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Head and Heart: A History of Christianity in America
Look out for a new book from Garry Wills, What the Qur'an Meant , coming fall 2017.
Gary Wills has won significant acclaim for his bestselling works of religion and history. Here, for the first time, he combines both disciplines in a sweeping examination of Christianity in America throughout the last 400 years. Wills argues that the struggle now, as throughout our nation's history, is between the head and the heart, reason and emotion, enlightenment and Evangelism. A landmark volume for anyone interested in either politics or religion, Head and Heart concludes that, while religion is a fertile and enduring force in American politics, the tension between the two is necessary, inevitable, and unending.
Gary Wills has won significant acclaim for his bestselling works of religion and history. Here, for the first time, he combines both disciplines in a sweeping examination of Christianity in America throughout the last 400 years. Wills argues that the struggle now, as throughout our nation's history, is between the head and the heart, reason and emotion, enlightenment and Evangelism. A landmark volume for anyone interested in either politics or religion, Head and Heart concludes that, while religion is a fertile and enduring force in American politics, the tension between the two is necessary, inevitable, and unending.
640 pages, Paperback
First published October 4, 2007
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289 people want to read
About the author
Garry Wills
153 books251 followersGarry Wills is an American author, journalist, political philosopher, and historian, specializing in American history, politics, and religion, especially the history of the Catholic Church. He won a Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction in 1993.
Wills has written over fifty books and, since 1973, has been a frequent reviewer for The New York Review of Books. He became a faculty member of the history department at Northwestern University in 1980, where he is an Emeritus Professor of History.
Wills has written over fifty books and, since 1973, has been a frequent reviewer for The New York Review of Books. He became a faculty member of the history department at Northwestern University in 1980, where he is an Emeritus Professor of History.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 54 reviews
December 26, 2016
I love reading Wills and this long, yet truncated, history of Christianity in America is full of great stuff. Wills, however, suffers from the tendency to see History as something made by Elites and highlighted in Documents and Theology. Black religion makes a cameo appearance. Much is made of disestablishment—not the most exciting 10% of the book. Wills’ takedown of recent attempts to Christianize the Founding Fathers is satisfying and expert. While this was a nice refresher, a collage of fun-facts, the book suffers from some flaws that should keep it from being a timeless introduction. There is too much emphasis on the Founding Fathers, and 10% of the book is dedicated to the machinations of the Bush Administration. Wills’ Big Claims—that there is a dialectic between Enlightenment and Evangelical currents—is fine, but not nuanced. Wills’ treatment of Transcendentalism was, for me, interesting, but an elite sideshow. Absent: Mormons, New Age-y Christianity, non-denominational culture.
June 13, 2010
This is a good book 3.5 about how history influenced America's character
Pre-enlightenment era:
Todays Evangelicals tell the truth at its foundation America has strong impulses as a Christian nation. The Puritans who were the dominant protestant force in early US because they were the most learned and thus could right their opinions done for posterity were obsessed with the Christian faith. In terms of government, it was basically a theocracy much like Iran who prosecuted people with impunity if they did not share similar religious sentiments.
But despite this scary notion before the enlightenment and the subsequent idea of separation of church and state, the Puritans did set the idea of American individualism through their idea personal salvation, the idea that people were saved individually regardless of whom you were born from. Also the seeds of grass-roots democracy was born via the idea of congregationalism that is the election of the church leaders only by its congregation.
The Puritans also gave the US its first universities, initally for the purposes of schooling the clergy, later for the schooling of its leaders.
Pre-Enlightenment figures
Samuel Sewall - was a judge who first argued that slavery was morally wrong. At the time, it was commonly believed that slavery was sanctioned by the bible because most prominent people in the bible had slaves (Abraham, King David/Solomon). But as mark of the Enlightenment period Sewall began questioning what was at the time biblical inerrancy with logic but using Scripture as the basis for the logic. For example, he states that Jesus comes with a new covenant that replaces the Old Testament and thus slavery of the past must give way to the equality of souls to the present. Also, he cites the golden rule as an antidote to the question of slavery.
Roger Williams - was the trouble-maker father of Providence, RI who made Providence the seat of religious tolerance. He thought it was impossible to live in this world and be totally pure (I agree with him, if one trully wants to live by God's laws all the time one must become a secluded monk). Since the laws of God has been corrupted by man, then the laws of man needs to be followed because it is objective instead of corrupted laws of God because it has become subjective based on the religion one follows.
Great Awakening:
The Great Awakening (1730-40's) was the first American evangelical movement. This period is marked by what would be called today as "born-again" feeling that the holy spirit has descended and blessed the people who accept it. It is also marked by unlearned preachers who feel the spirit as opposed to the learned theologians of Harvard and Yale. It is interesting that even back then there was already a rift between the Evangelical "feel the spirit" movement and the Old Protestant order which valued the theological reason for explaining God. And it is also interesting to note that this feeling also gives it resonance to todays rift between the ivy-league learned liberals and the Evangelical Christian conservatives. Like present day evagelicals, the "unlearned" preachers of the Great Awakening used scaring congregants of the upcoming Apocalypse in order to convert them. Because if they do not repent and come into God, they will burn in the fires of hell for all eternity. It is the same formula but different time period. For these Christians, one has to know one can be damned before one can be saved but if this is so then how do the Calvanist justify predestination? Wills contends that the Enlightenment which our Founding Fathers subscribed to and our Constitution is based on was a direct reaction to the Great Awakening.
Enlightened Religion
Unitarianism: Their basic tenent is that there is only one God because that is the most logical belief and the trinity is illogical thus it is false. Unitarianism is thought to be of the Enlightenment because it tries to provide logical answers to God instead of faith&belief. Apparently the author chose John Locke as the main guy who represents Unitarianism. Even though most Christian churchs today believe in the Trinity, the Unitarianism train of thought still pervades most Protestant/ Christian teaching in focusing only on Jesus Christ instead of all three.
Quakers: Their claim to fame is they were the first major religious group who decried the institution of slavery. The author chose Benjamin Lay, John Woolman, and Anthony Benezet as the three people who best represented the Quakers antipathy to slavery that later led to the abolition of slavery first in the North and then after the Civil War to the rest of society. What made them a relgious organization of the enlightenment was the fact they questioned understood dogma of the time of the issue whether slavery was in fact sanctioned by God via the bible. Basically they used biblical text to discredit people unquestionable interpretation of the bible about slavery.
Deist: Most of the major figures of the Founding Fathers were Deist, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Aaron Burr, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison were Deist. Deist believed in an amorphous God but not necessarily Christianity. This is consistent with the fact that Washington was a known Mason and I think Masons were Deist. This is the reason that there is religious tolerance in the Constituion and most importantly the 1st amendment in the right to practice any religion a person wants. Today's Christian right are correct in stating the US is founded as a religious nation but they are wrong that that religion is only Christianity.
Disestablishment of Religion:
John Locke believed that religious tolerance should be granted by the state because the state should be only concerned with civil matters whereas the church should be concerned with matters of the soul. "...the state as holder of a monopoly of force deployed to protect the civil interest of society...the church, contrast, is a voluntary society in which men join 'in order to the public worshipping of God, in such a manner as they judge acceptable to him and effectual to the salvation of their souls.' The state has no competence to decide what a man considers the proper means to please God and save his soul. And the church has no competence to use force for any means, and especially not to affect others' civil interest." John Locke wanted a society that believed in God, preferably a Christian one, but not necessarily.
Jefferson makes the freedom to choose one's religion free of government intrusion and inalienable right instead of merely a tolerance that the state can take away from that person. It is clear from his Danbury letter to the Baptist that he thought that the Separation of Church and State was paramount in his thinking of the 1st Amendment. The idea of the separation of church and state is as much for the state being free of a certain religion as it is for the right of any man to profess their own religion outside any state intereference. So, I do not understand what the issue is?
James Madison the actually writer of the 1st Amendment showed in his Remonstrance letter to the Virginia assembly that religion should be based on one's CONCIENCE and the reason for the clear separation of church and state is both to protect the state from unwanted influence of the church but also to protect any religion from an established church religion that has the potential of limit the competing religions. So, I do not even understand how the Christian Right can claim that the US is a Chrisitan country when US Constitution does not even mention God in its Constitution. And the separation of church and state is as important to each individual denomenation as it is to non-Christians. Although I do agree to Jefferson and Madison's assessment of things, I disagree with having church pay taxes. After all, paying taxes would make the Church supporting the State financially and thus subservient to it.
ROMANTIC PERIOD: 19 century response to the rational enlightenment period in which inspiration and intuition ruled. For intellectuals, it lead to Transcendentalism and its accompanying nature mysticim and thus rejection of doctrine. For the common people, the period was ushered by the Second Great Awakening with the emphasis of personal salvation by an empathic Christ.
Transcendentalism and Emerson: Emerson was the epicenter of the Transcendentalist which denied any source of Doctrine as too constricting for the human soul. They wanted the soul through self-expression to transcend the superficial confines of doctrine (which include formal churches, ministers, and biblical texts) and become one with God. They also wanted the self's soul to trully be at the heart of religion not dogma. The Transcedalist went a step further than the Unitarians and discounted the role of supernatural miracles in favor of the miracles of Nature. They believe that God spoke to them through awesomeness of nature and not through supernatural signs. This is way environmental groups of today really love the Transcendentalist especially Thoreau and Emerson.
Religion of the Heart:
2nd Great Awakening - Evangelicalism was prevalent in the American Frontier because the Methodist preachers would ride out to these places and convert people. Because it was the Frontier where "old-world" position mattered less, there was certain egalitarian feeling akin to todays entrepreneurial spirit in which anyone with creativity can become rich. Also since it was the frontier era, there was essentially no government so non-profits usually via evangelical religions took over what the community needed (ie: social services)If it worked back then I do not understand why it would not work now, that is faith-based initiatives taking over social services. What better way to help people by giving them a chance to turn over their lives while saving their souls. Also the preachers of this period counted their successes by the number of people they convert and who attend their services not what seminary they went to or educational pedigrees they had. I think this the reason most evangelical preachers today are obsessed with conversion of souls because it is the only marker to show how successfult they are.
Schism over Slavery - Although Protestant America was initially unified in its Anti-Papist stance, it split due to the issue of Slavery. Whereas the south actively promoted the biblical condoning of slavery, the north condemned it as an abomination.
God of Battles - Both the North and the South believed that they were right in the eyes of God and the other was doing the work of the anti-Christ. Although it has been always been portrayed that the abolutionist justified a holy war, the book showcase the fact that the south cursed Lincoln and portrayed him seriously as the Anti-Christ that was sent here to do the work of the devil. In fact far from being Evangelical, Lincoln subscribed to Black Religion in that he believed that Christianity had to save an entire people not just one soul at a time.
Religion of the Gilded Age - Although Non-evangelical ministers gradually lost clout, the Evangelical ministers of the period gradually gained it especially because it was funded by robber barons of the period in the form of the "Moody empire". Moody preached personal salvation through hard work (very entrpreneurial in thought). One of the main characteristics of Moody's movement was The Holiness Movement meaning having total trust in God through being "saved". The reason rich people funded this sort of evangelical movement was because this movement was against unions. To them unions were dangerous because it showed men can solve their own problems without the help of God whereas individual salvation was entrepreneurial by nature that is the individuaal wants to be saved and thus become saved by the Grace of God, similarly if a person wants to be rich, he does.
Culture Wars: Doomsday or Progress?
