The 1920s saw one of the most striking revolutions in manners and morals to have marked North American society, affecting almost every aspect of life, from dress and drink to sex and salvation. Protestant Christianity was being torn apart by a heated controversy between traditionalists and the modernists, as they sought to determine how much their beliefs and practices should be altered by scientific study and more secular attitudes. Out of the controversy arose the Fundamentalist movement, which has become a powerful force in twentieth-century America.
During this decade, hundreds (and perhaps thousands) of young girl preachers, some not even school age, joined the conservative Christian cause, proclaiming traditional values and condemning modern experiments with the new morality. Some of the girls drew crowds into the thousands. But the stage these girls gained went far beyond the revivalist platform. The girl evangelist phenomenon was recognized in the wider society as well, and the contrast to the flapper worked well for the press and the public. Girl evangelists stood out as the counter-type of the flapper, who had come to define the modern girl. The striking contrast these girls offered to the racy flapper and to modern culture generally made girl evangelists a convenient and effective tool for conservative and revivalist Christianity, a tool which was used by their adherents in the clash of cultures that marked the 1920s.

Negotiating Respect is an ethnographically rich investigation of Pentecostal Christianity-the Caribbean's fastest growing religious movement-in the contemporary Dominican Republic. Within the context of urban poverty in a barrio of Villa Altagracia, Brendan Jamal Thornton considers the role of religious identity in the lives of young male churchgoers who navigate conversion as a transformative means of status acquisition, authority, and transition out of gang life. Thornton shows that conversion offers both spiritual and practical social value because it provides a strategic avenue for prestige and an acceptable way to transcend personal history.

The Methodist Societies: The Minutes of Conference reproduces the Minutes as a formal record andconveys the nature and role of the Conference in Methodist life and polity during John Wesley's time. Included is information from letters and diaries of preachers as well as from John Wesley, some of which is newly published here. This material highlights some of the problems that arose in the meetings themselves, which in Wesley's eyes was merely summoned to advise him but, in his later years, almost imperceptibly became more of a legislative and ruling body, increasingly preoccupied with what would happen after Wesley's death.Despite the breadth of this volume, the American Minutes are not included, partly because they were in no sense Wesley's own work and partly because they could not be, at present, edited to the required standard. The Irish Minutes are included in an appendix."

This brilliant study opposes the Marxist concept of dialectical materialism and its view that change takes place through the conflict of opposites. Instead, Weber relates the rise of a capitalist economy to the Puritan determination to work out anxiety over salvation or damnation by performing good deeds - an effort that ultimately encouraged capitalism.

This is a comprehensive handbook on Methodist history, theology and practice. Part of a series projected by T&T Clark/Continuum, this volume is a handbook on Methodism containing an introduction, dictionary of key terms, and concentrates on key themes, methodology, and research problems for those interested in studying the origins and development of the history and theology of world Methodism. The literature describing the history and development of Methodism has been growing as scholars and general readers have become aware of its importance as a world church with approximately 40,000,000 members in 300 Methodist denominations in 140 nations. The tercentenary celebrations of the births of its founders, John and Charles Wesley, in 2003 and 2007 provided an additional focus on the evolution of the movement which became a church. The book will research questions, problems, and resources for further study.

Timeless truths from J. C. Ryle, first Anglican Bishop of Liverpool, the author of "Holiness."

Stories from a Place That Feels Like Home

Master storyteller Philip Gulley envelops readers in an almost forgotten world of plainspoken and honest small-town values, evoking a simpler time when people knew each other by name, folks looked out for their neighbors, and people were willing to do what was right--no matter the cost.

When Philip Gulley began writing newsletter essays for the twelve members of his Quaker meeting in Indiana, he had no idea one of them would find its way to radio commentator Paul Harvey Jr. and be read on the air to 24 million people. Fourteen books later, with more than a million books in print, Gulley still entertains as well as inspires from his small-town front porch.

The Book of Mormon is an influential and controversial book. It launched a religious movement, has been believed by millions to be scripture, and has been derided by others as fraudulent. Despite this (or perhaps as a result), the book's contents have been subject to both academic neglect and popular myth. This book challenges some of that neglect by examining the Book of Mormon through the lens of its relationship with the Bible: a work which the Book of Mormon openly quotes and expects to be read alongside, and the only text which everyone agrees is connected to the Book of Mormon. Through close examination of the Book of Mormon text and biblical parallels, including three substantial case studies, this book examines the ways in which the Book of Mormon draws upon and interprets the biblical text. This book demonstrates the complexity with which the Book of Mormon handles biblical material, and the close correlation between its reading of the Bible and the Book of Mormon's own core themes.

This title provides an upper-level introduction to the doctrine of justification which triggered the Reformation and is still high up on the agenda in Ecumenical dialogue. The core of the book is an historical survey of the doctrine of justification as it has developed within the Western church - a somewhat simplified version of McGrath's Justitia Dei, but with a more outspoken assessment of the various moves that are taken at various stages in the discussion. Attention will is paid to the context or prevailing world view in which such a doctrine is deemed significant. Although the focus is on a number of principal theologians there are some reference to their peers or followers. Only at the end the Pauline texts are examined. The conclusion considers what part a doctrine of justification can have within a modern worldview in which the concept of divine judgement has generally been marginalised. Continuum's Guides for the Perplexed are clear, concise and accessible introductions to thinkers, writers and subjects that students and readers can find especially challenging - or indeed downright bewildering. Concentrating specifically on what it is that makes the subject difficult to grasp, these books explain and explore key themes and ideas, guiding the reader towards a thorough understanding of demanding material.