Auswahl der wissenschaftlichen Literatur zum Thema „South Congregational Society in Lowell“

Moral renewal: a challenge to the churchesThe article addresses the issue of moral formation in the South African society and focuses on the role the Christian churches can play in this respect. It argues that the church can indeed play a vital role, if it succeeds in facing up to at least four challenges. The first one has to do with a stronger emphasis on the moral implications of the gospel on congregational level. Too many churches preach a version of the gospel that lacks clarity about the moral commitment asked of disciples. The second challenge is to get a more focused picture of what an intrinsic Christian lifestyle looks like. A plea is made for the reinstatement of a condensed basic moral code grounded in biblical teaching. The third challenge relates to the vital question of how moral formation is actually being implemented in the faith communities. Attention is given to different ways this question is being answered. The fourth challenge concerns the churches' hesitancy to accept co-responsibility for the public communities we are living in. Congregational and denominational leaders have to realize that churches are called not only to discipleship, but also to citizenship. If the churches are willing to accept these challenges, they can be an important factor in the moral renewal of the South African society.

The concept of biblical charis has been interpreted in most Christian congregational gatherings as gracefulness, kindness, favour, prosperity, freedom, liberality, lawlessness, pleasure and the like, with little or no interest for its implications for good works and moral values in the society. This paper, therefore, explores the translation of charis from Greek into English and Yoruba languages with a view to bringing to the fore its socio-religious implications via good works and moral values in the context of South-western region of Nigeria and beyond. The study purposely selected three pericopes that centred on a New Testament word charis translated into English as grace and Yoruba as Oore-ofe as stated in the Gospel according to John 1:14-18; Paul’s Epistles to the Ephesians 2:8-10 and to Titus 2:11-14 respectively. These selected passages from New Testament Greek version were analysed as translated into English by New International Version (henceforth, NIV) (1987) and Bibeli Yoruba Atoka (BYA) (1998) (that is Yoruba Reference Bible) respectively. It employed descriptive research method and subjected selected verses to exegetical and translation analysis with a view to suggesting novel interpretation of charis in Christian congregational teachings and meetings. Based on the exegetical inference, the work has suggested that Bible interpreters as well as Christian ministers should take advantage of the import of Charis to interpret the Word of God for the benefits of social values among their listeners. Bible interpreters should emphasise grace as imperative for good works in Christian congregational teachings and meetings to the advantage of global peace and enhancement of effective socio-religious relationships. The work has asserted that both translations of Charis in English and Yoruba versions have areas of convergences and divergences. The convergences are mostly on direct lexical equivalence, while the divergences are the results of differences in approaches that were employed by the translators. Keywords: Yoruba Bible Translation, Translation of Charis, Exegetical approach to translation, Grace implications

Abstract: The Oak Lake Writers' Society was formed in 1993 at the South Dakota State University (SDSU) Field House near Oak Lake. SDSU Professor Charles Woodard and tribal educators Lowell Amiotte and Elden Lawrence coordinated the gatherings. Tribal college and public university officials submitted names of tribal citizens they believed would benefit from an Indigenous writer's retreat. The Field House, used as a Girl Scout cabin prior to SDSU acquiring the property, contained a large meeting room with a fireplace, a full kitchen, two bathrooms and several sleeping rooms. The Field House was located a few hundred yards from the lake. There were about fifteen tribal citizens from South Dakota who attended the first retreat. Most of the participants experienced dreams or unexplained incidents while exploring the area surrounding the cabin and lake during the initial retreat. During one of the group sessions, we discussed what we were experiencing both in the cabin and surrounding area. Several incidents on the last day of the retreat were experienced as a group. Our time there was no coincidence. Many of the group members believe they were drawn to Oak Lake to help with healing one instance of trauma experienced by their ancestors.