2nd Coming Theology - A further influcence of Moody was his 2nd coming Theology in the form of his associate Torrey - Torrey the most influential man of the Premillenialist movement used John Nelson Darby's rapture movement to preach the imminent 2nd Coming of the messiah, thus giving greater urgency to converting the unrepentant.
2nd Coming Politics - Because these Evangelical Fundamentalist thought the 2nd Coming of Jesus Christ and the havoc that it will create, they initially did not want to be involved in worldly affairs because to be involved in politics would take away from the urgent affairs of trying to save the damned. They also want to hasten Armageddon via demolishing the Islamic Dome of the Rock and rebuilding the Temple at Jerusalem. They rejoice in building weapons for that purpose such as nuclear weapons and see 9/11 as fulfillment of prophesy. Before reading this book, I use to think the alliance between the Evangelical Christian right and the American military was a weird one but now that I have read this book it makes sense. The Christian right wants a strong military because in their mind it will serve as the Army of God in an impending Armageddon and since the end is near then US government should solely focus on the military and not social services which they think detract from people relying on God for their needs and instead shift their reliance toward the State.
The Social Gospel - Wereas the Religious right were concerned in saving individual souls, the Religious left (progressives for cities) were concerned in saving American societies. The only problem with the left @ the beginning of the 20 century is they were tied to Christian Imperialism in the form of American Imperialism in order to "Christianize the natives" (ie: Philippines).
Culture Wars: Reversals
Evangelicals riding high - The major enemy which the evangelicals eventually won was prohibition. Frances Willard used the Temperance movement as a social vehicle toward other women issues such as women's sufferage, prison reform, 8 hour day, and federal aid to education Wayne Wheeler was the first man who used get out the vote for a single issue of prohibition and succeeded by using Christian values in influencing politics. Billy Sunday was a layman without any theological background who succeeded Moody as being the most celebrated televangelist of his day. His strength lies in the fact that he was so common. And as always WWI cemented the religious fervor of the US.
Evangelicals riding low - Although Wayne Wheeler used tough tactics to allow the 18th Amendment to pass, because he pushed aggressively the enforcement of Prohibition, he unwittingly led to its demise because of the impossibility of enforcing it (it would be like trying to outlaw and enforce home porn laws today). Secondly, the Scopes Trial which created the ACLU was a trial against Darwinism because in the belief that Darwinism challenged biblical innerancy about the creation of man. James Cannon in campaining for Herbert Hoover against the Irish Catholic Al Smith realigned the Democratic party as the party for immigrants because of his constant linking of immigrants with the Democratic party. I always wondered why Evangelical Christians had such animosity toward the ACLU; now I know it is due to the Scopes Trial and the way the ACLU's first big case challenge biblical inerrency via defending Darwinism to be taught in schools.
Religion in a Radical Time - Ironically, there was no significant religious revivals in the Great Depression. Rather the "Puritanism", came from the Catholic and Jewish segments of the society in the form of cinema censorship and clamping down of Protestant Hollywood excesses of the Roaring 20's. FDR provided the country with the first administration with a broad based religious coalition of Catholics/Jews which represented a fifth of his administration. Also the leading critic of his at the time was Father Coughlin.
Religious Nation: Euphoria
The Great Religious Truce - Immediately after WWII, the feeling of America was elation and gratefulness to God for vanquishing the evil Nazi empire. During Eisenhowers administration, the feeling of the communist threat was so real that "Under God", was placed into the pledge of allegiance just to distinguish intself from the godless Communism. For all intents and purposes, America embraced Judaism and Catholicism as as pro-American as Protestanism and Billy Graham was America's pastor because of his ecumenicism.
The Rights Revolution of the 1960's were religious in nature from the Civil Rights, which garnered support from Black Church leaders and Northern church leaders of Protestant, Evangelical, Catholic, and Jewish persuasion, to Women's Rights which allowed all women be common in the work place and right to abortion, to Catholic liberation in denouncing the thought that Jews were Christ killers, to saying the pluralistic democracy was okay, to gay liberation via the Stonewall Revolution that led to the Gay Liberation Front, to American Indian Rights by Vine Deloria, to American Latino migrant workers rights via Cesar Chavez.
Evangelical Counterattack happened because Evangelicals thought that God's way was being attacked by the Supreme Courts by not allowing school prayer and allowing evolution to be taught. They generally regard the Human rights revolution of the 60's as part of the SECULAR HUMANISM plot to do the bidding of the Devil. They do not like anything that impinges the on core family which includes women's rights, children's rights, abortion rights, gay rights, prevention of AIDS (God's scourge toward homosexual), and sex education because they think it promotes promiscuity. Thus, Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority, Pat Robinson's Christian Coalition to Gary Baur Research on the Family were movements that capitalized on these prevailing sentiments.
Religious Nation: The Karl Rove Era
Faith-Based Government - W. was the pinnacle of the mixing b/w Faith and Governmet. Faith-based Justice with John Ashcroft thought the walls between church and state as oppressive. Thus under his rule, violence against abortion clinics were not prosecuted. The civil rights department now had religiou wing that enforced partial-ban abortions. Furthermore, Bush pushed for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. Faith-based Social Services meant federal money were given to churches who performed social services especially to Black Churches who are more accustomed to help their congregants in exchange for voting for W. Faith-based Science was used to dispel the truthfulness of Darwanism and Global Warming in favor of faith. I think Faith-based Science is a contradiction in terms. Science is science and faith is faith. Faith-based Health in the form of no contraception especially condom use and abstinence only education in combination with Terri Schiavo case which is not life because she needed a machine to survive. Faith-based War in which General William Boykin used believed with all his heart that the axis of evil was really Satan's army.
Ecumenical Karl - Karl Rove wanted to unite all the religious leaders behind whatever their beliefs are behind value-based system and thus to vote for W. To this, he used wedge-issues such as the pro-life movement and anti-gay marriage that are near and dear to people who are religious.
Eventually their was a backlash from the middle who thought Bush was really a big spending liberal and overreach of his evangelical base.
Separation not Supression - I agree with his assessment that religion should inspire policy but should not intertwine with it. I believe social services should naturally be faith-based but it should be faith-based without government support such as what happened in the 2nd Great Awakening period.
Pre-enlightenment era:
Todays Evangelicals tell the truth at its foundation America has strong impulses as a Christian nation. The Puritans who were the dominant protestant force in early US because they were the most learned and thus could right their opinions done for posterity were obsessed with the Christian faith. In terms of government, it was basically a theocracy much like Iran who prosecuted people with impunity if they did not share similar religious sentiments.
But despite this scary notion before the enlightenment and the subsequent idea of separation of church and state, the Puritans did set the idea of American individualism through their idea personal salvation, the idea that people were saved individually regardless of whom you were born from. Also the seeds of grass-roots democracy was born via the idea of congregationalism that is the election of the church leaders only by its congregation.
The Puritans also gave the US its first universities, initally for the purposes of schooling the clergy, later for the schooling of its leaders.
Pre-Enlightenment figures
Samuel Sewall - was a judge who first argued that slavery was morally wrong. At the time, it was commonly believed that slavery was sanctioned by the bible because most prominent people in the bible had slaves (Abraham, King David/Solomon). But as mark of the Enlightenment period Sewall began questioning what was at the time biblical inerrancy with logic but using Scripture as the basis for the logic. For example, he states that Jesus comes with a new covenant that replaces the Old Testament and thus slavery of the past must give way to the equality of souls to the present. Also, he cites the golden rule as an antidote to the question of slavery.
Roger Williams - was the trouble-maker father of Providence, RI who made Providence the seat of religious tolerance. He thought it was impossible to live in this world and be totally pure (I agree with him, if one trully wants to live by God's laws all the time one must become a secluded monk). Since the laws of God has been corrupted by man, then the laws of man needs to be followed because it is objective instead of corrupted laws of God because it has become subjective based on the religion one follows.
Great Awakening:
The Great Awakening (1730-40's) was the first American evangelical movement. This period is marked by what would be called today as "born-again" feeling that the holy spirit has descended and blessed the people who accept it. It is also marked by unlearned preachers who feel the spirit as opposed to the learned theologians of Harvard and Yale. It is interesting that even back then there was already a rift between the Evangelical "feel the spirit" movement and the Old Protestant order which valued the theological reason for explaining God. And it is also interesting to note that this feeling also gives it resonance to todays rift between the ivy-league learned liberals and the Evangelical Christian conservatives. Like present day evagelicals, the "unlearned" preachers of the Great Awakening used scaring congregants of the upcoming Apocalypse in order to convert them. Because if they do not repent and come into God, they will burn in the fires of hell for all eternity. It is the same formula but different time period. For these Christians, one has to know one can be damned before one can be saved but if this is so then how do the Calvanist justify predestination? Wills contends that the Enlightenment which our Founding Fathers subscribed to and our Constitution is based on was a direct reaction to the Great Awakening.
Enlightened Religion
Unitarianism: Their basic tenent is that there is only one God because that is the most logical belief and the trinity is illogical thus it is false. Unitarianism is thought to be of the Enlightenment because it tries to provide logical answers to God instead of faith&belief. Apparently the author chose John Locke as the main guy who represents Unitarianism. Even though most Christian churchs today believe in the Trinity, the Unitarianism train of thought still pervades most Protestant/ Christian teaching in focusing only on Jesus Christ instead of all three.
Quakers: Their claim to fame is they were the first major religious group who decried the institution of slavery. The author chose Benjamin Lay, John Woolman, and Anthony Benezet as the three people who best represented the Quakers antipathy to slavery that later led to the abolition of slavery first in the North and then after the Civil War to the rest of society. What made them a relgious organization of the enlightenment was the fact they questioned understood dogma of the time of the issue whether slavery was in fact sanctioned by God via the bible. Basically they used biblical text to discredit people unquestionable interpretation of the bible about slavery.
Deist: Most of the major figures of the Founding Fathers were Deist, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Aaron Burr, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison were Deist. Deist believed in an amorphous God but not necessarily Christianity. This is consistent with the fact that Washington was a known Mason and I think Masons were Deist. This is the reason that there is religious tolerance in the Constituion and most importantly the 1st amendment in the right to practice any religion a person wants. Today's Christian right are correct in stating the US is founded as a religious nation but they are wrong that that religion is only Christianity.
Disestablishment of Religion:
John Locke believed that religious tolerance should be granted by the state because the state should be only concerned with civil matters whereas the church should be concerned with matters of the soul. "...the state as holder of a monopoly of force deployed to protect the civil interest of society...the church, contrast, is a voluntary society in which men join 'in order to the public worshipping of God, in such a manner as they judge acceptable to him and effectual to the salvation of their souls.' The state has no competence to decide what a man considers the proper means to please God and save his soul. And the church has no competence to use force for any means, and especially not to affect others' civil interest." John Locke wanted a society that believed in God, preferably a Christian one, but not necessarily.
Jefferson makes the freedom to choose one's religion free of government intrusion and inalienable right instead of merely a tolerance that the state can take away from that person. It is clear from his Danbury letter to the Baptist that he thought that the Separation of Church and State was paramount in his thinking of the 1st Amendment. The idea of the separation of church and state is as much for the state being free of a certain religion as it is for the right of any man to profess their own religion outside any state intereference. So, I do not understand what the issue is?
