The Democratization of American ChristianityA provocative reassessment of religion and culture in the early days of the American republic "The so-called Second Great Awakening was the shaping epoch of American Protestantism, and this book is the most important study of it ever published."—James Turner, Journal of Interdisciplinary History
Winner of the John Hope Franklin Publication Prize, the Society for Historians of the Early American Republic book prize, and the Albert C. Outler Prize In this provocative reassessment of religion and culture in the early days of the American republic, Nathan O. Hatch argues that during this period American Christianity was democratized and common people became powerful actors on the religious scene. Hatch examines five distinct traditions or mass movements that emerged early in the nineteenth century—the Christian movement, Methodism, the Baptist movement, the black churches, and the Mormons—showing how all offered compelling visions of individual potential and collective aspiration to the unschooled and unsophisticated. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 62
... Protestants . Bob , we shall long remember your clear exposition of the proper distinction be- tween schismatic , heretic , and infidel . Each of these co - workers also contributed to the completion of this book : Bob Burke gave up a ...
... Protestant ministers and church members in the United States.1 Between the American Revolution and 1845 , the population of the United States grew at a staggering rate : two and a half million became 3 twenty million in seventy years ...
... Protestantism has been skewed away from central ecclesiastical institutions and high culture ; it has been pushed and pulled into its present shape by a democratic or populist orientation . At the very time that British clergy were ...
... Protestant denominations as " sectarians . " The fundamental history of this period may be , as Roland Berthoff suggests , a story of things left out . 1o Churches and religious movements after 18oo operated in a climate of withering ...
... Protestant focus in order to trace the rise of a full - fledged populist clergy . 24 In the same vein , I focus on common developments rather than those characteristic of a given region such as the South , the " Burned - Over District ...
Contents
3 | |
17 | |
49 | |
67 | |
The Sovereign Audience | 125 |
The Right to Think for Oneself | 162 |
Upward Aspiration and Democratic Dissent | 193 |
The Recurring Populist | 210 |
A Sampling of Anticlerical | 227 |
Notes | 244 |
Index | 305 |
Other editions - View all
The Democratization of American Christianity Nathan O. Hatch,Professor Nathan O Hatch Limited preview - 1989 |