The aim of this study was to assess community members’ knowledge and awareness levels, attitudes, and practices of Drug Resistant Tuberculosis. A quantitative descriptive cross sectional study was carried out in the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa. The sample size consisted of four hundred (400) respondents aged 18 years and above on their last birthday who were purposively and conveniently selected from Port Elizabeth area in the Nelson Mandela Municipality. Data were collected using close-ended questions, which were administered by the researcher and two research assistants to the selected respondents. Data were analysed using descriptive statistics. The results of this study show poor knowledge and awareness levels, unfavourable attitudes, but good prevention practices of Drug Resistant Tuberculosis among Port Elizabeth community members. This study also found a statistically significant association between knowledge and attitudes (p value = <0.001), and no statistically significant association between knowledge and practices and attitude and practices, respectively (p values = 0.120 and 0.136). The study also revealed low literacy levels, inadequate information, misconceptions and erroneous beliefs about causes, transmission, prevention, treatment, and management of Drug Resistant Tuberculosis among the respondents. This study also highlighted the use and existence of dual healthcare system (traditional spiritual and western).The study found that the main source of Drug Resistant TB information was radio and television among the majority of research respondents. It is recommended that in future health education interventions and awareness campaigns need to be intensified in the area so that misconceptions and erroneous beliefs that exist in society can be addressed. It is also recommended that training programs that are culturally sensitive should be developed and delivered taking into account different languages and literacy levels that exist in society. Such education interventions should be facilitated in collaboration with people living with Drug Resistant Tuberculosis. A multidisciplinary approach should be fostered and collaborations with spiritual healers and various congregational leaders, traditional health practitioners, community leaders, and government leaders in the health sector should be promoted in order to deal with Drug Resistant Tuberculosis. It is also recommended that a similar study be conducted using a qualitative research approach in urban and rural areas of the Eastern Cape. Lastly, assessment of knowledge, attitudes, and practices of spiritual and traditional healers with regard to Drug Resistant Tuberculosis should be conducted as they can influence health-seeking behaviour.

Ileana Rodríguez; Transatlantic Topographies: Islands, Highlands, Jungles (Stuart McLean)Eliga H. Gould, Peter S. Onuf (eds.); Empire and Nation: The American Revolution in the Atlantic World (Peter A. Coclanis)Michael A. Gomez; Reversing Sail: A History of the African Diaspora (James H. Sweet)Brian L. Moore, Michele A. Johnson; Neither Led Nor Driven: Contesting British Cultural Imperialism in Jamaica, 1865-1920 (Gad Heuman)Erna Brodber; The Second Generation of Freemen in Jamaica, 1907-1944 (Michaeline A. Crichlow)Steeve O. Buckridge; The Language of Dress: Resistance and Accommodation in Jamaica, 1760- 1890 (Jean Besson)Deborah A. Thomas; Modern Blackness: Nationalism, Globalization, and the Politics of Culture in Jamaica (Charles V. Carnegie)Carolyn Cooper; Sound Clash: Jamaican Dancehall Culture at Large (John D. Galuska)Noel Leo Erskine; From Garvey to Marley: Rastafari Theology (Richard Salter)Hilary McD Beckles; Great House Rules: Landless Emancipation and Workers’ Protest in Barbados, 1838‑1938 (O. Nigel Bolland)Woodville K. Marshall (ed.); I Speak for the People: The Memoirs of Wynter Crawford (Douglas Midgett)Nathalie Dessens; Myths of the Plantation Society: Slavery in the American South and the West Indies (Lomarsh Roopnarine)Michelle M. Terrell; The Jewish Community of Early Colonial Nevis: A Historical Archaeological Study (Mark Kostro)Laurie A. Wilkie, Paul Farnsworth; Sampling Many Pots: An Archaeology of Memory and Tradition at a Bahamian Plantation (Grace Turner)David Beriss; Black Skins, French Voices: Caribbean ethnicity and Activism in Urban France (Nadine Lefaucheur)Karen E. Richman; Migration and Vodou (Natacha Giafferi)Jean Moomou; Le monde des marrons du Maroni en Guyane (1772-1860): La naissance d’un peuple: Les Boni (Kenneth Bilby)Jean Chapuis, Hervé Rivière; Wayana eitoponpë: (Une) histoire (orale) des Indiens Wayana (Dominique Tilkin Gallois)Jesús Fuentes Guerra, Armin Schwegler; Lengua y ritos del Palo Monte Mayombe: Dioses cubanos y sus fuentes africanas (W. van Wetering)Mary Ann Clark; Where Men Are Wives and Mothers Rule: Santería Ritual Practices and Their Gender Implications (Elizabeth Ann Pérez)Ignacio López-Calvo; “God and Trujillo”: Literary and Cultural Representations of the Dominican Dictator (Lauren Derby)Kirwin R. Shaffer; Anarchism and Countercultural Politics in Early Twentieth-Century Cuba (Jorge L. Giovannetti)Lillian Guerra; The Myth of José Martí: Conflicting Nationalisms in Early Twentieth-Century Cuba (Jorge L. Giovannetti)Israel Reyes; Humor and the Eccentric Text in Puerto Rican Literature (Nicole Roberts)Rodrigo Lazo; Writing to Cuba: Filibustering and Cuban Exiles in the United States (Nicole Roberts)Lowell Fiet; El teatro puertorriqueño reimaginado: Notas críticas sobre la creación dramática y el performance (Ramón H. Rivera-Servera)Curdella Forbes; From Nation to Diaspora: Samuel Selvon, George Lamming and the Cultural Performance of Gender (Sue Thomas)Marie-Agnès Sourieau, Kathleen M. Balutansky (eds.); Ecrire en pays assiégé: Haiti: Writing Under Siege (Marie-Hélène Laforest)In: New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West-Indische Gids (NWIG), 80 (2006), no. 3 & 4