James Madison the actually writer of the 1st Amendment showed in his Remonstrance letter to the Virginia assembly that religion should be based on one's CONCIENCE and the reason for the clear separation of church and state is both to protect the state from unwanted influence of the church but also to protect any religion from an established church religion that has the potential of limit the competing religions. So, I do not even understand how the Christian Right can claim that the US is a Chrisitan country when US Constitution does not even mention God in its Constitution. And the separation of church and state is as important to each individual denomenation as it is to non-Christians. Although I do agree to Jefferson and Madison's assessment of things, I disagree with having church pay taxes. After all, paying taxes would make the Church supporting the State financially and thus subservient to it.
ROMANTIC PERIOD: 19 century response to the rational enlightenment period in which inspiration and intuition ruled. For intellectuals, it lead to Transcendentalism and its accompanying nature mysticim and thus rejection of doctrine. For the common people, the period was ushered by the Second Great Awakening with the emphasis of personal salvation by an empathic Christ.
Transcendentalism and Emerson: Emerson was the epicenter of the Transcendentalist which denied any source of Doctrine as too constricting for the human soul. They wanted the soul through self-expression to transcend the superficial confines of doctrine (which include formal churches, ministers, and biblical texts) and become one with God. They also wanted the self's soul to trully be at the heart of religion not dogma. The Transcedalist went a step further than the Unitarians and discounted the role of supernatural miracles in favor of the miracles of Nature. They believe that God spoke to them through awesomeness of nature and not through supernatural signs. This is way environmental groups of today really love the Transcendentalist especially Thoreau and Emerson.
Religion of the Heart:
2nd Great Awakening - Evangelicalism was prevalent in the American Frontier because the Methodist preachers would ride out to these places and convert people. Because it was the Frontier where "old-world" position mattered less, there was certain egalitarian feeling akin to todays entrepreneurial spirit in which anyone with creativity can become rich. Also since it was the frontier era, there was essentially no government so non-profits usually via evangelical religions took over what the community needed (ie: social services)If it worked back then I do not understand why it would not work now, that is faith-based initiatives taking over social services. What better way to help people by giving them a chance to turn over their lives while saving their souls. Also the preachers of this period counted their successes by the number of people they convert and who attend their services not what seminary they went to or educational pedigrees they had. I think this the reason most evangelical preachers today are obsessed with conversion of souls because it is the only marker to show how successfult they are.
Schism over Slavery - Although Protestant America was initially unified in its Anti-Papist stance, it split due to the issue of Slavery. Whereas the south actively promoted the biblical condoning of slavery, the north condemned it as an abomination.
God of Battles - Both the North and the South believed that they were right in the eyes of God and the other was doing the work of the anti-Christ. Although it has been always been portrayed that the abolutionist justified a holy war, the book showcase the fact that the south cursed Lincoln and portrayed him seriously as the Anti-Christ that was sent here to do the work of the devil. In fact far from being Evangelical, Lincoln subscribed to Black Religion in that he believed that Christianity had to save an entire people not just one soul at a time.
Religion of the Gilded Age - Although Non-evangelical ministers gradually lost clout, the Evangelical ministers of the period gradually gained it especially because it was funded by robber barons of the period in the form of the "Moody empire". Moody preached personal salvation through hard work (very entrpreneurial in thought). One of the main characteristics of Moody's movement was The Holiness Movement meaning having total trust in God through being "saved". The reason rich people funded this sort of evangelical movement was because this movement was against unions. To them unions were dangerous because it showed men can solve their own problems without the help of God whereas individual salvation was entrepreneurial by nature that is the individuaal wants to be saved and thus become saved by the Grace of God, similarly if a person wants to be rich, he does.
Culture Wars: Doomsday or Progress?
2nd Coming Theology - A further influcence of Moody was his 2nd coming Theology in the form of his associate Torrey - Torrey the most influential man of the Premillenialist movement used John Nelson Darby's rapture movement to preach the imminent 2nd Coming of the messiah, thus giving greater urgency to converting the unrepentant.
2nd Coming Politics - Because these Evangelical Fundamentalist thought the 2nd Coming of Jesus Christ and the havoc that it will create, they initially did not want to be involved in worldly affairs because to be involved in politics would take away from the urgent affairs of trying to save the damned. They also want to hasten Armageddon via demolishing the Islamic Dome of the Rock and rebuilding the Temple at Jerusalem. They rejoice in building weapons for that purpose such as nuclear weapons and see 9/11 as fulfillment of prophesy. Before reading this book, I use to think the alliance between the Evangelical Christian right and the American military was a weird one but now that I have read this book it makes sense. The Christian right wants a strong military because in their mind it will serve as the Army of God in an impending Armageddon and since the end is near then US government should solely focus on the military and not social services which they think detract from people relying on God for their needs and instead shift their reliance toward the State.
The Social Gospel - Wereas the Religious right were concerned in saving individual souls, the Religious left (progressives for cities) were concerned in saving American societies. The only problem with the left @ the beginning of the 20 century is they were tied to Christian Imperialism in the form of American Imperialism in order to "Christianize the natives" (ie: Philippines).
Culture Wars: Reversals
Evangelicals riding high - The major enemy which the evangelicals eventually won was prohibition. Frances Willard used the Temperance movement as a social vehicle toward other women issues such as women's sufferage, prison reform, 8 hour day, and federal aid to education Wayne Wheeler was the first man who used get out the vote for a single issue of prohibition and succeeded by using Christian values in influencing politics. Billy Sunday was a layman without any theological background who succeeded Moody as being the most celebrated televangelist of his day. His strength lies in the fact that he was so common. And as always WWI cemented the religious fervor of the US.
Evangelicals riding low - Although Wayne Wheeler used tough tactics to allow the 18th Amendment to pass, because he pushed aggressively the enforcement of Prohibition, he unwittingly led to its demise because of the impossibility of enforcing it (it would be like trying to outlaw and enforce home porn laws today). Secondly, the Scopes Trial which created the ACLU was a trial against Darwinism because in the belief that Darwinism challenged biblical innerancy about the creation of man. James Cannon in campaining for Herbert Hoover against the Irish Catholic Al Smith realigned the Democratic party as the party for immigrants because of his constant linking of immigrants with the Democratic party. I always wondered why Evangelical Christians had such animosity toward the ACLU; now I know it is due to the Scopes Trial and the way the ACLU's first big case challenge biblical inerrency via defending Darwinism to be taught in schools.
Religion in a Radical Time - Ironically, there was no significant religious revivals in the Great Depression. Rather the "Puritanism", came from the Catholic and Jewish segments of the society in the form of cinema censorship and clamping down of Protestant Hollywood excesses of the Roaring 20's. FDR provided the country with the first administration with a broad based religious coalition of Catholics/Jews which represented a fifth of his administration. Also the leading critic of his at the time was Father Coughlin.
Religious Nation: Euphoria
The Great Religious Truce - Immediately after WWII, the feeling of America was elation and gratefulness to God for vanquishing the evil Nazi empire. During Eisenhowers administration, the feeling of the communist threat was so real that "Under God", was placed into the pledge of allegiance just to distinguish intself from the godless Communism. For all intents and purposes, America embraced Judaism and Catholicism as as pro-American as Protestanism and Billy Graham was America's pastor because of his ecumenicism.
The Rights Revolution of the 1960's were religious in nature from the Civil Rights, which garnered support from Black Church leaders and Northern church leaders of Protestant, Evangelical, Catholic, and Jewish persuasion, to Women's Rights which allowed all women be common in the work place and right to abortion, to Catholic liberation in denouncing the thought that Jews were Christ killers, to saying the pluralistic democracy was okay, to gay liberation via the Stonewall Revolution that led to the Gay Liberation Front, to American Indian Rights by Vine Deloria, to American Latino migrant workers rights via Cesar Chavez.
Evangelical Counterattack happened because Evangelicals thought that God's way was being attacked by the Supreme Courts by not allowing school prayer and allowing evolution to be taught. They generally regard the Human rights revolution of the 60's as part of the SECULAR HUMANISM plot to do the bidding of the Devil. They do not like anything that impinges the on core family which includes women's rights, children's rights, abortion rights, gay rights, prevention of AIDS (God's scourge toward homosexual), and sex education because they think it promotes promiscuity. Thus, Jerry Falwell's Moral Majority, Pat Robinson's Christian Coalition to Gary Baur Research on the Family were movements that capitalized on these prevailing sentiments.
Religious Nation: The Karl Rove Era
Faith-Based Government - W. was the pinnacle of the mixing b/w Faith and Governmet. Faith-based Justice with John Ashcroft thought the walls between church and state as oppressive. Thus under his rule, violence against abortion clinics were not prosecuted. The civil rights department now had religiou wing that enforced partial-ban abortions. Furthermore, Bush pushed for a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. Faith-based Social Services meant federal money were given to churches who performed social services especially to Black Churches who are more accustomed to help their congregants in exchange for voting for W. Faith-based Science was used to dispel the truthfulness of Darwanism and Global Warming in favor of faith. I think Faith-based Science is a contradiction in terms. Science is science and faith is faith. Faith-based Health in the form of no contraception especially condom use and abstinence only education in combination with Terri Schiavo case which is not life because she needed a machine to survive. Faith-based War in which General William Boykin used believed with all his heart that the axis of evil was really Satan's army.
Ecumenical Karl - Karl Rove wanted to unite all the religious leaders behind whatever their beliefs are behind value-based system and thus to vote for W. To this, he used wedge-issues such as the pro-life movement and anti-gay marriage that are near and dear to people who are religious.
Eventually their was a backlash from the middle who thought Bush was really a big spending liberal and overreach of his evangelical base.
Separation not Supression - I agree with his assessment that religion should inspire policy but should not intertwine with it. I believe social services should naturally be faith-based but it should be faith-based without government support such as what happened in the 2nd Great Awakening period.
December 18, 2009
I've read two other books by Wills - Nixon Agonisties and The Kennedy Imprisonment - but both of those were almost purely political. This one was certainly not. I liked where Wills started from. He takes on the oft-reported opinion that American is today a less religious nation, with the Establishment Clause being the thing that's slowly killing religion in America. Also, he addresses the evidence around whether or not the Founding Fathers were "Christian". All of these things he finds to be untrue. His assertion is that the Establishment Clause actually strengths religion - in a sense keeps it pure - while also strengthening government.
All his conclusions were seemingly very reasonable. Wills is a devout Catholic (he's written a number of books about the Bible and Christianity), but his seemingly deep faith never clouds his logic. There are a number of surprises (to me) that came through the book. Jefferson comes across as a deeply spiritual man, but skeptical of organized religion. Madison as well. Also, there's a good explanation of how Christianity has evolved through the years - it's waxing and waning through the times. Ultimately, the last large portion of the book is devoted to the W. Bush years, and how government and religion commingled in unprecedented ways. Wills is a ruthless writer with a huge vocabulary. He will fly through complex subjects and quickly dispatch with people and ideas he finds unworkable. I enjoy his direct, antagonistic style.
Added bonus - an argument against abortion even being a religious question.
All his conclusions were seemingly very reasonable. Wills is a devout Catholic (he's written a number of books about the Bible and Christianity), but his seemingly deep faith never clouds his logic. There are a number of surprises (to me) that came through the book. Jefferson comes across as a deeply spiritual man, but skeptical of organized religion. Madison as well. Also, there's a good explanation of how Christianity has evolved through the years - it's waxing and waning through the times. Ultimately, the last large portion of the book is devoted to the W. Bush years, and how government and religion commingled in unprecedented ways. Wills is a ruthless writer with a huge vocabulary. He will fly through complex subjects and quickly dispatch with people and ideas he finds unworkable. I enjoy his direct, antagonistic style.
Added bonus - an argument against abortion even being a religious question.
