Brett Malcolm Grainger's Books

Church in the Wild

Evangelicals in Antebellum America

By: Brett Malcolm Grainger

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Church in the Wild

Evangelicals in Antebellum America

By: Brett Malcolm Grainger

A religious studies scholar argues that in antebellum America, evangelicals, not Transcendentalists, connected ordinary Americans with their spiritual roots in the natural world. We have long credited Emerson and his fellow Transcendentalists with revolutionizing religious life in America and introducing a new appreciation of nature. Breaking with Protestant orthodoxy, these New Englanders claimed that God could be found not in church but in forest, fields, and streams. Their spiritual nonconformity had thrilling implications but never traveled far beyond their circle. In this essential reconsideration of American faith in the years leading up to the Civil War, Brett Malcolm Grainger argues that it was not the Transcendentalists but the evangelical revivalists who transformed the everyday religious life of Americans and spiritualized the natural environment. Evangelical Christianity won believers from the rural South to the industrial North: this was the true popular religion of the antebellum years. Revivalists went to the woods not to free themselves from the constraints of Christianity but to renew their ties to God. Evangelical Christianity provided a sense of enchantment for those alienated by a rapidly industrializing world. In forested camp meetings and riverside baptisms, in private contemplation and public water cures, in electrotherapy and mesmerism, American evangelicals communed with nature, God, and one another. A distinctive spirituality emerged pairing personal piety with a mystical relation to nature. As Church in the Wild reveals, the revivalist attitude toward nature and the material world, which echoed that of Catholicism, spread like wildfire among Christians of all backgrounds during the years leading up to the Civil War.

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Page Count

281

Publisher

Harvard University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0674919378

ISBN 13

9780674919372

Church in the Wild

Evangelicals in Antebellum America

By: Brett Malcolm Grainger

Write a review Read reviews Take a Quiz Solve Book Puzzle

Church in the Wild

Evangelicals in Antebellum America

By: Brett Malcolm Grainger

Average ratings

N/A

Write a review

Solve jigsaw puzzle

Age

Page Count

281

Publisher

Harvard University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0674919378

ISBN 13

9780674919372

In the World But Not of It

One Family's Militant Faith and the History of Fundamentalism in America

By: Brett Grainger

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In the World But Not of It

One Family's Militant Faith and the History of Fundamentalism in America

By: Brett Grainger

A history of American fundamentalism as reflected by the author's own family experiences describes his Plymouth Brethren ancestry while reporting on such fundamentalist themes as biblical literalism, the experience of "getting saved," and the paradox of c

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Age

Page Count

176

Publisher

Bloomsbury Publishing USA

Published Date

ISBN 10

0802715591

ISBN 13

9780802715593

Book's by Brett Malcolm Grainger

Church in the Wild

Church in the Wild

Church in the Wild

Church in the Wild

In the World But Not of It

In the World But Not of It

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