Ileana Rodríguez; Transatlantic Topographies: Islands, Highlands, Jungles (Stuart McLean)Eliga H. Gould, Peter S. Onuf (eds.); Empire and Nation: The American Revolution in the Atlantic World (Peter A. Coclanis)Michael A. Gomez; Reversing Sail: A History of the African Diaspora (James H. Sweet)Brian L. Moore, Michele A. Johnson; Neither Led Nor Driven: Contesting British Cultural Imperialism in Jamaica, 1865-1920 (Gad Heuman)Erna Brodber; The Second Generation of Freemen in Jamaica, 1907-1944 (Michaeline A. Crichlow)Steeve O. Buckridge; The Language of Dress: Resistance and Accommodation in Jamaica, 1760- 1890 (Jean Besson)Deborah A. Thomas; Modern Blackness: Nationalism, Globalization, and the Politics of Culture in Jamaica (Charles V. Carnegie)Carolyn Cooper; Sound Clash: Jamaican Dancehall Culture at Large (John D. Galuska)Noel Leo Erskine; From Garvey to Marley: Rastafari Theology (Richard Salter)Hilary McD Beckles; Great House Rules: Landless Emancipation and Workers’ Protest in Barbados, 1838‑1938 (O. Nigel Bolland)Woodville K. Marshall (ed.); I Speak for the People: The Memoirs of Wynter Crawford (Douglas Midgett)Nathalie Dessens; Myths of the Plantation Society: Slavery in the American South and the West Indies (Lomarsh Roopnarine)Michelle M. Terrell; The Jewish Community of Early Colonial Nevis: A Historical Archaeological Study (Mark Kostro)Laurie A. Wilkie, Paul Farnsworth; Sampling Many Pots: An Archaeology of Memory and Tradition at a Bahamian Plantation (Grace Turner)David Beriss; Black Skins, French Voices: Caribbean ethnicity and Activism in Urban France (Nadine Lefaucheur)Karen E. Richman; Migration and Vodou (Natacha Giafferi)Jean Moomou; Le monde des marrons du Maroni en Guyane (1772-1860): La naissance d’un peuple: Les Boni (Kenneth Bilby)Jean Chapuis, Hervé Rivière; Wayana eitoponpë: (Une) histoire (orale) des Indiens Wayana (Dominique Tilkin Gallois)Jesús Fuentes Guerra, Armin Schwegler; Lengua y ritos del Palo Monte Mayombe: Dioses cubanos y sus fuentes africanas (W. van Wetering)Mary Ann Clark; Where Men Are Wives and Mothers Rule: Santería Ritual Practices and Their Gender Implications (Elizabeth Ann Pérez)Ignacio López-Calvo; “God and Trujillo”: Literary and Cultural Representations of the Dominican Dictator (Lauren Derby)Kirwin R. Shaffer; Anarchism and Countercultural Politics in Early Twentieth-Century Cuba (Jorge L. Giovannetti)Lillian Guerra; The Myth of José Martí: Conflicting Nationalisms in Early Twentieth-Century Cuba (Jorge L. Giovannetti)Israel Reyes; Humor and the Eccentric Text in Puerto Rican Literature (Nicole Roberts)Rodrigo Lazo; Writing to Cuba: Filibustering and Cuban Exiles in the United States (Nicole Roberts)Lowell Fiet; El teatro puertorriqueño reimaginado: Notas críticas sobre la creación dramática y el performance (Ramón H. Rivera-Servera)Curdella Forbes; From Nation to Diaspora: Samuel Selvon, George Lamming and the Cultural Performance of Gender (Sue Thomas)Marie-Agnès Sourieau, Kathleen M. Balutansky (eds.); Ecrire en pays assiégé: Haiti: Writing Under Siege (Marie-Hélène Laforest)In: New West Indian Guide / Nieuwe West-Indische Gids (NWIG), 80 (2006), no. 3 & 4

