Phillis Wheatley’s Genius in Bondage

Last updated on: September 13, 2012 at 1:13 am By johnturner

Others at the Anxious Bench know far more about the subject than I do, but I enjoyed reading Jonathan Yeager’s Books & Culture review of Vincent Caretta’s new biography of Phillis Wheatley (A Genius in Bondage reads the subtitle). I’ve always wanted to know more about Wheatley, especially after becoming somewhat familiar with Atlantic World evangelicals of African descent such as Olaudah Equiano and Rebecca Protten. I found this passage in Yeager’s review worthy of thought: The wealthy evangelical merchant... Read more

Is America New England Writ Large?

Last updated on: September 11, 2012 at 10:32 pm By John Fea

I spent the last couple of days at Duke University where I gave a lecture at a really interesting conference on the Bible in the Public Square. The conference was sponsored by the Duke Department of Religion, the Duke Center for Jewish Studies, and Southern Methodist University. What I found particularly interesting about the conference was that many of the speakers assigned with the task of talking about the role of the Bible in public life were scholars of Judaism. ... Read more

“Tweet for Youcef”: Social Media and Religious Liberty

Last updated on: September 10, 2012 at 4:25 pm By Thomas Kidd

The happy news came this weekend that long-imprisoned Iranian Christian convert and pastor Youcef Nadarkhani had been freed from prison. I found out on Twitter, a fact that highlights one of the most fascinating aspects of this story. Social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter have already played a role in an array of social protest movements. The #TweetforYoucef campaign by the American Center for Law and Justice (ACLJ) must be regarded as one of the most successful social media... Read more

ANXIOUS TOURS

Last updated on: September 9, 2012 at 9:28 pm By Philip Jenkins

I recently remarked on the concentration of important religious sites in upstate New York, the famous Burned Over District. I mentioned just a couple of these evocative places, from a large list of possible candidates – Palmyra, Seneca Falls, Hydesville. One of my favorites, though, is Oneida, which is just seventy miles from Seneca Falls. Oneida recalls America’s long history of communes and religious settlements – if you want to be rude, call them “cult compounds.” It beautifully illustrates the... Read more

Pioneer Prophet on the Road

Last updated on: September 9, 2012 at 7:43 pm By johnturner

Fortunately not by handcart. For any of our readers in Utah (and their friends), I’m going to be in the Beehive State this week talking about Brigham Young in Logan, Provo, and Salt Lake City. Tuesday, Sept. 11: Utah State University, Old Main Room 225, 4:30 p.m. Thursday, Sept. 13: Brigham Young University, Varsity Theatre, 11:00. Thursday, Sept. 13: Benchmark Books, Salt Lake City. For details on the above talks, see http://johngturner.com/2012/09/09/utah-trip/ (still working out a few kinks on the website).... Read more

BURNED-OVER DISTRICTS

Last updated on: September 6, 2012 at 10:04 am By Philip Jenkins

You can learn a lot about a society by what it remembers, but even more by what it forgets. If you have the slightest interest in American religious history, then it’s difficult to find a more evocative landscape than the burned-over district of western New York state. In the early and mid-nineteenth century, this was the seedbed of many explosive movements, of Mormonism, Adventism, Spiritualism, Utopianism, of new forms of Revivalism. Older Shaker communities now counted Fourier Socialists among their... Read more

Book of Mormon Girl

Last updated on: September 6, 2012 at 12:27 am By johnturner

Over the years, I’ve experimented with several ways to introduce students to the topic of Mormonism: either South Park or the song “All-American Prophet” from the Book of Mormon: The Musical, Joseph Smith’s First Vision, sections of the Helen Whitney documentary The Mormons, as well as several excellent short introductions (namely Matt Bowman’s The Mormon People and Richard Bushman’s Mormonism: A Very Short Introduction). Now there’s one more great option: Joanna Brooks’s The Book of Mormon Girl: Memoir of an... Read more

An Epic Night in Philadelphia

Last updated on: September 4, 2012 at 10:19 pm By John Fea

It has been a long week and creativity is lacking, so please forgive me for the cross-post today. The following post was published on September 4, 2012 at The Way of Improvement Leads Home. –JF We almost didn’t see Bruce Springsteen in Philadelphia on Sunday night. I have spent the last couple of weeks battling something akin to bronchitis and the members of my family were not feeling well either. On Saturday I thought about trying to put the tickets... Read more

Barack Obama: Self-Professed Evangelical?

Last updated on: September 3, 2012 at 4:15 pm By Thomas Kidd

One of the most peculiar moments of the Republican National Convention — at least among those that did not involve an empty chair — was Mike Huckabee’s proclamation that Barack Obama was a “self-professed evangelical.” Mollie Hemingway at GetReligion (now housed at Patheos) registered puzzlement at that statement, a feeling I certainly share. A couple months ago, the Anxious Bench’s John Turner asked “What Is Evangelicalism?”, generating an interesting discussion not only about the meaning of the term ‘evangelical,’ but about its uses in the media and pop... Read more

Where Was California at the First Thanksgiving?

Last updated on: January 3, 2015 at 5:30 pm By Agnes Howard

This summer our family traveled to southern California, a first trip to San Diego. Our children clambered through tide pools on Point Loma peninsula at the Cabrillo monument. This National Park honors Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, the first European to alight in 1542 on the west coast of what is now the United States of America. It’s a gorgeous place, blue Pacific vistas on both sides, the city to the east and sailboats, surfers, and an occasional sea-lion sighting to the... Read more