The Other Evangelicals (Eerdmans, 2023)

For many, the answer is "white," "patriarchal," "conservative," or "fundamentalist"--but as Isaac B. Sharp reveals, the "big tent" of evangelicalism has historically been much bigger than we've been led to believe. In The Other Evangelicals, Sharp brings to light the stories of those twentieth-century evangelicals who didn't fit the mold, including Black, feminist, progressive, and gay Christians.

Though the binary of fundamentalist evangelicals and modernist mainline Protestants is taken for granted today, Sharp demonstrates that fundamentalists and modernists battled over the title of "evangelical" in post-World War II America.

In fact, many ideologies characteristic of evangelicalism today, such as "biblical womanhood" and political conservatism, arose only in reaction to the popularity of evangelical feminism and progressivism.

 

Link

Evolution of religious landscape (Switzerland)

According to the new study juste released by the Federal Statistical Office (Switzerland)...

Between 2010 and 2021, the proportion of Roman Catholics and Reformed Protestants fell slightly (by 6 and 7 percentage points respectively), in contrast to that of Muslims and other Islamic communities (+1 point). The proportion of Jewish communities has hardly changed whereas that of persons without religious affiliation has risen by 12 percentage points.

And Evangelicals themselves may represent about 2,5% of the Swiss population.

Link

Studies in World Christianity, 9.2

This issue of Studies in World Christianity includes a look at some of the papers from the 2022 Yale–Edinburgh Conference on ‘World Christianity: Legacy and the State of the Field’.

• Kyama Mugambi, ‘The Gospel beyond the West: The Sanneh–Walls Legacy and Emerging Conversation Partners in World Christianity Studies’
• Jackie Jia Chyi Hwang, ‘Longing for Belonging: Forwarding Andrew Walls’ Thoughts on Migration and Mission through an Ethnographic Study on Diasporic Chinese in Singapore’s Christian Communities’
• John Sampson, ‘Unearthing Treasure in Clay Jars: T. C. Chao and the Formation of Chinese Dogmatic Theology

Together, these articles very much pay tribute to the pioneering work of Andrew Walls, Lamin Sanneh and the Yale–Edinburgh Group. But they also demonstrate the ways in which the ideas which gave birth to the field of World Christianity have been generative across a multiplicity of disciplines to open up new ways of understanding Christianity. 

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Caught in the Current

Caught in the Current

British and Canadian Evangelicals in an Age of Self-Spirituality

Evangelical Christianity is known for its defence of traditional Christian teachings and resistance to liberalizing trends. Many Western evangelicals themselves do not yet realize how their faith is being reshaped by the modern zeitgeist.

Caught in the Current explores how and why Western evangelicals are changing. Church attendance is declining, conservative moral positions are unpopular, and young people are drifting away from the faith. Evangelism is avoided, so few are joining congregations. Yet these surface changes are only symptoms of a more profound shift that church leaders have not fully apprehended.

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Nigerian Gospel and "“Singing in Tongues”

The Nigerian gospel music industry has over the years witnessed the emergence of many artistic, cultural and philosophical movements. One of these movements is the “singing-in-tongues” paradigm, particularly endorsed by the new generation of Pentecostal hip-hop musicians, many of whom seem bent on redefining the boundaries of Nigerian gospel music. Although remarkable, the singing-in-tongues paradigm (as deployed by Nigerian artistes) has remained understudied or virtually non-theorized by scholars.

This paper seeks to fill this apparent gap in knowledge by exploring the singing-in-tongues concept in the light of two philosophical/religious currents, namely esotericism and postmodernism. What has been the place of the singing-in-tongues paradigm in the evolution of the Nigerian gospel music industry? 

Link

World Vision: God's Internationalists

As the amount of research on Christian Nationalism is growing rapidly (for good reasons), let's not forget that Evangelicalism per se can't be simply coined as a whole as "nationalist". A very robust internationalist and transnational trend can be noticed all over its contemporary history, including on the US ground.

Time to remind readers of this highly valuable piece of research published by David P. King in 2019 on one of the World's biggest humanitarian NGO today : World Vision.

"Chronicling the evolution of World Vision's practices, theology, rhetoric, and organizational structure, King demonstrates how the organization rearticulated and retained its Christian identity even as it expanded beyond a narrow American evangelical subculture". 

Link

White US Evangelicals and Politics: a documentary to watch

From the Cold War to the present day, the rise of white Evangelical Christianity in America has brought religion clearly into the public sphere. A must-watch: this three-part documentary (from ARTE Channel) on how the politico-religious machine of US white evangelicalism is determined to reshape USA.... and the world (with the participation of the sociologist Philippe Gonzalez).

Disaffiliation within Canadian Evangelical communities

Evangelical Protestantism is often studied from the angle of proselytizing and conversion dynamics.

Research on departures and defectors from Evangelicalism are much rarer. For example, Canadian evangelical communities have not received much attention in recent years regarding disaffiliation, even though this phenomenon exists throughout Canada and most notably in the Quebec province.

