How do politics and science affect theology? (206)
distrust of authority
Reason vs. Enthusiasm
Pietism – Methodism
baptismal regeneration (211 - Wesley rejected)
"City on a hill" the dream (221)
Edwards re. experience & theology (223)
predestination for the Calvinists in America
challenge of slavery to American experience
From Enlightenment to a New world
p. 216: Ambivalence of these thinkers
City on a hill
The city on a hill
the idea of denomination really developed in the US
bewildering variety of developments in US (219)
Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. –Thomas Jefferson
Sinners in the hands of an angry God (J. Edwards)
Covenant
Territory & the Church faith within it
Now to be understood as an individual's commitment (covenant) – not a function of being born into a territory
seen by some as a modification of strict Calvinist predetermination – because keeping the covenant was freely entered into – then becomes an obligation
Ann Hutchinson
prophecies & visions – her view that grace could come to anyone – "unpredictable grace seemed to threaten" the discipline needed to make the "city on a hill" work (cf. quote 221)
conversion came to be a requirement for inclusion in the civic community … communion, baptism, etc.
Jonathan Edwards
science vs. traditional theology. For JE "orthodox Calvinism fit best with modern science. Accepting Locke's view that our knowledge begins with experience
not necessarily materialism from scientific perspective
JE saw correspondence between Newton's view of the universe and Calvin's predetestination (223) "…setting traditional doctrines in a new metaphysical context. He believed in a God so powerful he left no room for anything else."
George Whitefield (1740) built on the outburst of conversion experiences – JE defended the developments
Rational religion
Benjamin Franklin
Thomas Jefferson
And yet until the 1880's (223) "every state except Rhode Island still required some sort of religious affirmation from anyone seeking public office (Church & State)
Rationalism "took institutional form in Unitarianism – rejection of Trinity, original sin, predestination
Revivals on the Frontier
Nathaniel W. Taylor & Lyman Beecher organizing frontier revivals
Charles Finney carried revivals into New York – priding himself on his lack of sophistication
Mother Ann Lee experienced visions that led her to form a Quakerism for women (the female aspect of divinity)
Oneida community – eschatological communities
Seventh Day Adventists – incorporating Jewish elements into their communitarianism
Joseph Smith: Latter Day Saints
Romanticism in America
reaction to rationalism … a cluster of responses called romanticism
Ralph W. Emerson … appealing to intuition – "transcendentalism"
leading in a variety of paths
Horace Bushnell (before Civil War) "attacking individualism and the emphasis on revivals and raising questions about rationalism in religion." (229)
Slavery & Black religion
cf. opening p. 230 – we must not ignore "full consequences of slavery and non-emancipation" in story of American church
race pecularly the criteria in American slavery
"In America … only the Quakers (starting in the 1750s) really demanded" that the church reject slavery (230)
the unfulfilled dream of Puritan America
(231) … are we a city on a hill? Inspiring the world?