Religion in America:

Odd Gods
There are a lot of small, new religions in the United States, and it seems that more pop up all the time. What are they and what do they want? Why are people attracted to them? Perhaps more importantly, how are we as individuals and as a society supposed to react to these new religious groups? Read More...

Give Me That Online Religion
Religion is developing an increasing presence online, there is no question about that. But what does this development mean for religion and for the online world? That question isn't so easy to answer, but Barbara Brasher does explore the matter and attempts to give us an ideas of where the answer might lie. Read More...

The New Buddhism
Buddhism has become very popular in the West over the past couple of decades, but to what degree has Buddhism been changing the West, and to what degree has Buddhism itself undergone change? According to William Coleman, Buddhism has changed a lot, yet nevertheless, it is fundamentally the same as it has always been. But how can this be? Read More...

Fire and Roses
The United States of America likes to pride itself on its religious tolerance; although that is often true, such assumptions should not be made in a context of historical ignorance. It has been a long road to get to where we are, and a long road lies ahead of us yet. Nancy Schultz brings to life one particularly violent and hateful stop along our historical path: the attack on and burning of a convent of Ursuline nuns in Charlestown, Massachusetts. Read More...

The Transformation of American Religion
Religion in America has been changing over the past few decades - and the change is one which reflects similar changes in previous centuries. Earlier changes were called "Great Awakenings" - mass movements of people reaching radical new understandings of their religion, their spirituality, and the place religion had in their lives. According to Porterfield, that is what is happening again. Read More...

Lying Awake
If you thought that you were receiving visions from God, but learned that they may be caused by an easily repairable brain problem, what would you do? This is the dilemma facing Sister John of the Cross, a middle-aged nun living a cloistered life in a Carmelite monastary. Read More...

Daughters of Light: Quaker Women Preaching
What role and influence did Christian women have in 17th and 18th century America? Most people's answer to this question would be heavily colored by the image of Puritan women, who practiced a religion which idealized female submission to men in both this world and the next. These were not, however, the only Christian women in America - there were also many Quaker women, and they lead dramatically different lives. Read More...

Southern Cross: The Beginnings of the Bible Belt
What is the "Bible Belt" and how did it originate? Why is it that the location of the most conservative strains of Christianity moved from New England down to the South? Much has been written about Southern evangelical and fundamentalist Christianity in America, some of it positive and some of it negative. But not a lot has been written about its very earliest origins - how a mostly Anglican region based upon money and commerce was converted to the Baptist and Methodist denominations. Read More...

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