November 24, 2014
I'm both a history nerd and fascinated by religious (and philosophical) thought and expression, so this was right up my alley. Entirely relevant insofar as religion/Christianity has been a big part of American history and politics from the colonial era to the present moment. I'm no kind of authority on the subject, but this certainly seemed well-researched, an academic (non-sectarian) work, Wills mostly concerned with the facts, respectful to history's players without entirely suppressing his own opinions and biases, a fair approach to my way of thinking. Read this if you've ever been interested in or wondered what the Pilgrims believed and hoped to accomplish, what the Transcendendalists thought or fundamentalists think, or why people debate about where "the wall of separation between church and state" should be (it should be high, by the way!).
January 8, 2009
This was a sophisticated history of the Christian faith in the United States, and how it has influenced culture and politics. Wills' premise is that America has had two main strains of Christianity: Enlightment (head) and evangelical (heart). They reached synthesis at key points in our history, namely to oppose slavery and fight for civil rights for African Americans and other minorities.
The early chapters are a bit of a slog -- it's hard to keep track of all the Puritan offshoots and leaders, and Wills assumes a lot of knowledge on the part of the casual reader. The book is most entertaining when Wills examines Transcendatlism, religion and the Civil War and the evangelical awakening in the early part of the 20th century.
The early chapters are a bit of a slog -- it's hard to keep track of all the Puritan offshoots and leaders, and Wills assumes a lot of knowledge on the part of the casual reader. The book is most entertaining when Wills examines Transcendatlism, religion and the Civil War and the evangelical awakening in the early part of the 20th century.
August 27, 2020
Wills lays out a detailed history of America’s relation between popular religion and popular government – from the absolutist theocracy of the Puritans, to the Enlightenment-age rational religion of the founding fathers, to the explosion of 19th century revivalism, the transcendentalist visionaries, the fundamentalists with their convoluted premillennial or postmillennial theology, the evangelicals for progressive civil rights, and the religious far-right movement for an officially Christian state. Through it all Wills illustrates the creative tension between intellectual visions and emotional devotion. He also traces an ongoing tug-of-war between a dream of religion free from government control and the freedom of religious people to control the government.
August 7, 2023
Between lumping historians and separating historians, Wills is definitely a lumper. Good overview of religion in America until the end, when Wills got opinionated and political.
November 28, 2024
I picked up this book on a family trip to St. Augustine, before I had read Nixon Agonistes. It has a basic thesis about the Head (very elitist centered in concept, Enlightenment, Transcendental adjacent) and the Heart (largely Evangelicalism) are two poles of Christianity in America that need each other and are at their best in a balance with each other. Evidences are linked through the centuries. One example is the basically entirely Deist/Unitarian founding fathers trying to set up a system (especially Jefferson, Madison) of free inquiry which they felt would inevitably lead to Unitarianism. The great irony being that this system is what led evangelicalism to rise from it's American nadir just before the war (as the first great awakening quickly dissipated) to the continuous rise of religion and evangelicalism up until parts of the 20th century. A second example being the transcendentalist influence on Lincoln. A third example being MLK where he was educated in the liberal theology tradition due to university segregation, and Black Baptist/Evangelical mode of preaching is very distinctive and a part of his public presentation. He takes this thesis up to the failures of the Bush Administration, where he takes to task the culmination of the religious right coming to power. In general while I think it's a fairly vague thesis with an ok argument, in general I do think there has to be a real humility to be learned how often the "less orthodox" and often more persecuted groups/people have taken a righteous stand for more "Christian" principles than the supposedly orthodox groups. The most obvious example in this history is the many abolitionist Quakers.
The most interesting parts were the early colonial stuff to me, as my knowledge of the interactions of the colonies with different denominations was somewhat vague, and I liked the specifically religious and ideological history Wills analyzes. I hardly need this book to puncture some sort of myth of the Founders being orthodox and establishing this as a Christian nation, the nation became much more Christian after the founding, and in a direction none of the founders would have liked. Many of the people Wills deals with are very recognizable to me, and as we move through the centuries they are increasingly more so. The material on the Bush administration is his weakest stuff even where I share his concerns, but that's where the book moves from a kind of narrativization of the history of Christianity in America from a certain perspective, and towards a more straight polemic. The prose is far less appealing than that of Nixon Agonistes, and it doesn't attempt to be as psychologically insightful, but it's a very different genre and it's still written well.
I finished this the day I went to vote so that was funny. Wills diverts to tie the rise of Evangelicalism and Transcendentalism to Romanticism. This year has been interesting in learning more about and becoming more able to recognize the imprint of various intellectual strains, but I guess that's what happens when I actually start reading a couple nonfiction books, though reading Blake/Whitman while reading something like this or Hegel and Modern Society helps to tie it all together. Absurd delays on some reviews are just taking notes in an unorganized way makes compilation after the fact tedious.
Quotes, People, Notes, Mess:
Richard, Increase, Cotton Mather (1663-1728) - Puritan, New England, wilderness, conversion of slaves and conversion and murder of indians
Thomas Hooker (1586-1647) - Puritan, "who led a group out of Massachusetts in 1636 to found the Connecticut Colony, took the practice of
requiring conversion accounts with him." Conversion in stages. Desired the halfway covenant, see Baptism chapter.
John Cotton (1585-1652) - accused of antinomianism with Hutchinson, who he later disavowed after pressure from Winthrop and Shepard (Athanasius-y). "In fact, John Cotton argued that Hooker's theology of "stages" took away the "assurance" of conversion as an infallible sign of predestination. It was too open-ended, both fore and aft. Before, the preparation involved human effort to bring on one's salvation. And afterward, the separation between justification and sanctification made a person try to prove his justification by engaging in virtuous acts ("sanctification"). In either case, one was relying on human "works" for salvation—which, in Cotton's eyes, made Hooker papistical: "Whatsoever is of grace is not of works, and whatsoever is of works is not of grace.""
Roger Williams (1603-1683) - Not a Baptist, but friendly to them, and early church / state separation, with a twist. He believes the church did not exist. He had the odd belief that apostolic tradition was necessary and true, but not extant. "The garden had never existed in America, only the wilderness."
Charles Chauncy (1592-1672) - Universalist, Arminian, precursor to Unitarian movement, opposed the First Great Awakening. " John Adams would in time adopt a similar view of God's benevolence: "Now, my friend, can prophecies or miracles convince you or me that infinite benevolence, wisdom, and power created and preserves, for a time, innumerable millions to make them miserable forever for his own glory?""
Henry Dunster (1609-1659) - In 1654, Henry Dunster had been forced to resign as Harvard's president because of his views on baptism. Writing in 1935, Samuel Eliot Morison said of this scandal: "The news that President Dunster had become an 'antipaedobaptist' created much the same sensation in New England as would be aroused in the country today if President Conant should announce his adherence to communism."
James Davenport (1716-1757) - burned books, follower of George Whitefield who became nearly as prominent a 1GA itinerant.
Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) - First Great Awakening, had no prominent successors that followed his ideas. "The difference was that Edwards had translated the new languages back into the old dogma, while Bellamy and Hopkins had begun the process of translating the old dogma into a new language, a language of rights, reason, and universal moral intuition." Disliked itinerant preachers like George Whitefield, who fascinated young Ben Franklin
Benjamin Lay (1682-1759) - "His most famous bit of guerrilla theater occurred in 1738, at the annual meeting in Burlington, New Jersey. He wore a military coat and sword under his plain Quaker cloak, and carried a hollowed-out Bible in which he had placed a bladder of red pokeberry juice. In the middle of the service he threw off his cloak, pulled his sword, and stabbed the Bible, sprinkling its "blood" over bystanders as he told them that they were fake pacifists—they waged war on mankind and denied the Bible when they captured and held slaves. At another time, he lured the favored child of a slaveholding Quaker to his house and kept him there while the parents searched frenziedly. Then he returned the child, saying, "You may now conceive of the sorrow you inflict upon the parents of the Negro girl you hold in slavery, for she was torn from them by avarice."...Banned from meetings, Lay went into the marketplace to keep up his demonstrations, once throwing his wife's teacups from a balcony, smashing them on the ground, to protest the use of tea leaves harvested by slaves. He also inveighed against capital punishment, the lack of religious education for poor children, and cruel penal practices. He was much admired by Benjamin Franklin, who helped shape his massive and rambling attack on slavery into publishable form."
John Woolman (1720-1772) - After Lay (but in his lifetime), abolitionist, argued for reparations, refused to drive by stagecoach because of how animals were treated.
Washington - left before every communion
Charles Finney (1792-1875) - 2GA, called manipulative, altar calls, sawdust trail.
Lincoln - never mentioned Jesus once in any writing of his, except a single time indirectly. Civil war does not directly manifest a Head/Heart tension.
Frances Willard (1839-1898) - Women's Christian Temperance Union, suffragist, kindergarten movement.
DL Moody (1837-1899) - the gilded age business savvy revivalist. Followers were more militantly pre-mil. "I don't see how someone can follow Jesus and not be successful.
C I Scofield (1843-1921) - Abandoned his family. Systematized John Darby's Premil views. Dispensationalist. Futurist. Scofield Reference Bible. Funded by Lyman Stewart. Wills suggests non-KJV translations of Matt 6:13 is a better proof text of "Rapture" and points to how fundamentalists tied themselves to that translation.
Father Charles Coughlin (1891-1979) - father of the radio. Supported Roosevelt, then turned on him. 65% non-cath audience by '34. Became virulently antisemitic. Coalition with Gerald L.K. Smith.
persecution, hanging of Quakers...Mary Dyer...Cotton Mather "The quaking which distinguished these poor creatures
was a symptom of diabolical possession"
Quakers had been presenting petitions to King Charles II ever since his restoration to power two years earlier. He sent an instruction to Massachusetts, telling its rulers to stop executing his subjects for their religious opinions...It would be a mistake to look for religious tolerance in seventeenth century New England. Toleration, when it did come, was forced on the Puritans from the very authority they had fled. ...Thus the pure intolerance of New England was gradually eaten away by royal acts from abroad, running from Cromwell's inclusion of all forms of dissent to Charles II's letter of 1662 to James II's Proclamation of Indulgence to William of Orange's Act of Toleration.
Another troublesome issue arose in the course of the Antinomian controversy. As we have seen, a synod—a regional council—had been called to cure the Antinomian infection. Was the cure worse than the illness?
Me: I could've printed the entire Baptism chapter in quotes because i found it so interesting, in part because I am not part of a paedobaptist tradition.
