Christianity takes root in America

1. Christianity takes root in America Gonzalez, Chaps. 25-26

2. The Thirteen Colonies

3. Virginia Colony • Jamestown (1607)

4. The Mayflower & Plymouth Colony (1620)

5. The Northern Puritan Colonies

6. Rhode Island & the Baptists (1644)

7. Maryland Colony (1632) • Founded by Cecil Calvert, Lord Baltimore

8. The Mid-Atlantic Colonies • New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware

9. The First Great Awakening • Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758)

10. The “Half-Way Covenant” Controversy (1662) • New England Congregationalism • The idea of “partial church membership” was promoted by Solomon Stoddard, the grandfather of Jonathan Edwards • Many felt that the second and third generations of immigrants were lax in their Puritan zeal for religion • Massachusetts law thus required a “personal experience of conversion” for full membership – Full-Covenant Keepers; those who could not fully accept the terms of church membership could not have their children baptized • The Half-Way Covenant allowed for the children and grandchildren of those who could not fully accept the terms of membership to be baptized anyway, in hopes that in time and under the influence of the church’s preaching they would be converted • This controversy provided the impetus behind the later Great Awakening

11. The First “Great Awakening” • Pietist ideas flowing into the New World • New Hampton, MA (1734) – Jonathan Edwards began to preach on the need for a personal experience of conversion; the response to this idea among Edwards’ peers was mixed • Many people began to respond enthusiastically to this message, some with emotional outbursts, but many with profoundly changed lives • Movement swept the area and reached into Connecticut, then began to subside after three years • New impetus was given to it by George Whitefield, who was invited to preach at Edwards’ church in New Hampton

12. The Great Awakening spreads to other colonies and denominations • Whitefield’s popularity gave new impetus to the movement, and its influence spread throughout the colonies • Originally affecting only Congregationalists, the movement now spread to Anglicans and Presbyterians as well; the Awakening brought new zeal to the pulpits • “Old Light” vs. “New Light” controversies in various denominations; (“Old Side” vs. “New Side” in Presbyterianism) • Controversy caused a temporary split within Presbyterianism

13. Baptists embrace the Great Awakening • At first, the Baptists opposed the movement, calling it frivolous and superficial • However, the Great Awakening had an unanticipated affect on the early American theological landscape: the theology of “conversion experience” seemed best suited for the practice of “believer’s baptism” (recall the “Half-Way Covenant” controversy) • As a result of the Great Awakening, many Congregationalists and even Anglicans and Presbyterians would eventually reject infant baptism, and become Baptists

14. The American Frontier • The Great Awakening had its most dramatic effect on the western frontier • The Baptists and the Methodists quickly took advantage of this, and thus were the big “winners” with respect to number of conversions

15. Events that shaped the nation

16. The Independence of the Thirteen Colonies

17. The effects of independence on the denominations • Anglicans suffered due to their association with Great Britain; remaining parishes organize into the Protestant Episcopal Church (1783-1789) • Methodism at first suffered for the same reasons as Anglicanism; organized in 1784 (Christmas Conference) • Despite the widespread influence of the Great Awakening, Congregationalism stayed mainly in New England • Baptists grew quickly in Virginia and the southern states, penetrating into the new territories of Tennessee and Kentucky • New “homegrown” denominations (e.g. Disciples of Christ) grew out of response and reaction to denominationalism (i.e. The Restorationist Movement)

18. Disciples of Christ • Thomas Campbell (1763-1854) • Alexander Campbell (1788-1866)

19. The effects of immigration in 18th – 19th centuries • Unprecedented immigration from Europe from the late 18th century and throughout the 19th century; particularly from Germany; due partly from the Napoleonic Wars • Continuing slave trade brought many unwilling immigrants from Africa • The Catholic Church, once a small minority, quickly became the largest religious body as immigrants came in from France, Germany, Poland and later from Ireland (1846 – Great Famine) • The growth of the Catholic Church provoked strong anti-Catholic sentiment and reaction • Lutheranism also grew rapidly, as immigrants from Scandinavia poured into the frontier • Others: Mennonites, Moravians, Eastern Orthodox, Jews

20. The “sects” Those who aspired to live into the ideal of religious community

21. The “Shakers” • Founder: Mother Ann Lee (1736-1784)

22. The Moravians • Lititz, PA

23. Schwarzenau Brethren (Dunkers) • Dunkers Church, Antietam, MD

24. Ephrata, Pennsylvania • 1732, Founded by the Mystic Order of the Solitary (“Seventh-Day” Dunkers)

25. The Mennonites & The Amish

26. Oneida Community (New York) • Founded 1848

27. New ReligionS

28. “Latter Day Saints”: The Mormons • Founder: Joseph Smith, Jr. • Smith claimed to have been visited by an angel (Moroni) who led him to a collection of golden tablets written in ancient Egyptian hieroglyths, as well as two “seer stones” with which it was possible to read the tablets • Hidden behind a curtain, Smith dictated his translation of the sacred tablets to others who wrote it down; the result was the Book of Mormon (1830) • Smith’s continuing visions led him and his followers further and further away from orthodox Christianity • Founding an autonomous colony in Illinois, tensions grew between the Smith’s followers and the rest of society

