The Idolatry of Nuclearism

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4. The "sloppy rhetoric" is not the author's.

She's simply reporting her research on a specific movement that comes out of the Catholic Left, called the Plowshares Movement. (Note the title of the book.)

The so-called "sloppy rhetoric" simply reflects the religious beliefs of many folks in the Plowshares Movement, as reflected by research.

Nepstad describes the methodology that she used in her research on the Plowshares Movement in the preface.

Methodology

Yet precisely because these activists are in and out of prison, conducting research on them was challenging at times. Before I began my work, I knew that the movement had historically experienced significant repression and that it might not be easy for an outsider to make inquires, asking people to talk about political "crimes" they committed. In fact, a priest who wrote a book chronicling Catholic Left history from 1961 to 1975 wrote, "The Catholic Left was a very volatile and fluid social phenomena not at all amenable to routine research methods. In view of it's highly illegal activities, one can hardly consult membership lists or expect to have questionnaires returned." Aware of the potential obstacles, I set out to learn as much as I could about the Plowshares movement, recognizing that I would need to take a multi-method approach.

OK, I'm tired of typing, but this initial paragraph does illustrate some of the difficulties of such research, and I'll try to make a link into the preface at google books so you can read the rest of what she has to say about her methodology.

https://books.google.com/books?id=_HTIZhUv994C&pg=PR15&lpg=PR15&dq=Yet+precisely+because+these+activists+are+in+and+out+of+prison&source=bl&ots=6AoTC0p18w&sig=U2GZvlZuPc8UCjG7Cx0b3gCweps&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CB4Q6AEwAGoVChMIvtPG2e6WxwIVgcSACh3NswrV#v=onepage&q=Yet%20precisely%20because%20these%20activists%20are%20in%20and%20out%20of%20prison&f=false