That churches are one of the most important cornerstones of black political organization is a commonplace. In this history of African American Protestantism and American politics at the end of the Civil War, Nicole Myers Turner challenges the idea of always-already politically engaged black churches. Using local archives, church and convention minutes, and innovative Geographic Information Systems (GIS) mapping, Turner reveals how freedpeople in Virginia adapted strategies for pursuing the freedom of their souls to worship as they saw fit-and to participate in society completely in the evolving landscape of emancipation. Freedpeople, for both evangelical and electoral reasons, were well aware of the significance of the physical territory they occupied, and they sought to organize the geographies that they could in favor of their religious and political agendas at the outset of Reconstruction. As emancipation included opportunities to purchase properties, establish black families, and reconfigure gender roles, the ministry became predominantly male, a development that affected not only discourses around family life but also the political project of crafting, defining, and teaching freedom. After freedmen obtained the right to vote, an array of black-controlled institutions increasingly became centers for political organizing on the basis of networks that mirrored those established earlier by church associations.

Based on the National Study of Youth and Religion--the same invaluable data as its predecessor, Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers--Kenda Creasy Dean's compelling new book, Almost Christian, investigates why American teenagers are at once so positive about Christianity and at the same time so apathetic about genuine religious practice.
In Soul Searching, Christian Smith and Melinda Lundquist Denton found that American teenagers have embraced a "Moralistic Therapeutic Deism"--a hodgepodge of banal, self-serving, feel-good beliefs that bears little resemblance to traditional Christianity. But far from faulting teens, Dean places the blame for this theological watering down squarely on the churches themselves. Instead of proclaiming a God who calls believers to lives of love, service and sacrifice, churches offer instead a bargain religion, easy to use, easy to forget, offering little and demanding less. But what is to be done? In order to produce ardent young Christians, Dean argues, churches must rediscover their sense of mission and model an understanding of being Christian as not something you do for yourself, but something that calls you to share God's love, in word and deed, with others. Dean found that the most committed young Christians shared four important traits: they could tell a personal and powerful story about God; they belonged to a significant faith community; they exhibited a sense of vocation; and they possessed a profound sense of hope. Based on these findings, Dean proposes an approach to Christian education that places the idea of mission at its core and offers a wealth of concrete suggestions for inspiring teens to live more authentically engaged Christian lives.
Persuasively and accessibly written, Almost Christian is a wake up call no one concerned about the future of Christianity in America can afford to ignore.

The contributors to this volume examine the complex and dynamic role that Protestant majorities and minorities played in shaping the Reformations of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In doing so, it offers an important perspective on the range of intellectual, social, economic, political, theological and ecclesiological factors that governed intra- and inter-confessional encounter in the early modern period. While the principal focus is on the situation of different Protestant majority and minority groups, many of the contributions also engage the relation of Protestants and Catholics, with a number also considering early modern Christian dialogue with Muslims and Jews.The volume is organised into five sections, which together provide a comprehensive picture of Protestant majorities and minorities. The first section explores intellectual trajectories, especially those which promoted confessional unity or sought to break down confessional boundaries. The second section, taking the neglected Spanish Reformation as an important case-study, examines the clandestine aspect of minority activities and the efforts of majorities to control and suppress them. The third section pursues a similar theme but examines it through the lens of Flemish and Walloon Reformed refugee communities in Germany and the Netherlands, demonstrating the way in which confessional factors could lead to the integration or exclusion of minorities. The fourth section examines marginal or peripheral Reformations, whether geographically or doctrinally understood, focussing on attempts to implement reform in the shadow of the Ottoman Empire. Finally, the fifth section looks at confessional identity and otherness as a principal theme of majority and minority relations, providing both theoretical and practical frameworks for its evaluation.

For too long, scholars have published new research on Edwards without paying due attention to the work he took most seriously: biblical exegesis. Edwards is recognized as an innovative theologian who wielded tremendous influence on revivalism, evangelicalism, and New England theology. What is often missed is how much time he devoted to studying and understanding the Bible. He kept voluminous notebooks on Scripture and died with unrealized plans for major treatises on the Bible. More and more experts now recognize the importance of this aspect of his life; this book brings together the insights of leading Edwards scholars on this topic. The essays in Jonathan Edwards and Scripture set Edwards' engagement with Scripture in the context of seventeenth-century Protestant exegesis and eighteenth-century colonial interpretation. They provide case studies of Edwards' exegesis in varying genres of the Bible and probe his use of Scripture to develop theology. The authors also set his biblical interpretation in perspective by comparing it with that of other exegetes. This book advances our understanding of the nature and significance of Edwards' work with Scripture and opens new lines of inquiry for students of early modern Western history.

"Puritans in the New World" tells the story of the powerful yet turbulent culture of the English people who embarked on an "errand into the wilderness." It presents the Puritans in their own words, shedding light on the lives both of great dissenters such as Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson and of the orthodox leaders who contended against them. Classics of Puritan expression, like Mary Rowlandson's captivity narrative, Anne Bradstreet's poetry, and William Bradford's "Of Plymouth Plantation" appear alongside texts that are less well known but no less important: confessions of religious experience by lay people, the "diabolical" possession of a young woman, and the testimony of Native Americans who accept Christianity. Hall's chapter introductions provide a running history of Puritanism in seventeenth-century New England and alert readers to important scholarship.

Above all, this is a collection of texts that vividly illuminates the experience of being a Puritan in the New World. The book will be welcomed by all those who are interested in early American literature, religion, and history.