All Is Forgiven : The Secular Message in American Protestantism / Marsha Witten.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Witten, Marsha, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Protestant churches--United States--Doctrines--History--20th century.

Protestant churches.

Secularization (Theology)--History of doctrines--19th century.

Secularization (Theology).

Preaching--United States--History--20th century.

Preaching.

Sermons, American--History and criticism.

Sermons, American.

United States--Church history--20th century.

United States.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (190 pages)

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Princeton, New Jersey : Princeton University Press, [1993]

Summary:

How the image of God is being refashioned from the Protestant pulpit for an increasingly secular worldIn recent years, direct-mail Christianity has extended a new kind of invitation to the Protestant faithful: slick brochures enumerating the social and psychological advantages of church attendance, with no mention whatsoever of spiritual striving, suffering, or faith in God. Does this kind of secularity prevail in mainline Protestant churches? Marsha Witten looks for an answer to this question through an in-depth analysis of preaching on an important New Testament text: the Parable of the Prodigal Son.Witten finds that the transcendent and awesome God of Luther and Calvin, whose image informed early Protestant visions of the relationship between human beings and the divine, has been greatly softened in demeanor in American Protestant churches, with only minor resistance from conservative traditions. As preached from the pulpits of the Presbyterian Church (USA) and the Southern Baptist Convention, God is a deity whose primary function lies in providing psychological benefits to individual church members: the Parable of the Prodigal Son portrays God as a loving and understanding daddy figure. The focus is not on the challenges that the church could pose to the secular sphere of life. Instead, individuals are encouraged to make the right choices among the secular world's various offerings, or, as in many Southern Baptist messages, to accept God's offer of rescue from the "lostness" of secular confusions.Situating the sermon at the heart of Protestant worship, All Is Forgiven shows how complex rhetorical strategies continue to transform Christian faith and help it survive in a secular world.

Contents:

Intro

Half Title

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Contents

Acknowledgments

Chapter One: Protestant Preaching in Contemporary American Culture

Chapter Two: Secular Culture and the Churches’ Responses

Chapter Three: God as Daddy, Sufferer, Lover, and Judge

Chapter Four: Images of Christian Faith in the Contemporary World

Chapter Five: Images and Mitigations of Sin

Chapter Six: The Transformed Self

Chapter Seven: Secularity and Religious Speech in the Two Denominations

Appendix One: Brief Histories of the Two Denominations

Appendix Two: Methodology

Notes

Bibliography

Index.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9781400808687

1400808685

9780691261195

0691261199