It is suggested that a clear prophetic voice of the congregational gathering could change the society to which the congregants belong. The problem is that this prophetic voice seems to have disappeared in many cases. A solution might be found if the point of view is taken that the prophetic voice in the congregational gathering is heard in the liturgical acts or rites. In the science of Liturgy attention must be given to the revitalisation of the gift of prophesy. In this article the prophetic testimony of the Old Testament prophets and of the Prophet, Jesus Christ, were used as sources. Following in the footsteps of Brueggemann, an effort will be made to establish in relevant scripture passages what the attitude and practise of prophetic testimony should be. The possibility of rendering service through prophetic testimony as a liturgical act in the South African society is wide open. Prophetic testimony serves to criticise the dominant perception in order to dismantle it, but is also serves to energise persons and communities by its promise of another time and situation towards which the community of faith could move.

The church is not like any other institution or organisation in society. Although the church is primarily invisible and spiritual, it is a visible organisation in the world, and it spans across borders of nations, languages and countries. John Calvin strongly rejected the notion that the church is only a spiritual organisation of which the visible administrative side is downplayed. The fellowship of the church must not only be seen as a mystical relation with Jesus Christ. During 2010, an empirical study was done on the extent to which congregations of the Reformed Churches of South Africa (RCSA) adhere to the request to have a well-designed congregational strategy. The knowledge gained from a literature study on the science of Strategic Management and the results of the empirical study was combined into a framework for crafting and executing a congregational strategy. This framework can be used by congregational leaders to guide them through their own process of crafting and executing their unique congregational strategy. The research was concluded with a recommendation that the Theological School of the RCSA should consider including a course on Strategic Management in the training syllabus of aspiring ministers. Considering that Strategic Management is a specialised management science, and external Strategic Management consultants tend to be expensive, the research also recommended that the Administrative Bureau of the RCSA consider employing their own Strategic Management consultant for the RCSA with the specific assignment of assisting and guiding all congregations with their congregational strategy.’n Raamwerk vir die ontwerp en implementering van ’n gemeentestrategie in die plaaslike gemeentes van die Gereformeerde Kerke in Suid-Afrika. ’n Kerk is ’n unieke organisasie. Die kerk is primêr onsigbaar en geestelik van aard. Tog funksioneer dit as ’n instituut in die wêreld en moet dit doelmatig en doeltreffend bestuur word, ten einde alles ordelik te laat verloop en doelgerig te laat funksioneer. Johannes Calvyn het die idee dat ’n gemeente slegs ’n geestelike instelling is, waarvan die sigbare administratiewe deel as onbelangrik afgemaak word, verwerp. ’n Empiriese studie is gedurende 2010 onderneem om vas te stel tot watter mate gemeentestrategieë wel in die Gereformeerde Kerke in Suid-Afrika (GKSA) opgestel en uitgevoer word. Die kennis wat ingewin is met die empiriese studie is gekombineer met ’n literatuurstudie oor die vakgebied van Strategiese Bestuur, en ’n raamwerk vir die ontwerp en implementering van ’n gemeentestrategie is daargestel. Hierdie raamwerk kan deur gemeenteleiers gebruik word in die ontwerp en implementering van hulle gemeente se strategie. Die navorsing sluit af met die aanbeveling dat daar oorweging geskenk moet word om ‘n kursus in strategiese bestuur in die opleidingsillabus van teologiese studente in te sluit. ’n Verdere aanbeveling is gemaak dat, weens die gespesialiseerde aard en koste aan eksterne Strategiese Bestuurskonsultante verbonde, die Administratiewe Buro van die GKSA oorweging behoort te skenk om hulle eie konsultant in diens te neem. Die opdrag moet wees om gemeentes van die GKSA by te staan in die ontwerp en implementering van die gemeentestrategie.

