American Piety, Then and Now by K.L. Bnungsieyn”All the good the Savior gave to the world wasncommunicated through this book [the Bible]. Butnfor it we could not know right from wrong.”n—Abraham Lincolnn”The Cosby Show is the greatest teacher of moralsnin American society.”n— Sheldon Hackney, president,nUniversity of PennsylvanianVoices From the Heart: FournCenturies of American Piety bynRoger Lundin and Mark A. Noll,nGrand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans;n$19.95.nReforming Fundamentalism:nFuller Seminary and the NewnEvangelicalism by GeorgenMarsden, Grand Rapids:nEerdmans; $19.95.nA rnerica was born a ChristiannTY nation. America was born tonexemplify that devotion to the elementsnof righteousness which are derived fromnthe revelations of the Holy Scripture.”nIt is the kind of statement fullyncapable of causing Madeline O’Hair toncheck her pulse or Norman Lear tonreach for his checkbook. Did it perhapsnproceed from a pre-fall Jimmy Swaggartnbroadcast, or a North Carolina stumpnspeech by Pat Robertson? Actually, itnwas Woodrow Wilson, on May 17,n1911.nOne might quibble with Wilson’sn”Christian nation” formula, but WheatonnCollege professors Roger Lundinnand Mark Noll have collected considerablenevidence for a solidly religiousnnation, what the subtitle of their bookncalls “four centuries of American piety.”nThe authors of Voices From thenHeart are quick to add that the limitationnof their work to “Christians whonhappened to live in North America”ndoes not mean that Americans arenmore pious than other peoples, nornthat America is “a new PromisednLand.” (Belgians and Swedes who arencontent at home may rest easy.)nHere is an eclectic bunch indeed:nJohn Winthrop, Roger Williams, Jona-nK.L. Billingsley writes often onnreligion and politics.nthan Edwards, Jean de Brebeuf, FredericknDouglass, Herman Melville,nWalter Rauschenbusch, D.L. Moody,nThomas Merton, Harry Emerson Fosdick,nFlannery O’Connor, DorothynDay, John Updike, and Virginia StemnOwens among others. The anthologynincludes letters, journal entries, sermons,npoems, fiction, and historicalndocuments such as Lincoln’s 1863nnnproclamation of a national fast. SomenJewish voices such as Will Herbergnmight have been included. Theynwould certainly have been more representativenof American piety thanntrendy Dutch priest Henri Nouwen.nBut the range is broad enough tonprovide a biopsy of the American soul.nAnd as Tocqueville noted, America is annation with the soul of a church.nThroughout the early selections,none is struck by the ease in which thensubjects refer to the divine. This camenas naturally as breathing not only tonPuritan theologians and scribes such asnMarie of the Incarnation but, as noted,nto carpenters and farmers as well.nThere is sometimes a travail of soul,nbut also a clear sense of joy andncertainly none of the modernnsqueamishness about death. “It is ofnSEPTEMBER 1988/27n
January 1975July 26, 2022By The Archive
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