treatments furnished by physicians because of their parents' intense religious beliefs. The tragic deaths of these youngsters have received intense scrutiny from both the news media and public authorities seeking to protect the health and welfare of children.

[Peters] provides a vivid, almost anthropological account of the juridification of US society.