When developing new perspectives and paradigms for practical theology in South Africa, we obviously have to take our South African context seriously. We live in a post-conflict society in which gigantic sociocultural shifts have taken place since 1994. Many institutions and groups endeavour to address the conflict, injustices and pain of the past, including the Institute for the Healing of Memories (IHOM). The Institute makes use of a specific methodology in their workshops. Having participated in these workshops in congregational contexts as well as in the training of theological students, in this article I investigated the methodology of the Institute as a framework for new perspectives on practical theology in South Africa. Making use of Victor Turner’s theoretical construct of ‘social drama’ as one way of looking at the methodology of the IHOM, I reflected critically on the challenges that it poses to practical theology by making use of a ‘rhetorical frame’ and trying to delineate some constructive proposals for further reflections on practical theological paradigms and perspectives.

South Africa remains one of the most unequal societies in the world and any discussion around poverty and the church’s response cannot exclude this reality. This article attempts to analyse the response of wealthy, ‘majority white’ suburban congregations in the southern suburbs of Cape Town to issues of poverty and inequality. This is attempted through the lense of restorative justice, which is broadly explored and defined through a threefold perspective of reconciliation, reparations and restitution. The first part explores a description of the basic features of poverty and inequality in South Africa today, followed by a discussion on restorative justice. This is followed by the case study, which gives the views of clergy and lay leaders with regard to their congregations’ perspectives and responses to poverty and inequality within the context of restorative justice. Findings from the case study begin to plot a tentative ‘way forward’ as to how our reality can more constructively be engaged from the perspective of congregational involvement in reconstruction of our society.

Text in German, summaries in English and German
This dissertation is a missiological research on reports of first and second generation missionaries from the Hermannsburg mission society in Germany. The missionaries worked for their lifetime among the Batswana. An important point in the first chapter is the attempt to clarify the theological foundation for the understandung of inculturation, from which my conception later arose. The second chapter deals with the founders of the Hermannsburg missionary society and describes the spiritual background of the missionaries. The following three chapters cover the work of the missionaries, in each case father and son at Dinokana, Bethanie and Phokeng chronologically from 1857 - 1940. Special attention is given to their socio-cultural expierences and traditional-religious knowledge. The last chapter evaluates the work of the missionaries and takes into account the present missiological debate on mission. Here again it becomes clear what I mean by Inculturation.
Die vorliegende Arbeit ist eine missionsgeschichtliche und -theologische Untersuchung uber die ersten beiden Generationen Hermannsburger Missionare unter den Batswana in Transvaal. Im ersten Kapitel stelle ich verschiedene Konzepte zum Verstandnis von lnkulturation vor, aus denen ich Anstosse fur meine eigene Konzeption gewonnen habe. Das zweite Kapitel beschreibt die spirituelle Herkunft der Missionare und ihre theologische Pragung. In den folgenden drei Kapiteln untersuche ich die Arbeit der Missionare, jeweils Vater und Sohn, auf ihren Stationen Dinokana, Bethanie und Phokeng von 1857 - 1940 in chronologischer Reihenfolge. Ein besonderer Schwerpunkt liegt dabei auf den sozio-kulturellen Erfahrungen und traditionell-religiosen Erkenntnissen dieser Missionare. Das letzte Kapitel enthalt eine Bewertung der Missionsarbeit und beleuchtet sie auf den Hintergrund der gegenwartigen missionstheologischen Diskussion. Besonder in diesem Kapitel wird noch einmal deutlich wie ich Inkulturation verstanden habe.
Missiology
D.Th. (Missiology)

