This expansive study offers an interpretation of the 'new Pentecost': the rise of charismatic Christianity, before, during, and after the 'long 1960s'. It examines the translocal actors, networks, and media which constructed a 'Spiritscape' of charismatic renewal in the Anglo-world contexts of Australia, the British Isles, Canada, New Zealand, South Africa, and the United States. It places this arena also in a wider and dynamic worldwide setting, exploring the ways in which charismatic imaginations of an 'age of the Spirit' were shaped by interpenetrations with the 'Third World', the Soviet Bloc, and beyond in the global Sixties and Seventies. Age of the Spirit explains charismatic developments within Protestantism and Catholicism, mainline and non-denominational churches, and within existing pentecostalisms, and places these in relation to lively scholarly themes such as secularisation, authenticity, and cosmopolitanism. It offers an unrivalled analysis of charismatic music, books, television, conferences, personalities, community living, and controversies in the 1960s and 1970s. It looks forward to the many global legacies of charismatic renewal, for example in relation to the politics of sexuality in the Anglican Communion, or to support for President Donald J. Trump. The essential question at the heart of this book is relevant for scholars and practitioners of Christianity alike: how did charismatic renewal transform the churches in the twentieth century, moving from the periphery to the mainstream?

In postapartheid Cape Town-Africa's gay capital-many Pentecostal men turned to "ex-gay" ministries in hopes of "curing" their homosexuality in order to conform to conservative Christian values and African social norms. In Desire Work Melissa Hackman traces the experiences of predominantly white ex-gay men as they attempt to forge a heterosexual masculinity and enter into heterosexual marriage through emotional, bodily, and religious work. These men subjected themselves to daily self-surveillance and followed prescribed behaviors such as changing how they talked and walked. Ex-gay men also saw themselves as participating in the redemption of the nation, because South African society was perceived as suffering from a crisis of masculinity in which the country lacked enough moral heterosexual men. By tying the experience of ex-gay men to the convergence of social movements and public debates surrounding race, violence, religion, and masculinity in South Africa, Hackman offers insights into the construction of personal identities in the context of sexuality and spirituality.