29. Brigham Young takes over leadership • Smith fell afoul of a lynch mob in Illinois, resulting in his “martyrdom” • The leadership of the movement fell to Brigham Young, who led the Mormons to Utah; there they established an autonomous state until the United States took possession of the territory in 1850; war broke out in 1857 • The state of Utah was admitted into the union in 1890 when the Mormon church officially abandoned the practice of polygamy

30. Joseph Smith & Brigham Young • Smith (1805-1844) • Young (1801-1877)

31. Watchtower Society: “Jehovah’s Witnesses” • The 18th century was a period of wild speculation on biblical prophecy (i.e. Adventist movement); most of this speculation occurred within the context of essentially traditional orthodox teaching • Charles Taze Russell, a popular Bible teacher, declared that there were three “great Satans”: government, business, and the church; he also rejected the doctrine of the Trinity • Disappointed that the Second Coming of Christ did not visibly occur in 1874 (as he and other adventist teachers had come to believe); he revised his beliefs to say that Christ’s return was “invisible,” and that he had been ruling from the heavens ever since. He went on to say that the present age of the “Gentiles” would end in 1914

32. Jehovah’s Witnesses • Russell interpreted the outbreak of World War I as the beginning of Armageddon • Needless to say Russell’s predictions did not come to pass as they thought they would, leading to yet further revisions in the beliefs of his followers • Russell died in 1917; Joseph F. Rutherford (“Judge Rutherford”) took control of the movement, turning it into a missionary society and reinterpreting Russell’s teaching after the fiasco of 1914

33. Charles Taze Russell (1852-1916)

34. Christian Science • Founder: Mary Baker Eddy; suffered repeated illnesses and addiction to morphine for the pain • Went to P.P. Quimby, who claimed that illness was error, and knowledge of truth sufficed to cure it; Eddy was cured by Quimby and became his follower until his death • Several years later she published Science and Health, with a Key to the Scriptures (1875) • Eddy reinterpreted many traditional Christian terms in “gnostic” fashion; her main teaching was the illness was a mental error, which only proper knowledge could cure • The Church of Christ, Scientist was officially founded in 1879

35. Mary Baker Eddy (1821 -1910)

36. Second Great Awakening

37. Second Great Awakening • New England, late 18th century • Not marked by great emotional outbursts, but rather by a sudden earnestness in Christian devotion and living • Did not have the anti-intellectual overtones that overtook the First Great Awakening

38. Timothy Dwight (1752-1817) • President of Yale; grandson of Jonathan Edwards

39. Societies and movements that were founded… • American Bible Society (1816) • American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (1810) • Baptist General Convention • American Colonization Society (1816) • American Society for the Promotion of Temperance (1816) • Women’s Christian Temperance Union

40. Cane Ridge Revival (1801) • Cane Ridge, Kentucky

41. Barton Stone (1772-1884) • Founder, along with Alexander Stone, of the Disciples of Christ (Christian Church) Movement

42. Restorationist Movement • “Stone-Campbell” Movement • Disciples of Christ • Christian Church • Churches of Christ • Sought to restore the primitive church • Weekly Lord’s Supper • No clergy • Baptism of believers only – necessary for salvation

43. Camp Meeting Movement

44. Manifest Destiny • President James Monroe (1823) – the “Monroe Doctrine” • “Manifest Destiny” coined in 1845 – impetus for the western expansion of the United States all the way to the Pacific Ocean • The Republic of Texas was annexed to the United States in 1845 • Oregon territory (disputed with Great Britain) finally resolved in 1846 • Mexican territory was the only obstacle to realizing “Manifest Destiny”

45. Churches begin to divide over two important issues • Manifest Destiny & Slavery • The War with Mexico was seen as both naked aggression and as an attempt to re-institute slavery in lands where it had been banned (Mexico had banned slavery in 1824)

46. Early Christian Protests against Slavery • As early as 1776, Quakers had expelled from their communities everyone who insisted on holding slaves • Christmas Conference of 1784, which had organized American Methodism, also banned slaveholding among its members • Many early Baptists had taken a similar stance, though early on they lacked a national organization to enforce it • However, of all the early protests, the Quakers were the only ones to remain firm; Methodists and Baptists began to attract southern slaveholders • The General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church, while declaring its opposition to the slave trade, also declared its opposition to abolition

47. Abolition Movement • Early in American history the feelings towards abolition were uniform throughout the country (north and south), with significant abolitionist sentiments throughout • American Colonization Society (1817) • Republic of Liberia • Overtime the Abolition Movement became stronger and stronger in the north; the opposite was happening in the south

48. Church Splits over Slavery • The Methodist Church split in 1844 when the General Conference condemned the bishop of Georgia for holding slaves • The Southern Baptist Convention was formed when the Home Mission Society refused a missionary candidate recommended by the Georgia Baptist Convention on the grounds that he owned slaves • In 1861, southern presbyteries of the Presbyterian Church founded their own denomination • The only denominations able to weather the storm without schism were the Catholics and the Episcopalians

49. The American Civil War (1861-1865)

50. African-American Churches • African-Methodist Episcopal Church (1816)