Presbyterians and Congregationalists arrived in colonial America as Dissenters; however, they soon exercised a religious and cultural dominance that extended well into the first half of the nineteenth century. The multi-faceted Second Great Awakening led within the Reformed camp by the Presbyterian James McGready in Kentucky, a host of New Divinity ministers in New England, and Congregationalist Charles Finney in New York energized Christians to improve society (Congregational and Presbyterian women were crucial to the three most important reform movements of the nineteenth century—antislavery, temperance, and missions) and extend the evangelical message around the world. Although outnumbered by other Protestant denominations by mid-century, Presbyterians and Congregationalists nevertheless expanded geographically, increased in absolute numbers, spread the Gospel at home and abroad, created enduring institutions, and continued to dominate formal religious thought. The overall trajectory of nineteenth-century Presbyterianism and Congregationalism in the United States is one that tracks from convergence to divergence, from cooperative endeavours and mutual interests in the first half the nineteenth century to an increasingly self-conscious denominational awareness that became firmly established in both denominations by the 1850s. With regional distribution of Congregationalists in the North and Presbyterians in the mid-Atlantic region and South, the Civil War intensified their differences (and also divided Presbyterians into antislavery northern and pro-slavery southern parties). By the post-Civil War period these denominations had for the most part gone their separate ways. However, apart from the southern Presbyterians, who remained consciously committed to conservatism, they faced a similar host of social and intellectual challenges, including higher criticism of the Bible and Darwinian evolutionary theory, to which they responded in varying ways. In general, Presbyterians maintained a conservative theological posture whereas Congregationalists accommodated to the challenges of modernity. At the turn of the century Congregationalists and Presbyterians continued to influence sectors of American life but their days of cultural hegemony were long past. In contrast to the nineteenth-century history of Presbyterian and Congregational churches in the United States, the Canadian story witnessed divergence evolving towards convergence and self-conscious denominationalism to ecclesiastical cooperation. During the very years when American Presbyterians were fragmenting over first theology, then slavery, and finally sectional conflict, political leaders in all regions of Canada entered negotiations aimed at establishing the Dominion of Canada, which were finalized in 1867. The new Dominion enjoyed the strong support of leading Canadian Presbyterians who saw in political confederation a model for uniting the many Presbyterian churches that Scotland’s fractious history had bequeathed to British North America. In 1875, the four largest Presbyterian denominations joined together as the Presbyterian Church in Canada. The unifying and mediating instincts of nineteenth-century Canadian Presbyterianism contributed to forces that in 1925 led two-thirds of Canadian Presbyterians (and almost 90 per cent of their ministers) into the United Church, Canada’s grand experiment in institutional ecumenism. By the end of the nineteenth century, Congregationalism had only a slight presence, whereas Presbyterians, by contrast, became increasingly more important until they stood at the centre of Canada’s Protestant history.