Though they professed the "plain style" of preaching, they did not talk down to their audiences, who were expected to listen to hours on end of biblical exegesis and controversial theology. The whole community's pride in its literacy was proclaimed in the clear glass windows with which they had replaced the stained glass of Anglican cathedrals, the better to read one's Bible and the Psalter during services. The preachers' plain style was not a matter of being simple for the simple folk. Like the Puritans' plain dress, it was meant to draw attention to the essentials. It was opposed to the gaudy rhetoric of Anglican preachers (Lancelot Andrewes and John Donne, for instance). Puritan preachers expounded the sense of Scripture, breaking it down into heads and subheads as was taught by the Renaissance logician Peter Ramus
The schools were set up as bastions of orthodoxy against challenges from within the society—Harvard to counter the Antinomians, Yale to oppose tendencies typified in the Halfway Covenant. In Massachusetts, the charter for a college was authorized in 1636, while Sir Henry Vane was governor, and it was destined for Salem, which was hospitable to the Antinomians. But when Winthrop came in the next year, the site was changed to Newtown (Cambridge), the bastion of the conservatives, where they had held the General Court meetings and the synod that condemned Antinomians
The Puritans' introspection, their self-examination, the private conversion experience that set off soul from soul by God's election, the minute scrutiny of the stages of conversion—all this made the individual prize his or her singular experience. Tocqueville discerned something like this when he introduced the new word individualisme into the analysis of America: "Individualism is a considered and tranquil trait that inclines each citizen to separate himself from the crowd of his fellows, withdrawing into the enclave of his family and friends so that, having formed a little society of his own, he gladly lets the larger society go its way without him." One coming to that passage directly after studying the Puritans could well imagine that it was meant to describe New England, where the individual withdrew into a private experience of being saved and then joined the elect circle of "visible saints," separating himself from the unregenerate world, which had to wallow along toward damnation apart from him and his. And that private experience of being saved was like the personal assurance that would later be called "self-confidence" by Emerson—the highest virtue in his eyes. It had recently been coined in France as a pejorative term, to criticize the atomizing forces let loose by the French Revolution...Tocqueville had distinguished individualisme from egoisme, but he said that as individualisme develops, it circles back into egoisme? "Egoism dries up the very seed of every virtue; individualism initially crushes only the impulses to public virtue, but over time it turns on and obliterates every other virtue and at last it disappears into egoism." This antisocial urge could not be internally corrected, Tocqueville argued. It could be blunted only by some external and countervailing factor—in America, by the individual's partial re-entry into society by way of voluntary associations, which served as buffers between the individual and the state...Americans soon gave it an almost entirely sunny sense. It was no longer a dark force that needed correction from outside, one crushing public virtue, but was itself the source of all American virtue. After all, concentration on one's own independent state was a sign of being saved in New England.
Madison's Remonstrance:
"[We remonstrate] because the establishment proposed by the bill is not requisite for the support of the Christian religion. To say that it is, is a contradiction to the Christian religion itself, for every page of it disavows a dependence on the powers of this world. It is a contradiction to fact, for it is known that this religion [Christianity] both existed and flourished, not only without the support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition from them, and not only during the period of miraculous aid [in the era of Jesus], but long after it had been left on its own evidence and the ordinary care of Providence"...Madison agreed with Priestley and other Enlightenment figures that the purity of Christian belief and practice was corrupted when Constantine made it a state religion. All the abuses of power through the Middle Ages reflected the entanglement of the spiritual with the worldly...separation of church and state is for the protection of religion, not the state
By the 1850s the Methodists by themselves—joined together through an interlocking system of personal and epistolary contact—had constructed almost as many churches as there were post offices and employed almost as many ministers as there were postal workers. The largest evangelical denominations were each raising almost as much money per year as the postal service took in. Considered together, the evangelical churches employed nearly double the personnel, maintained nearly twice as many facilities, and raised at least three times the money as the Post Office. Moreover, the churches delivered their message to more people in more places than the postal service delivered letters and newspapers... the people of the United States were hearing several more times the number of Methodist sermons each year than they received pieces of mail. In fact, by 1840, Methodists "were, after the federal government, the nation's largest organization of any kind."
Since Sunday preached to all denominations, his choice of a church to be ordained in was not based on doctrine. He seems to have gone to the most respectable body that would take him—which he decided was the Presbyterians, who had ordained his mentor Wilbur Chapman. Richard Hofstadter quotes what he calls "a bit of Protestant folk lore": "A Methodist is a Baptist who wears shoes; a Presbyterian is a Methodist who has gone to college; and an Episcopalian is a Presbyterian who lives off his investments." Sunday just squeaked by in his bid for clerical status. To the examining board of ministers in Chicago, he answered doctrinal or historical questions with frank admissions that "that's too deep for me," or "I'll have to pass that up."
Eisenhower, when he met Graham, said, "I don't believe the American people are going to follow anybody who's not a member of a church." Not only was Eisenhower not a member. He had never been baptized. What denomination should he adopt? Graham asked what his parents had belonged to, and Eisenhower said the River Brethren. Graham thought Presbyterians would be more acceptable, so Eisenhower was baptized into that church after his election to the presidency.
Me: Despite never being baptized, Eich also told Graham that he believed part of his purpose in becoming president was to start a Revival.
The most interesting parts were the early colonial stuff to me, as my knowledge of the interactions of the colonies with different denominations was somewhat vague, and I liked the specifically religious and ideological history Wills analyzes. I hardly need this book to puncture some sort of myth of the Founders being orthodox and establishing this as a Christian nation, the nation became much more Christian after the founding, and in a direction none of the founders would have liked. Many of the people Wills deals with are very recognizable to me, and as we move through the centuries they are increasingly more so. The material on the Bush administration is his weakest stuff even where I share his concerns, but that's where the book moves from a kind of narrativization of the history of Christianity in America from a certain perspective, and towards a more straight polemic. The prose is far less appealing than that of Nixon Agonistes, and it doesn't attempt to be as psychologically insightful, but it's a very different genre and it's still written well.
I finished this the day I went to vote so that was funny. Wills diverts to tie the rise of Evangelicalism and Transcendentalism to Romanticism. This year has been interesting in learning more about and becoming more able to recognize the imprint of various intellectual strains, but I guess that's what happens when I actually start reading a couple nonfiction books, though reading Blake/Whitman while reading something like this or Hegel and Modern Society helps to tie it all together. Absurd delays on some reviews are just taking notes in an unorganized way makes compilation after the fact tedious.
Quotes, People, Notes, Mess:
Richard, Increase, Cotton Mather (1663-1728) - Puritan, New England, wilderness, conversion of slaves and conversion and murder of indians
Thomas Hooker (1586-1647) - Puritan, "who led a group out of Massachusetts in 1636 to found the Connecticut Colony, took the practice of
requiring conversion accounts with him." Conversion in stages. Desired the halfway covenant, see Baptism chapter.
John Cotton (1585-1652) - accused of antinomianism with Hutchinson, who he later disavowed after pressure from Winthrop and Shepard (Athanasius-y). "In fact, John Cotton argued that Hooker's theology of "stages" took away the "assurance" of conversion as an infallible sign of predestination. It was too open-ended, both fore and aft. Before, the preparation involved human effort to bring on one's salvation. And afterward, the separation between justification and sanctification made a person try to prove his justification by engaging in virtuous acts ("sanctification"). In either case, one was relying on human "works" for salvation—which, in Cotton's eyes, made Hooker papistical: "Whatsoever is of grace is not of works, and whatsoever is of works is not of grace.""
Roger Williams (1603-1683) - Not a Baptist, but friendly to them, and early church / state separation, with a twist. He believes the church did not exist. He had the odd belief that apostolic tradition was necessary and true, but not extant. "The garden had never existed in America, only the wilderness."
Charles Chauncy (1592-1672) - Universalist, Arminian, precursor to Unitarian movement, opposed the First Great Awakening. " John Adams would in time adopt a similar view of God's benevolence: "Now, my friend, can prophecies or miracles convince you or me that infinite benevolence, wisdom, and power created and preserves, for a time, innumerable millions to make them miserable forever for his own glory?""
Henry Dunster (1609-1659) - In 1654, Henry Dunster had been forced to resign as Harvard's president because of his views on baptism. Writing in 1935, Samuel Eliot Morison said of this scandal: "The news that President Dunster had become an 'antipaedobaptist' created much the same sensation in New England as would be aroused in the country today if President Conant should announce his adherence to communism."
James Davenport (1716-1757) - burned books, follower of George Whitefield who became nearly as prominent a 1GA itinerant.
Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) - First Great Awakening, had no prominent successors that followed his ideas. "The difference was that Edwards had translated the new languages back into the old dogma, while Bellamy and Hopkins had begun the process of translating the old dogma into a new language, a language of rights, reason, and universal moral intuition." Disliked itinerant preachers like George Whitefield, who fascinated young Ben Franklin
Benjamin Lay (1682-1759) - "His most famous bit of guerrilla theater occurred in 1738, at the annual meeting in Burlington, New Jersey. He wore a military coat and sword under his plain Quaker cloak, and carried a hollowed-out Bible in which he had placed a bladder of red pokeberry juice. In the middle of the service he threw off his cloak, pulled his sword, and stabbed the Bible, sprinkling its "blood" over bystanders as he told them that they were fake pacifists—they waged war on mankind and denied the Bible when they captured and held slaves. At another time, he lured the favored child of a slaveholding Quaker to his house and kept him there while the parents searched frenziedly. Then he returned the child, saying, "You may now conceive of the sorrow you inflict upon the parents of the Negro girl you hold in slavery, for she was torn from them by avarice."...Banned from meetings, Lay went into the marketplace to keep up his demonstrations, once throwing his wife's teacups from a balcony, smashing them on the ground, to protest the use of tea leaves harvested by slaves. He also inveighed against capital punishment, the lack of religious education for poor children, and cruel penal practices. He was much admired by Benjamin Franklin, who helped shape his massive and rambling attack on slavery into publishable form."
John Woolman (1720-1772) - After Lay (but in his lifetime), abolitionist, argued for reparations, refused to drive by stagecoach because of how animals were treated.
Washington - left before every communion
Charles Finney (1792-1875) - 2GA, called manipulative, altar calls, sawdust trail.
Lincoln - never mentioned Jesus once in any writing of his, except a single time indirectly. Civil war does not directly manifest a Head/Heart tension.
Frances Willard (1839-1898) - Women's Christian Temperance Union, suffragist, kindergarten movement.
DL Moody (1837-1899) - the gilded age business savvy revivalist. Followers were more militantly pre-mil. "I don't see how someone can follow Jesus and not be successful.
C I Scofield (1843-1921) - Abandoned his family. Systematized John Darby's Premil views. Dispensationalist. Futurist. Scofield Reference Bible. Funded by Lyman Stewart. Wills suggests non-KJV translations of Matt 6:13 is a better proof text of "Rapture" and points to how fundamentalists tied themselves to that translation.
Father Charles Coughlin (1891-1979) - father of the radio. Supported Roosevelt, then turned on him. 65% non-cath audience by '34. Became virulently antisemitic. Coalition with Gerald L.K. Smith.
persecution, hanging of Quakers...Mary Dyer...Cotton Mather "The quaking which distinguished these poor creatures
was a symptom of diabolical possession"
Quakers had been presenting petitions to King Charles II ever since his restoration to power two years earlier. He sent an instruction to Massachusetts, telling its rulers to stop executing his subjects for their religious opinions...It would be a mistake to look for religious tolerance in seventeenth century New England. Toleration, when it did come, was forced on the Puritans from the very authority they had fled. ...Thus the pure intolerance of New England was gradually eaten away by royal acts from abroad, running from Cromwell's inclusion of all forms of dissent to Charles II's letter of 1662 to James II's Proclamation of Indulgence to William of Orange's Act of Toleration.
Another troublesome issue arose in the course of the Antinomian controversy. As we have seen, a synod—a regional council—had been called to cure the Antinomian infection. Was the cure worse than the illness?
Me: I could've printed the entire Baptism chapter in quotes because i found it so interesting, in part because I am not part of a paedobaptist tradition.
