All truly religious movements are informed by a search for spiritual renewal, often signalled by an attempt to return to what are seen as the original, undiluted values of earlier times. Elements of this process are to be seen in the history of almost all modern religious revivals, both inside and outside the mainstream denominations.

A.G. Dickens is the most eminent English historian of the Reformation. His books and articles have illuminated both the history and the historiography of the Reformation in England and in Germany. Late Monasticism and the Reformation contains an edition of a poignant chronicle from the eve of the Reformation and a new collection of essays. The first part of the book is a reprint of his edition of The Chronicle of Butley Priory, only previously available in a small privately financed edition which has long been out of print. The last English monastic chronicle, it extends from the early years of the sixteenth century up to the Dissolution. Besides giving an intimate portrait of the community at Butley, it reveals many details concerning the local history and personalities of Suffolk during that period. The second part contains the most important essays published by A.G. Dickens since his Reformation Studies (1982). Their themes concern such areas of current interest as the strength and geographical distribution of English Protestantism before 1558; the place of anticlericalism in the English Reformation; and Luther as a humanist. Also included are some local studies including essays on the early Protestants of Northamptonshire and on the mock battle of 1554 fought by London schoolboys over religion.

A penetrating study of Calvin's Institutes and an illumination of Calvin's theology as a whole.This work, by one of the world's pre-eminent Calvin scholars, has long been regarded as a work of the greatest importance. Professor de Kroon is a leading Reformation historian and historian of doctrine. His knowledge of Protestant and Catholic theology in the Reformation era is unparalleled.For all scholars and student of Calvin's theology.

In Theology from Listening: Finding the Core of Liberal Quaker Theological Thought, Rhiannon Grant explores the changes and continuities in liberal Quaker theology over the twentieth and early twenty-first centuries in multiple English-speaking Quaker communities around the world. The work involves a close analysis of material produced by Quaker meetings through formal, corporate methods; of material produced by individuals and small groups within Quaker communities; and of writing by individuals and small groups working primarily within academic or ecumenical theological settings. It concludes that although liberal Quaker theology is diverse and flexible, it also possesses a core coherence and can meaningfully be discussed as a single tradition. At the centre of liberal Quaker theology is the belief that direct, unmediated contact with the Divine is possible and results in useful guidance.

This book attempts to understand Calvin in his sixteenth-century context, with attention to continuities and discontinuities between his thought and that of his predecessors, contemporaries, and successors. Richard Muller is particularly interested in the interplay between theological and philosophical themes common to Calvin and the medieval doctors, and developments in the rhetoric and argument associated with humanism.

John Calvin revolutionized Christianity. Without him, there would not have been apologetics, evangelism, or even the protestant reformation It's easy to say you think he's a pretty important guy, but it's hard to know why without a clear understanding of things like total depravity, sovereign grace, and predestination--concepts that are quite complex to fully grasp. This book breaks down Calvinism into language we can all understand: plain and simple English If you are curious about Calvinism, but don't want a bias view from someone either for the church or against the church, then this is the book for you. This unbiased book explains Calvinism in a way that's easy to understand: in plain and simple English

This unique book aims to provide the first extended account of the intellectual history of aesthetic discourse among British and American evangelicals from the awakening of a modern aesthetic consciousness in the eighteenth century to the fundamentalist-modernist controversy of the early twentieth century. Drawing on an extensive but largely forgotten body of periodical source materials, it seeks to map the evangelical aesthetic tradition's intellectual terrain, to highlight its connections to other philosophical discourses, and to assess some of its theological implications. In doing so, it challenges the still prevalent stereotype of evangelicalism as aesthetically 'impoverished' and devoid of serious reflection on the arts, offering instead a narrative sensitive to the historical complexities of evangelical approaches to aesthetic theory and criticism.

"This colection brings together two generations of scholarship on many important topics in African-American religious history. . . . A useful and judiciously chosen compilation that should serve well in the classroom."
-- "Religious Studies Review"

"It serves as a smorgasbord of the study of black spirituality."
-- "Black Issues Book Review"

Down by the Riverside provides an expansive introduction to the development of African American religion and theology. Spanning the time of slavery up to the present, the volume moves beyond Protestant Christianity to address a broad diversity of African American religion from Conjure, Orisa, and Black Judaism to Islam, African American Catholicism, and humanism.

This accessible historical overview begins with African religious heritages and traces the transition to various forms of Christianity, as well as the maintenance of African and Islamic traditions in antebellum America. Preeminent contributors include Charles Long, Gayraud Wilmore, Albert Raboteau, Manning Marable, M. Shawn Copeland, Vincent Harding, Mary Sawyer, Toinette Eugene, Anthony Pinn, and C. Eric Lincoln and Lawrence Mamiya. They consider the varieties of religious expression emerging from migration from the rural South to urban areas, African American women's participation in Christian missions, Black religious nationalism, and the development of Black Theology from its nineteenth-century precursors to its formulation by James Cone and later articulations by black feminist and womanist theologians. They also draw on case studies to provide a profile of the Black Christian church today.

This thematic history of the unfolding of religious life in AfricanAmerica provides a window onto a rich array of African American people, practices, and theological positions.

Puritanism has a reputation for being emotionally dry, but seventeenth-century Puritans did not only have rich and complex emotional lives, they also found meaning in and drew spiritual strength from emotion. From theology to lived experience and from joy to affliction, this volume surveys the wealth and depth of the Puritans' passions.

The period 1928-1942 saw some of the greatest political and social upheavals in modern British history. Lang, as Archbishop of Canterbury, led the Church of England through this tumultuous period and was a pivotal influence in political and religious decision-making. In this book, Robert Beaken provides a new perspective on Lang, including his considerable relationship with the royal family. Beaken also shows how Lang proved to be a sensitive leader during wartime, opposing any demonisation of the enemy and showing compassion to conscientious objectors. Despite his central role at a time of flux, there has been little written on Lang since the original biography published in 1949, and history has not been kind to this intellectually gifted but emotionally complex man. Although Lang has often been seen as a fairly unsuccessful archbishop who was resistant to change, Beaken shows that he was, in fact, an effective leader of the Anglican community at a time when the Church of England was internally divided over issues surrounding the Revised Prayer Book and its position in an ever-changing world. Lang's reputation is therefore ripe for reassessment. Drawing on previously unseen material and first-hand interviews, Beaken tells the story of a fascinating and complex man, who was, he argues, Britain's first 'modern' Archbishop of Canterbury.