Baptists in nineteenth-century North America were known as eager proselytizers. They were evangelistic, committed to the idea of a believers’ church in which believers’ baptism was the norm for church membership and for the most part fervent revivalists. Baptist numbers soared in the early nineteenth-century United States though at the cost of generating much internal dissent, while in Canada New Light preachers such as Henry Alline were influential, but often had to make headway against an Anglican establishment. The Baptist commitment to freedom of conscience and gathered congregations had been hardened over the centuries by the experience of persecution and that meant that they were loath to qualify the freedom of individual congregations. The chapter concentrates on exposing the numerous divisions in the Baptist family, the most basic of which was the disagreement over the nature of the atonement, which separated General (Arminian) from Particular (Calvinist) Baptists. Revivals induced further divisions between Regular Baptists who were reserved about them and Separate Baptists who saw dramatic conversions and fervent outbursts as external signs of inward grace. Calvinistic Baptists took a dim view of efforts to induce conversions as laying too much trust in human agency. Though enthusiasm for missions gripped American and Canadian Baptists alike, there were those who feared that missionary societies would erode congregational autonomy. Dissent over slavery and abolition constituted the biggest single division in North American Baptist life. Southern Baptists developed biblical defences of slavery and were annoyed at attempts to keep slaveholders out of missionary work. As a result they formed a separate denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention, in 1845. Baptists had been successful in converting black slaves and black Baptists such as the northerner Nathaniel Paul were outspoken abolitionists. In the South after the Civil War, though, blacks marched out of white denominations to form associations of their own, often with white encouragement. Finally, not the least cause of internal dissent were disputes over ecclesiology, with J.M. Graves and J.R. Pendleton, the founders of Old Landmarkism, insisting with renewed radicalism on denominational autonomy. The chapter suggests that by the end of the century, Baptists embodied the tensions in Dissenting traditions. Their dissent in the public square intensified the possibility of internal disagreement, even schism, their tradition of Christian democracy proving salvifically liberating but ecclesiastically messy. While they stood for liberty and religious equality, they were active in anti-Catholic politics and in seeking to extend state activism in society through the Social Gospel movement.

Abstract When the General Association of Connecticut convened at the Congregational meetinghouse in Windham in June 1797, an atmosphere of expectancy pervaded the gathering. For several years evangelicals in both England and America had been praying fervently for a general revival of God’s people. Now, many New Light ministers believed, an awakening was at hand. From across the ocean came stirring news of wondrous missionary advances in Africa and the South Seas, while at home unusual “seriousness” seemed evident among many congregations throughout the state. New Divinity stalwart Charles Backus of Somers reported the commencement of “a great work” among his people, triggered, he believed, by a series of “sermons upon the inspiration of the scriptures.” In April word arrived of a “considerable awakening” in New York City, followed within weeks by missionary Seth Williston’s report of a marvelous outpouring of God’s Spirit in the Chenango settlements. These developments fired the imagination of New Lights and fueled millennial hopes that transformed the budding missionary movement.

Horace grew to become one of Timothy Dwight’s greatest acolytes, and out of this devotion he developed a strict Calvinistic religious orientation. In reward for his dedication, Horace was named head minister at Greenfield Hill Congregational Church and headmaster of Greenfield Hill Academy, positions formerly held by Dwight. But Horace tired of life as a country minister, and so he looked for and found a more compelling situation as head pastor of Hollis Street Church in South Boston. Here, he cultivated a more refined understanding of the social benefits of cultured society. His position at Hollis Street allowed him to participate in many of Boston’s elite organizations, and his proximity to the city’s elite expanded the scope of his ambitions.

The 1760s were a decade of significant institutional development for America’s Baptists, and Oliver Hart was a key figure in that advance. In the South, Hart led the Charleston Association to adopt the Charleston Confession as its doctrinal statement, setting a course for traditional Calvinism among white Southern Baptists for the next one hundred years or more. He also shaped the church government practices of Baptist churches, coauthoring the Summary of Church Discipline, which outlined the rigorous church order Baptists would become known for well into the nineteenth century. This chapter provides vivid examples of how this congregational government worked itself out in specific Baptist churches of the period. Beyond the South, Hart enthusiastically supported the Philadelphia Association project of founding Rhode Island College (later Brown University), an important signal that Baptists as a whole were becoming respectable in colonial American society. Finally, Hart’s frequent preaching excursions into the Carolina backcountry brought him into contact with the exploding Separate Baptist movement. Though they were far less sophisticated than his Charleston social circles, Hart found much to appreciate in the Separate Baptists and sought opportunities to unite them with his own Regular Baptist tribe.