Though they professed the "plain style" of preaching, they did not talk down to their audiences, who were expected to listen to hours on end of biblical exegesis and controversial theology. The whole community's pride in its literacy was proclaimed in the clear glass windows with which they had replaced the stained glass of Anglican cathedrals, the better to read one's Bible and the Psalter during services. The preachers' plain style was not a matter of being simple for the simple folk. Like the Puritans' plain dress, it was meant to draw attention to the essentials. It was opposed to the gaudy rhetoric of Anglican preachers (Lancelot Andrewes and John Donne, for instance). Puritan preachers expounded the sense of Scripture, breaking it down into heads and subheads as was taught by the Renaissance logician Peter Ramus
The schools were set up as bastions of orthodoxy against challenges from within the society—Harvard to counter the Antinomians, Yale to oppose tendencies typified in the Halfway Covenant. In Massachusetts, the charter for a college was authorized in 1636, while Sir Henry Vane was governor, and it was destined for Salem, which was hospitable to the Antinomians. But when Winthrop came in the next year, the site was changed to Newtown (Cambridge), the bastion of the conservatives, where they had held the General Court meetings and the synod that condemned Antinomians
The Puritans' introspection, their self-examination, the private conversion experience that set off soul from soul by God's election, the minute scrutiny of the stages of conversion—all this made the individual prize his or her singular experience. Tocqueville discerned something like this when he introduced the new word individualisme into the analysis of America: "Individualism is a considered and tranquil trait that inclines each citizen to separate himself from the crowd of his fellows, withdrawing into the enclave of his family and friends so that, having formed a little society of his own, he gladly lets the larger society go its way without him." One coming to that passage directly after studying the Puritans could well imagine that it was meant to describe New England, where the individual withdrew into a private experience of being saved and then joined the elect circle of "visible saints," separating himself from the unregenerate world, which had to wallow along toward damnation apart from him and his. And that private experience of being saved was like the personal assurance that would later be called "self-confidence" by Emerson—the highest virtue in his eyes. It had recently been coined in France as a pejorative term, to criticize the atomizing forces let loose by the French Revolution...Tocqueville had distinguished individualisme from egoisme, but he said that as individualisme develops, it circles back into egoisme? "Egoism dries up the very seed of every virtue; individualism initially crushes only the impulses to public virtue, but over time it turns on and obliterates every other virtue and at last it disappears into egoism." This antisocial urge could not be internally corrected, Tocqueville argued. It could be blunted only by some external and countervailing factor—in America, by the individual's partial re-entry into society by way of voluntary associations, which served as buffers between the individual and the state...Americans soon gave it an almost entirely sunny sense. It was no longer a dark force that needed correction from outside, one crushing public virtue, but was itself the source of all American virtue. After all, concentration on one's own independent state was a sign of being saved in New England.
Madison's Remonstrance:
"[We remonstrate] because the establishment proposed by the bill is not requisite for the support of the Christian religion. To say that it is, is a contradiction to the Christian religion itself, for every page of it disavows a dependence on the powers of this world. It is a contradiction to fact, for it is known that this religion [Christianity] both existed and flourished, not only without the support of human laws, but in spite of every opposition from them, and not only during the period of miraculous aid [in the era of Jesus], but long after it had been left on its own evidence and the ordinary care of Providence"...Madison agreed with Priestley and other Enlightenment figures that the purity of Christian belief and practice was corrupted when Constantine made it a state religion. All the abuses of power through the Middle Ages reflected the entanglement of the spiritual with the worldly...separation of church and state is for the protection of religion, not the state
By the 1850s the Methodists by themselves—joined together through an interlocking system of personal and epistolary contact—had constructed almost as many churches as there were post offices and employed almost as many ministers as there were postal workers. The largest evangelical denominations were each raising almost as much money per year as the postal service took in. Considered together, the evangelical churches employed nearly double the personnel, maintained nearly twice as many facilities, and raised at least three times the money as the Post Office. Moreover, the churches delivered their message to more people in more places than the postal service delivered letters and newspapers... the people of the United States were hearing several more times the number of Methodist sermons each year than they received pieces of mail. In fact, by 1840, Methodists "were, after the federal government, the nation's largest organization of any kind."
Since Sunday preached to all denominations, his choice of a church to be ordained in was not based on doctrine. He seems to have gone to the most respectable body that would take him—which he decided was the Presbyterians, who had ordained his mentor Wilbur Chapman. Richard Hofstadter quotes what he calls "a bit of Protestant folk lore": "A Methodist is a Baptist who wears shoes; a Presbyterian is a Methodist who has gone to college; and an Episcopalian is a Presbyterian who lives off his investments." Sunday just squeaked by in his bid for clerical status. To the examining board of ministers in Chicago, he answered doctrinal or historical questions with frank admissions that "that's too deep for me," or "I'll have to pass that up."
Eisenhower, when he met Graham, said, "I don't believe the American people are going to follow anybody who's not a member of a church." Not only was Eisenhower not a member. He had never been baptized. What denomination should he adopt? Graham asked what his parents had belonged to, and Eisenhower said the River Brethren. Graham thought Presbyterians would be more acceptable, so Eisenhower was baptized into that church after his election to the presidency.
Me: Despite never being baptized, Eich also told Graham that he believed part of his purpose in becoming president was to start a Revival.
January 16, 2011
the people who Should read this book probably won't ie conservative and fundementalist Christians. i didn't agree w/all of Wills' conclusions, he's a bit too cynical, but he makes his points solidly, fairly and factually
November 16, 2019
This volume by Garry Wills is one of the more notable contemporary takes on American religious history. I was pleased by Wills’ engaging style, ability to clearly summarize, and honest attempts to relate both sides of what is perhaps one of the most complex national religious histories. Wills adopts a model of American Christianity as comprising two “poles” or “tendencies,” one of which he labels “Enlightened Religion” and the other “Evangelical Religion.”
It was Enlightened Religion-religion focused on the “laws of nature and of nature’s God”-that gave us our unique freedom of religion and “might also be considered the typical American religion.” Evangelical Religion, on the other hand, focused on an experiential religion, best symbolized by the “revival,” of which America has experienced several major movements.
Obviously, a scholar (especially one of Wills’ stature) is free to choose any sort of analytical rubric to describe his or her topic. However. In this case, it becomes painfully obvious as the book progresses that Wills’ decision to adopt a tired dialectical construct serves in the end to flatten rather than enrich his view of the peculiarities of American religiosity.
In subtle and not-so-subtle ways, the book is an apology for Enlightened Religion over against Evangelical Religion. This does issue in a very fine discussion of the historical development of the principle of “separation of church and state,” a concept that has been very much abused by progressives and conservatives alike down through the years. However, Wills has a clear distaste for all things Evangelical that sometimes borders on active malice. It is clear by the end of the book (published during the end of George W. Bush’s presidency) that Wills’ key fear was an apparent Evangelical “takeover” of government. It is a bit ironic to me that a book that so stresses the need for separation of “church” and “state,” ends up in its final chapters becoming a commentary on the presidential administration. It seems Wills himself cannot seem to keep those lines clear.
I don’t mean to misrepresent Wills. I think he honestly does try to remain fair-handed in his analysis, and he does emphasize at several points that Enlightened and Evangelical religion really do need each other in order to survive. However, as the book progresses, bias begins to slip in, perhaps most egregiously with his claim that Evangelicals believe that gays “have no rights at all.” Of course. All Evangelicals believe that same-sex orientation strips you of all human and political rights. In my lifetime as what Wills would call an “Evangelical” (more on THAT in a moment), I’ve NEVER heard ANY leader who was deeply convinced that homosexual acts were defined by Scripture as sinful say anything other than that we should treat all people with respect and dignity and, most importantly, show to everyone the love of Christ. Perhaps I’ve been sheltered, but I rather believe that Wills is looking to some very “fringe” voices as representative of what HE thinks the Evangelical arm of American Christianity looks like.
Which leads me to my last (and most important) critique of this work. I was absolutely flummoxed to find that NOT EVEN ONCE did Garry Wills mention Pentecostalism. He claims that the iconic element of American Evangelical Religion is the “revival”…but fails completely to discuss the dynamics and global impact of the Azusa Street Revival. I’ll be honest: I find this omission absolutely inexcusable, especially for someone like Wills. It is either evidence of woeful ignorance or an inexcusable bias. The Pentecostal revival is perhaps America’s greatest impact of the 20th-century on the landscape of world religion.
What makes this omission so crushing to Wills’ work here is that Pentecostalism was despised by BOTH the enlightened Modernists and the evangelical Fundamentalists (for different reasons, obviously). However, it was something truly new and different…an actual “third way” between the poles of Enlightened and Evangelical Religion. Therefore, because Pentecostalism did not “fit” Wills’ framework, he apparently deigned it unworthy of his analysis.
For me, this book concluded as just another lesson in the failure of dialectical analysis that forces us to define only TWO sides to every story which leads to all sorts of distortions of the complexity of lived reality and destroys the ability to nuance. And it made me very sad. I liked reading Wills; his research was always thorough, his style was easy to follow, he shared many important insights. But, I feel that I must conclude that, though he stresses the important role of Enlightened Religion in American history, Wills’ understanding of American religion (at least, as it presented in this work) remains pretty unenlightened.
It was Enlightened Religion-religion focused on the “laws of nature and of nature’s God”-that gave us our unique freedom of religion and “might also be considered the typical American religion.” Evangelical Religion, on the other hand, focused on an experiential religion, best symbolized by the “revival,” of which America has experienced several major movements.
Obviously, a scholar (especially one of Wills’ stature) is free to choose any sort of analytical rubric to describe his or her topic. However. In this case, it becomes painfully obvious as the book progresses that Wills’ decision to adopt a tired dialectical construct serves in the end to flatten rather than enrich his view of the peculiarities of American religiosity.
In subtle and not-so-subtle ways, the book is an apology for Enlightened Religion over against Evangelical Religion. This does issue in a very fine discussion of the historical development of the principle of “separation of church and state,” a concept that has been very much abused by progressives and conservatives alike down through the years. However, Wills has a clear distaste for all things Evangelical that sometimes borders on active malice. It is clear by the end of the book (published during the end of George W. Bush’s presidency) that Wills’ key fear was an apparent Evangelical “takeover” of government. It is a bit ironic to me that a book that so stresses the need for separation of “church” and “state,” ends up in its final chapters becoming a commentary on the presidential administration. It seems Wills himself cannot seem to keep those lines clear.
I don’t mean to misrepresent Wills. I think he honestly does try to remain fair-handed in his analysis, and he does emphasize at several points that Enlightened and Evangelical religion really do need each other in order to survive. However, as the book progresses, bias begins to slip in, perhaps most egregiously with his claim that Evangelicals believe that gays “have no rights at all.” Of course. All Evangelicals believe that same-sex orientation strips you of all human and political rights. In my lifetime as what Wills would call an “Evangelical” (more on THAT in a moment), I’ve NEVER heard ANY leader who was deeply convinced that homosexual acts were defined by Scripture as sinful say anything other than that we should treat all people with respect and dignity and, most importantly, show to everyone the love of Christ. Perhaps I’ve been sheltered, but I rather believe that Wills is looking to some very “fringe” voices as representative of what HE thinks the Evangelical arm of American Christianity looks like.
Which leads me to my last (and most important) critique of this work. I was absolutely flummoxed to find that NOT EVEN ONCE did Garry Wills mention Pentecostalism. He claims that the iconic element of American Evangelical Religion is the “revival”…but fails completely to discuss the dynamics and global impact of the Azusa Street Revival. I’ll be honest: I find this omission absolutely inexcusable, especially for someone like Wills. It is either evidence of woeful ignorance or an inexcusable bias. The Pentecostal revival is perhaps America’s greatest impact of the 20th-century on the landscape of world religion.
