Product Description: Whether like Paul’s experience on the road to Damascus or Wesley’s “strangely warmed heart,” the desire to meet or be met by God is as old as humanity. But America has been the fertile seed bed for what William James famously called “varieties of religious experience...read more

Product Description: As the twenty-first century muddles along, perhaps the phrase "Can I get a witness?" will sharpen our thinking about the current state of religion in American culture, particularly for Protestants. Indeed, the permanent transition that characterizes American religious life offers an opportunity to revisit the word "witness" and its meaning for the future...read more

Product Description: This book provides a thorough introduction to historical and contemporary issues in American religion, tackling controversial hot-button topics such as abortion, Intelligent Design, and Scientology.• Approximately 500 entries written by more than 60 contributors• Primary documents that provide firsthand accounts of issues and event...read more

Product Description: Respected Baptist historian and theologian Bill Leonard takes readers through the theological and practical questions that are important to Baptists. In a clear style and with great sensitivity to the varieties of beliefs among Baptist bodies, Leonard considers the big questions of faith...read more

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Product Description: First in a series of concise dictionaries on various traditions in American Christianity, this comprehensive resource is an A-Z guide to the ideas, events, people, movements, practices, institutions, and denominations that have made up the Baptist tradition in North America, from its earliest days to the present...read more

Religion has long been a source of identity for many Southerners, and the Appalachian areas in particular have proven to be a virtual fortress protecting faith and culture. Yet, in a region popularly thought to be religiously homogeneous, congregations reflect a wide range of doctrinal differences over such issues as conversion, ministerial leadership, and the authority on which a church bases its core beliefs.Profiling the prominent Christian traditions in southern Appalachia, this book brings together contributions by twenty scholars who have long studied the religious practices found in the region’s cities, small towns, and rural communities. These authors provide insights into not only the independent mountain churches that are strongly linked to local customs but also the mainline and other religious bodies that have a significant presence in Appalachia but are not strictly associated with it. The essays explore the nature of ministry within these various churches, show the impact of broader culture on religion in the region, and consider the question of whether previously isolated, tradition-based churches can retain their distinctiveness in a changing world.One group of chapters focuses on elements of mountain religion as seen in the beliefs and practices of mountain Holiness folk, serpent handlers, and various Baptist traditions. Later chapters review the history and activities of other denominations, including Southern Baptist, Presbyterian, Wesleyan/Holiness, Church of God, and Roman Catholic. Also considered are the economic history of the region, popular religiosity, and the role of church-affiliated colleges. Taken together, these essays offer a richly nuanced understanding of Christianity in Appalachia.The Editor: Bill J. Leonard is dean of the Divinity School at Wake Forest University. His other books include Out of One, Many: American Religion and American Pluralism and God's Last and Only Hope: The Fragmentation of the Southern Baptist Convention.The Contributors: Monica Kelly Appleby, Donald N. Bowdle, Mary Lee Daugherty, Melvin E. Dieter, Howard Dorgan, Anthony Dunnavant, Gary Farley, Samuel S. Hill, Loyal Jones, Helen Lewis, Charles H. Lippy, Bill J. Leonard, Deborah Vansau McCauley, Lou F. McNeil, Marcia Clark Myers, Bennett Poage, Ira Read, James Sessions, Barbara Ellen Smith, H. Davis Yeuell.

Product Description: Leading scholars present entries on selected controversies and controversial individuals in American religious life from the colonial period to the present. Key figures, themes, terms, institutions and groups, books, and relevant secular topics that have contributed to religious controversy are included...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Product Description: Bill J. Leonard has always specialized in insightful exegesis of Christian history that vividly demonstrates the power of personal story to communicate the Word of God. In this third, enlarged edition of Word of God Across the Ages: Using Christian History in Preaching, Leonard returns to the roots of the Christian story to find in the lives of our faithful forebears examples of the potent presence of the gospel...read more

Product Description: Drawing upon the perspectives of Christian education, biblical studies, worship, ethics, the arts, the role of women, the role of minorities, sexuality, and vocation, this book provides a multifaceted picture of the meaning of spirituality...read more

Analyzes the recent controversy between moderate and fundamentalist Baptists from an historical perspective

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