The American Experience

1. The American Experience The Democratization of Christianity in 19th Century America

2. The Second Great Awakening(1800–1830s) • NAMES : Charles Grandison Finney, Lyman Beecher, • NRMs such as the Mormons and the Holiness movement. • CAMP MEETINGS • DENOMINATIONS: Churches of Christ, the Independent Christian Churches and the Disciples of Christ, and the Seventh-day Adventist Church. 19th Century US Church History

3. Charles Grandison Finney • Born in Warren, Connecticut • Finney became a minister in the Presbyterian Church. • Finney's logical, clear presentation of his Gospel. • Finney was known for his innovations, such as allowing women to pray in public and the development of the "anxious bench," and extemporaneous preaching. • Finney was involved with the abolitionist movement. • President of Oberlin College from 1851 – 1866. Oberlin was also the first American college to allow blacks and women into the same classrooms as white men. 19th Century US Church History

4. The Camp Meeting 19th Century US Church History

5. Why did Camp Meetings work so well? • The camp meeting was a religious service of several days' length • Settlers in thinly populated areas looked to the camp meeting as a refuge • The sheer exhilaration of participating in a religious revival inspired the dancing, shouting, and singing associated with these events. • More important than the social life was the profound impact on the individual's self esteem — shattered by a sense of guilt, then restored by a sense of personal salvation. 19th Century US Church History

6. The Holiness Movement • Wesley’s A Plain Account of Christian Perfection. • In 1836 a Methodist woman, Sarah Worrall Lankford, started Tuesday Holiness Meetings in New York City. In 1837 her sister, Phoebe Palmer, experienced what she called “entire sanctification.” • CongregationalistThomas Upham. Finding precursors. • Asa Mahan, the president of Oberlin College, and Charles Grandison Finney,. In 1836 Mahan experienced what he called a “baptism with the Holy Ghost.” • PresbyterianWilliam BoardmanThe Higher Christian Life • Hannah Whitall Smith, a Quaker. 19th Century US Church History

7. The Book of Mormon • Beginnings: Joseph Smith's First Vision, 1820 • Early visits by angels, Urim and Thummim, and the Book of Mormon • A Native American prophet-warrior, Moroni showed him where to find a set of buried Golden Plates • After he said he received the Golden Plates, Smith began to dictate what he said was their translation to his wife. • Initially, during the book's translation, Smith did not allow others to see the Golden Plates. Eventually, however, Three Witnesses wrote that they were shown the plates in June 1829 by an angel. 19th Century US Church History

8. The Third Great Awakening • A period of religious activism in American history from the late 1850s to the 1900s. It gathered strength from the postmillennial theology that the Second Coming of Christ would come after mankind had reformed the entire earth. • The Social GospelMovement and new NRMs Nazarene movements, and Christian Science. • The awakening in 1858 was interrupted by the American Civil War. • After the war, Dwight Moody made revivalism the centerpiece of his activities in Chicago by founding the Moody Bible Institute. The hymns of Ira Sankey were especially influential. 19th Century US Church History

9. The Social Gospel Movement • Numerous reforms, especially the battles involving child labour, compulsory elementary education and the protection of women. • In addition there was a major crusade for the prohibition of alcohol. • The Protestant denominations all sponsored growing missionary activities inside the United States and around the world. • The YMCA became a force in many cities, as did denominational youth groups such as the Epworth League (Methodist) and the Walther League (Lutheran). 19th Century US Church History

10. New Sects • Mary Baker Eddy introduced Christian Science, which gained a national following. • In 1880, the Salvation Army denomination arrived in America. • The Society for Ethical Culture was established in New York in 1876 by Felix Adler attracted a Reform Jewish clientèle. • With Jane Addams's Hull House in Chicago as its center, the settlement house movement and the vocation of social work were deeply influenced by the Tolstoyan reworking of Christian idealism. • Jehovah’s Witnesses with Charles TazeRussell (pictured). 19th Century US Church History

11. The Fundamentalist Reaction • Fundamentalist Christianity arose mainly within British and AmericanProtestantism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries by conservativeevangelical Christians. • In a reaction to modernism, they actively affirmed a "fundamental" set of Christian beliefs: the inerrancy of the Bible, Sola Scriptura, the virgin birth of Christ, the doctrine of substitutionary atonement, the bodily resurrection of Jesus, and the imminent return of Jesus Christ. • It evolved to become more dispensational in its theology. • Most fundamentalists have strongly opposed the Roman Catholic Church for theological reasons; with cooperation on certain social issues, such as abortion and issues concerning homosexuality. 19th Century US Church History