What makes this omission so crushing to Wills’ work here is that Pentecostalism was despised by BOTH the enlightened Modernists and the evangelical Fundamentalists (for different reasons, obviously). However, it was something truly new and different…an actual “third way” between the poles of Enlightened and Evangelical Religion. Therefore, because Pentecostalism did not “fit” Wills’ framework, he apparently deigned it unworthy of his analysis.
For me, this book concluded as just another lesson in the failure of dialectical analysis that forces us to define only TWO sides to every story which leads to all sorts of distortions of the complexity of lived reality and destroys the ability to nuance. And it made me very sad. I liked reading Wills; his research was always thorough, his style was easy to follow, he shared many important insights. But, I feel that I must conclude that, though he stresses the important role of Enlightened Religion in American history, Wills’ understanding of American religion (at least, as it presented in this work) remains pretty unenlightened.
May 24, 2018
Head and Heart, American Christianities. Garry Wills, The Penguin Press, 2007 552pgs
by Jeff Neuman-Lee, May 24, 2018
We Americans are in a religious war. Whether we like or not. It has been a long war that has ebbed and flowed; followed political movements, not followed political movements; been bitter justification of self over others and has led the way of human liberation. Garry Wills writes during the most overtly religious administration in American History (up to that time) was bowing out largely discredited, the George W. Bush administration. Our media doesn’t like to remember how extremely Evangelical his administration was, how so many decisions were not made with objective reality, but the accomplishment of religious myth. To actually name it for what it was would be taking sides, so the media pretends it was other. That it attempted to assert a clearly religious stance was also an afront to our nation’s identity. That, for whatever the hell the reason it was for (religious ideas about Israel?), we would start an unjust war and lose is something for which we can’t bear to take responsibility. Today we see many people rejecting “religion” in total, as if “religion” was that Evangelical delusion; Wills’ history shows that the forces of progressivism in America today are deeply religious.
Wills starts at the beginning of European occupation in North America and delineates the larger contours of religious thought of a people who would be the first to set a boundary between their religious institutions and their public institutions. A constant theme is that the boundary is a great help to both on either side of it. (Conversely, when the attempt is made to meld religion with the state, both are injured, and both existentially threatened.) He centers on the idea that religion is something existing between the tension of the head and the heart. This tension is a bit sentimental, not very clear, and perhaps a stab at building peace between the churches; but it gets a point across that fits with what we know of humans.
It is not this titular generalization that stands out for me, however, but, rather the long history of American religious movements that sets the context for the religious war we experience today. As Wills would propose, I do not see the right-wing conservatives of today as “people of the heart”, but rather people of the tribe. Wills convinces me of my point when showing that the basis of the extremes of the anti-abortion movement have created not a sincere religious doctrine, but rather an unquestionable political totem that is both unbiblical and holds no basis in objective human experience. What he clearly lifts up is exemplified in his book dedication to Anthony Benezet whom he calls an “American Saint.” Benezet, a Quaker of the 1700’s, woke up to realize that slavery was inconsistent with both the gospels and Enlightened reason. With little support and some confusion on the part of others, he spent his life working to encourage others to realize that love refuses to enslave another. He and a few others got quite an important ball rolling.
Who is a person, who deserves to be included in society, who gets respect are at heart religious questions. Some will say, “the few.” Others who follow Jesus (whether they know it or not) will say “everyone.” We are at war over this today. And some don’t care that they subvert the moral and spiritual basis of our nation to achieve their religious visions.
by Jeff Neuman-Lee, May 24, 2018
We Americans are in a religious war. Whether we like or not. It has been a long war that has ebbed and flowed; followed political movements, not followed political movements; been bitter justification of self over others and has led the way of human liberation. Garry Wills writes during the most overtly religious administration in American History (up to that time) was bowing out largely discredited, the George W. Bush administration. Our media doesn’t like to remember how extremely Evangelical his administration was, how so many decisions were not made with objective reality, but the accomplishment of religious myth. To actually name it for what it was would be taking sides, so the media pretends it was other. That it attempted to assert a clearly religious stance was also an afront to our nation’s identity. That, for whatever the hell the reason it was for (religious ideas about Israel?), we would start an unjust war and lose is something for which we can’t bear to take responsibility. Today we see many people rejecting “religion” in total, as if “religion” was that Evangelical delusion; Wills’ history shows that the forces of progressivism in America today are deeply religious.
Wills starts at the beginning of European occupation in North America and delineates the larger contours of religious thought of a people who would be the first to set a boundary between their religious institutions and their public institutions. A constant theme is that the boundary is a great help to both on either side of it. (Conversely, when the attempt is made to meld religion with the state, both are injured, and both existentially threatened.) He centers on the idea that religion is something existing between the tension of the head and the heart. This tension is a bit sentimental, not very clear, and perhaps a stab at building peace between the churches; but it gets a point across that fits with what we know of humans.
It is not this titular generalization that stands out for me, however, but, rather the long history of American religious movements that sets the context for the religious war we experience today. As Wills would propose, I do not see the right-wing conservatives of today as “people of the heart”, but rather people of the tribe. Wills convinces me of my point when showing that the basis of the extremes of the anti-abortion movement have created not a sincere religious doctrine, but rather an unquestionable political totem that is both unbiblical and holds no basis in objective human experience. What he clearly lifts up is exemplified in his book dedication to Anthony Benezet whom he calls an “American Saint.” Benezet, a Quaker of the 1700’s, woke up to realize that slavery was inconsistent with both the gospels and Enlightened reason. With little support and some confusion on the part of others, he spent his life working to encourage others to realize that love refuses to enslave another. He and a few others got quite an important ball rolling.
Who is a person, who deserves to be included in society, who gets respect are at heart religious questions. Some will say, “the few.” Others who follow Jesus (whether they know it or not) will say “everyone.” We are at war over this today. And some don’t care that they subvert the moral and spiritual basis of our nation to achieve their religious visions.
January 14, 2022
I found this book interesting but uneven. It tends to veer somewhat between being a theological history of America and a political history (as informed by theology) and both parts are weakened thereby. He kept it a reasonably centric view of the persistent tension between Head (Enlightened Christianity in his view) and Heart (Evangelical) for most of the way, but that stance was abandoned when it came to the 'present ' (2007) the GWB administration and the evil Karl Rove meme. As if no political strategist or party had ever pursued wedge issues or identity politics before then. The Democrats (and their MSM allies) are proven masters at keeping their base angry, motivated and loyal. It almost felt as if he wrote the first ¾ of the book just to have enough ammunition to win what was then a current political argument. There is absolutely no recognition that anything the Left (Head) was pushing at that time was anything but correct and pure in motive and that the Right (heart) alone was malign. I wonder if Mr. Wills would change his view today as we now see children allowed and even encouraged to ‘change’ sexes with the connivance of the psychological/medical field (presumably with the full approval of the churches these people attend) with surgeries and hormone treatments performed on young bodies and minds (see Abigail Shrier). Unfortunately , that late tack to a more tendentious analysis undermined to some extent the rest of the book which was highly informative and more objective. I guess it is easier to be so about the deep past. From the Puritans to the First and Second Great Awakenings, the effects of religion on the Revolutionary and Civil Wars, important leaders and various schisms serves as a fine reference. Especially as he rarely omits a single name from any list of players, often with short informative bios. His chapters on the Founding Fathers and their views on church-state separation are excellent with many long quotes from Jefferson and Madison (they wrote so beautifully back then!). Also his chapter on the emergence of Dispensational Pre-Millenialism and the fairly recent origins of the Rapture concept (only since ~1830s by a guy named John Nelson Darby) were also quite fascinating. He does make a very good point toward the end on the always difficult abortion question. First he denies that it is a religious question at all which was different. But he also suggests (and I think correctly) that a so-called victory outlawing abortion (or even overturning Roe v Wade) might be as pyrrhic as the 18th Amendment was for Fundamentalism in which a committed minority overrode the wishes of the bulk of the nation and deeply hurt the country and their own issues in the process.
December 6, 2018
Fascinating and comprehensive summary of the history of American religion and how the “separation of church and state” have been interpreted. There has long been a conflict between religions of the head and those of the heart, but this seems especially true now. Ideally both head and heart are essential. Often, our religions emphasize one over the other, or even exclude one or the other. The author filled in and confirmed many of my own concerns and suspicions about how religion has evolved in the US and how this evolution has played out in our politics. Having grown up in an evangelical, fundamentalist, anti-intellectual tradition and left it for a more enlightened and progressive approach, I was astonished at the evolution of both schools of thought and how they influenced and were influenced by powerful individuals and historic events and movements. My criticism of the book would be the author’s bias against the emotional component of religion. Indeed, emotion bonds groups and individuals and changes hearts and minds. I would recommend this book to both people of faith and people of doubt.
June 29, 2020
Serious errors in the book early on, about the history of witchcraft in Europe.
Bavaria and Southern Germany were FAR more a hotspot than England, Scotland, etc., in the period 15550-1650. Why? Before the Thirty Years War settled this issue, this was THE battleground between Protestants and Catholics (and within that, between Lutherans and Calvinists). ALL sides in this religious battle had massive witchcraft cases.
Exorcisms? Lutherans and Anglicans/Episcopalians still have the procedures on the books, and certainly still did them 1650 or so.
It's not the only book where Wills has had some serious unevenness.
The intra-Protestant tussles in the North? Not bad, but ... Wills doesn't delve very deeply into Methodism, doesn't look at Lutheranism in North America at all, and gives short shrift to sectarian and cultic Christianities.
Bavaria and Southern Germany were FAR more a hotspot than England, Scotland, etc., in the period 15550-1650. Why? Before the Thirty Years War settled this issue, this was THE battleground between Protestants and Catholics (and within that, between Lutherans and Calvinists). ALL sides in this religious battle had massive witchcraft cases.
Exorcisms? Lutherans and Anglicans/Episcopalians still have the procedures on the books, and certainly still did them 1650 or so.
It's not the only book where Wills has had some serious unevenness.
The intra-Protestant tussles in the North? Not bad, but ... Wills doesn't delve very deeply into Methodism, doesn't look at Lutheranism in North America at all, and gives short shrift to sectarian and cultic Christianities.
December 17, 2018
The first 3/4 of the book is interesting and enlightening. However, when historians try writing about contemporary times by just giving their opinions, they lose their strength. Wills is too personally involved and takes sides. And, when he reports that Evangelical pastors “required” their congregants to attend Mel Gibson’s “The Passion of Christ” he shows either ignorance or outright making it up.
Read
February 24, 2021so much solid well-written information - Puritans arrived not as subjects of religious intolerance; they had left Holland because there was tolerance; they set up an intolerant community against other believers. subsequent developments - the Congregationalists, the Universalists & others are the head/reason based seekers;
the Great Awakenings - brought the heart/spiritual believers - who seek to convert to their view
the Great Awakenings - brought the heart/spiritual believers - who seek to convert to their view
June 12, 2020
An extremely through overview of the relationship between the Protestant church and American governance since the Puritan era. If you're trying to understand how we got where we are in our relationship between church and state, read this cover to cover. A little digressively editorial toward the end, but all of the argumentation is at least thorough.
August 1, 2025
Dense yet readable due to the incredible prose of Wills. Over and over, he proves his thesis that separation of church and state strengthens both the state and religion. With trump today and bush in hindsight, we see the third movement of Christianity enjoy a longer, more frightening impact on our state. Wills must be aghast
December 5, 2019
It is the best book I have read.
As a Catholic I have learned the true reasons for the separation of Church and State. Mr. Wills explains why our Country is in the situation it is in today!
I will read another book written by Garry Wills! I can’t wait.
As a Catholic I have learned the true reasons for the separation of Church and State. Mr. Wills explains why our Country is in the situation it is in today!
I will read another book written by Garry Wills! I can’t wait.
Read
January 2, 2022This is a book on my shelves. It looks interesting. Then I realized from the underlining that I read it in 2008. Bought it at 57th St Books in Hyde Park. ($18.74) I wonder if anyone else totally forgets reading substantial books. Maybe I can reread it now.
March 9, 2018
Interesting take on American Christianity, with focus on the effect of the Puritans and the Enlightenment.
August 19, 2015
"We remonstrate against the said Bill,...3. Because it is proper to take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties. We hold this prudent jealousy to be the first duty of Citizens, and one of the noblest characteristics of the late Revolution. The free men of America did not wait till usurped power had strengthened itself by exercise, and entangled the question in precedents. They saw all the consequences in the principle, and they avoided the consequences by denying the principle. We revere this lesson too much soon to forget it. Who does not see that the same authority which can establish Christianity, in exclusion of all other Religions, may establish with the same ease any particular sect of Christians, in exclusion of all other Sects? that the same authority which can force a citizen to contribute three pence only of his property for the support of any one establishment, may force him to conform to any other establishment in all cases whatsoever?" From Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments. All Americans should familiarize themselves with this extraordinary document, and notice how the clear intent of the Constitution is now being wantonly violated in every respect...and how the principles set forth here are applicable much more widely than just to the separation of church and state. Madison was the greatest political thinker who ever lived.[return][return]Wills begins with the story of Mary Dyer, the Quaker woman who was hanged in Boston by the Puritans for...well, being a Quaker, and follows the history of Christianity in America through the present day. He pays particular attention to the deism of the nation's founders during the Enlightenment era, which is his area of greatest expertise. Unfortunately, he doesn't do as well with some other areas, such as his coverage of the so-called "Gilded Age", which is so one-sided as to be mere caricature, objecting to "social Darwinism", "robber barons", and "American imperialism" (to be fair, though, these subjects are relevant to the religious developments of the period which he's exploring). There's also a problem with his basic explanatory framework, his notion of "head" and "heart" as poles toward which religious expression can move (and the ideal being some moderate amount of each)---unfortunately, this is a sort of equivocal package-deal, which in various places he uses to mean mind-body integration, intellect and emotion, Enlightenment and Evangelism...but what it really boils down to is reason vs. blind faith. Christopher Hitchens is much more consistent in identifying the correct principles involved in his God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything.[return][return]Still, even though I disagree with some of his evaluations, Wills's historical analysis is usually dead-on (with a few exceptions, such as his strange cherry-picking of quotes from The Age of Reason to make Thomas Paine seem less irreligious than he actually was, something which he does not do with any of the other founders and in fact criticizes other Christians for doing). This book is a valuable resource for anyone concerned about religion in America today...and if you're not concerned about it, you should be.
September 25, 2016
Very informative about the uniqueness of the original concept of disestablishment, separation of church and state in the American constitution. Madison, Jefferson, even Washington really did want a wall between church and state and would not even allow a congressional chaplain or military chaplains. Also put the to lie the idea that the "founding fathers" were Christians especially fundamentalist Christians.
February 17, 2014
Reading through this book is sometimes hard. I'm not typically a nonfiction reader, but I had this book from a class I took at Lipscomb. It goes pretty in depth into the history of the United States and the issues with religion therein. It's a neat point that Garry Willis makes: forcing one religion on people, or "establishing" one religion, is oppression for those who do not believe in that religion. As a Christian, this is an important thing to think about. Even though I believe that my religion is right, I can't make others believe and feel like I do. For one, I would not want a different religion forced on me. And number two, because someone doesn't see eye to eye with me, I cannot force them into a meaningful, loving relationship. It is between God and that individual, certainly not my place to try and mimic God, nor is it the government's place.
Another neat thing about this book is the way that it is so heavily researched and factual. Though challenging to read, it helped to dissolve some of the misconceptions I had about the founding fathers, (i.e. Jefferson, Paine, Maddison, Washington, etc.). I am coming to realize that it is the decisions and the extreme forward thinking of these men that shaped this nation. Without them, I would be growing up and living in a very different nation than it is today.
It occurs to me that the great divide between left and right is not for lack of fervor. Each side fights and pushes and tries to convince the other. Perhaps the concern for others is so great that we've divided ourselves, and blinded ourselves, with judgement and defiance. The encouraging thing about this book though, is that somehow, America tips back into a functional balance. And through it all, I want to be like those moderates (Benezet, Lincoln, Douglass, King) with a blend of Enlightenment and Evangelicalism.
Another neat thing about this book is the way that it is so heavily researched and factual. Though challenging to read, it helped to dissolve some of the misconceptions I had about the founding fathers, (i.e. Jefferson, Paine, Maddison, Washington, etc.). I am coming to realize that it is the decisions and the extreme forward thinking of these men that shaped this nation. Without them, I would be growing up and living in a very different nation than it is today.
It occurs to me that the great divide between left and right is not for lack of fervor. Each side fights and pushes and tries to convince the other. Perhaps the concern for others is so great that we've divided ourselves, and blinded ourselves, with judgement and defiance. The encouraging thing about this book though, is that somehow, America tips back into a functional balance. And through it all, I want to be like those moderates (Benezet, Lincoln, Douglass, King) with a blend of Enlightenment and Evangelicalism.
October 13, 2013
Wills does a thorough job showing the history of Christian expression from pre-revolution up to the present. The premise he uses to do so (the tension between cerebral and emotional thought) has merit but is a bit too simplistic it seems to me. However he makes strong arguments that Christianity did flourish the best during the Great Awakenings when being the least entangled with the state. The book regretfully takes an unfortunate turn at the end when the author's subtle bias turns into a full diatribe against the George W. Bush administration's faith based initiatives and pro-life policies. For whatever reason Willis promotes his own thoughts that Christianity has no say either way in the debate. A contention few on either side would agree with I suspect. I particularly take offense at his castigation of officials disagreeing with anthropogenic global warming as being anti-science. Perhaps it was true some were but knowing a fair amount on the subject, I and many meteorologists based on sound research do not believe runaway warming will occur. Willis' point is true that decisions made solely on religion are regretful, however he doesn't seem to allow for the fact that one can be informed by natural knowledge as well as being guided by moral principles based on faith. One other thing I wish the author had written about at the end is how we are seeing a resurgence in philosophy and apologetics amongst evangelicals in the latter 20rh century, led by people like Alvin Plantinga and William Lane Craig. At any rate, the book is informative and enjoyable to read if interested in Christianity's history in America. If not for the end, could have given it 3 stars.
November 24, 2014
This book was so close to five stars. Will's explanation of Puritan history and religious thought is enthralling, and his core thesis: that American religiosity is constantly tugged between Enlightened thought (head) and Evangelical zeal (heart) is compelling. I loved the way he highlighted important figures on both sides of the pole, and the bigger picture that is painted is extremely interesting. I walked away from this book with a much deeper, nuanced understanding of Puritan though, the Founding Fathers' religious understanding, and the roles various Evangelical Awakenings have had in shaping American culture.
Where the book started to unravel is in the last 100 pages or so, when Wills encounters the modern, Bush-era Evangelicalism. His distaste for this brand of Christianity becomes all-too-clear, which ruins the thoughtful, balanced tone of the majority of the book. While I certainly don't love the neo-conservative, Republican-meshed Evangelicalism typified by George W., I really wish Wills would have stuck more carefully to the formula that works so well for most of the book: unpacking both Enlightened and Evangelical though. A more balanced look at modern Christianity would have made this book an absolute must-read. As it is, it's an extremely helpful look at the early roots of American Christianity from the Puritans through the 19th century.
Where the book started to unravel is in the last 100 pages or so, when Wills encounters the modern, Bush-era Evangelicalism. His distaste for this brand of Christianity becomes all-too-clear, which ruins the thoughtful, balanced tone of the majority of the book. While I certainly don't love the neo-conservative, Republican-meshed Evangelicalism typified by George W., I really wish Wills would have stuck more carefully to the formula that works so well for most of the book: unpacking both Enlightened and Evangelical though. A more balanced look at modern Christianity would have made this book an absolute must-read. As it is, it's an extremely helpful look at the early roots of American Christianity from the Puritans through the 19th century.
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December 1, 2008An amazing survey of Christianity (mostly Protestantism) throughtout American history as it relates to politics. I wish every American Christian had time to read it before the upcoming election.
Update: This was a very thought-provoking book. The "conventional wisdom" that America was a holy bastion, dedicated to a Christian God from its inception, and that has since lost its way as part of a steady, unidirectional moral decline was absolutely disproven. It effectively debunked Providentialism, refuted the idea that our founders were trinitarian Christians, and made a strong case for the separation of church and state as part of the founders' intentions--all in a compelling argument that was fundamentally pro-religion. I very much appreciated the way Wills including so much primary documentation, and the fact that he acknowledged other interpretations alongside his own. I found this book evenhanded in tone and painstakingly factual in content.
Update: This was a very thought-provoking book. The "conventional wisdom" that America was a holy bastion, dedicated to a Christian God from its inception, and that has since lost its way as part of a steady, unidirectional moral decline was absolutely disproven. It effectively debunked Providentialism, refuted the idea that our founders were trinitarian Christians, and made a strong case for the separation of church and state as part of the founders' intentions--all in a compelling argument that was fundamentally pro-religion. I very much appreciated the way Wills including so much primary documentation, and the fact that he acknowledged other interpretations alongside his own. I found this book evenhanded in tone and painstakingly factual in content.
August 27, 2008
By the author of What Jesus Meant. Wills traces the two fundamental styles of Protestant Christianity through American history. I loved his examination of the Enlightenment religious culture that was prevelant during the writing of the Constitution and led to the disestablishment of churches in the United States. Wills sees the Protestant tradition as a tug of war between the head and the heart throughout our history. I think the book loses its way in his discussion of the last several decades of the 20th century and the dawn of the new century. Clearly a proponent of "the head", he repeatedly sounds the alarm about the power of evangelicals. I gave the first 2/3 of the book 4 stars, and the last third only 2 stars.
December 26, 2016
Wills does a fine job exploring the history of religion in the U.S. in this book. The theme (that religion in the U.S. has been characterized by a tension and vacillation between "The Head," or the rational religion of the Enlightenment , and "The Heart," or the more emotionally based religion of Evangelism) is understated, but pretty well explored. I felt that too much attention may have been placed on the current connection between conservative Christianity and the Bush administration. I agree with Wills' perception of the subject, but I'm not convinced that this period is momentous enough in the big picture to have deserved the multiple chapters Wills gave it. But aside from this quibbling, the work is exceptional.
April 4, 2014
A very well-written review of the history of Christianity in the U.S., both in its entirety and in the separate histories of the "intellectual" and "emotional" versions of Christianity. Willa is at his best when writing history, and he especially when he doesn't have a big personal stake in what he's writing about. (See my review of "Papal Sins".) However, Wills does drift into polemics a bit describing Christianity's role in modern times.
Wills gives us a bonus by including in the Appendices Jefferson's "Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom" and Madison's "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments". Wills can be an excellent write, but Jefferson and Madison are even better!
Wills gives us a bonus by including in the Appendices Jefferson's "Virginia Statue for Religious Freedom" and Madison's "Memorial and Remonstrance Against Religious Assessments". Wills can be an excellent write, but Jefferson and Madison are even better!
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