This excellent article (written in french) from Benjamin Gagné sheds very useful analytical light on theses processes.

 

Available in full text here (Studies in Religion)

Evangelicals and Electoral Politics in Latin America

For a deeper understanding of the various ways through which Evangelicals get involved in Politics in Latin America, this new book from Prof. Taylor Boas (Boston University) is a must-read:

"Why are religious minorities well represented and politically influential in some democracies but not others? Focusing on evangelical Christians in Latin America, this book argues that religious minorities seek and gain electoral representation when they face significant threats to their material interests and worldview, and when their community is not internally divided by cross-cutting cleavages. Differences in Latin American evangelicals' political ambitions emerged as a result of two critical junctures: episodes of secular reform in the early twentieth century and the rise of sexuality politics at the turn of the twenty-first.

In Brazil, significant threats at both junctures prompted extensive electoral mobilization; in Chile, minimal threats meant that mobilization lagged. In Peru, where major cleavages divide both evangelicals and broader society, threats prompt less electoral mobilization than otherwise expected. The multi-method argument leverages interviews, content analysis, survey experiments, ecological analysis, and secondary case studies of Colombia, Costa Rica, and Guatemala."

Link

Christian nationalism : PRRI 2023 survey

According to the PRRI, "The rising influence of Christian nationalism in some segments of American politics" may pose "a major threat to the health of our democracy. Increasingly, the major battle lines of the culture war are being drawn between a right animated by a Christian nationalist worldview and Americans who embrace the country’s growing racial and religious diversity".

To check this PRRI survey about Christian Nationalism (2023), click here

 

'Fundamentalism and American Culture', third edition updated

'Fundamentalism and American Culture' (Marsden) has long been considered a classic in religious history, and to this day remains unsurpassed. Now available in a new edition, this highly regarded analysis takes us through the full history of the origin and direction of one of America's most influential religious movements.

In the twenty-first century, militantly conservative white evangelicals have become more prominent than ever in American life. Marsden's volume, which now takes the history through the end of the Trump administration, remains the essential starting point for understanding the degree to which that militancy has been shaped by the fundamentalist heritage of the twentieth century. 

To read more about this third and updated edition, click here (link)

New French-speaking role models for Christian Africa ?

Based in Accra (Ghana)  Pastor Dag Heward-Mills is one of the most prominent postcolonial Evangelical leader in West Africa.

Here below (link) he's advertised in Ivory Coast.

Less knowed is the fact that French-speaking West Africa is experiencing, over the last 25 years, a major Evangelical/Pentecostal revival, creating new French-speaking role models for Christian Africa.

 

To know more, click below to discover this Field Album (pics done during a 8 days stay in Abidjan, Ivory Coast).

Link

 

Harrist Church : still vibrant in Ivory Coast today

"Prophet Harris, The 'Black Elijah' of West Africa" (David Shank, Brill, 1994, 346p) offers the only comprehensive study of the thought of William Wade Harris, the Glebo (Liberia) loyalist whose prophetic mission from 1910-29 moved tens of thousands of West Africans out of traditional religion into the stream of Christianity and modernization, particularly in the Ivory Coast.
It reviews that unparalleled breakthrough, thoroughly examines traditional African, Western missionary and colonial influences which helped determine religious innovation and shape his vocation as prophet of Christ's reign of peace and prosperity." (link).  

 

Christianity in Ivory Coast: read Bony Guiblehon

As I'm getting ready to go to Ivory Coast for field research, let's thank Professor Bony Guiblehon (Bouaké University / IMAF) for this very good piece of research (among many others):

Guiblehon, B. “LES JEUNES ET LE MARCHÉ DE LA SPIRITUALITÉ PENTECÔTISTE EN CÔTE D’IVOIRE”. European Scientific Journal, ESJ, Vol. 8, no. 24, Oct. 2012 (link)

The main objective of this paper is to question the Pentecostal spirituality market filled by a generation of young pastors who position themselves in the Ivorian religious audience. Indeed, the market of spirituality arose in the 1990s in the context of socio-economic crises, political and religious freedom, showing a new generation of self-proclaimed servants, "pastors", "bishops", "doctors" , "apostles", "prophets" ... in the Pentecostal movement. These young people perceive spirituality as an opportunity for self-recognition, social dignity and professional integration. To reach their goal, they put on the religious market products such as theology of prosperity and healing, they are involved in communication enterprise, take care of their style ( look) and leadership to meet the social and spiritual expectations of people experiencing the anguish of life pressure. Mobilizing social marketing strategy they capture potential believers and financial resources that could contribute to their personal success 

(link)

GLOPENT, European Research Network on Global Pentecostalism

As Alexandre Antoine (EPHE-PSL) is going to defend tomorrow his PhD Thesis on the History of the Assemblies of God in France (1909-1968), it's time to highlight this stimulating European research network on Pentecostalism:

The European Research Network on Global Pentecostalism (GloPent) is an interdisciplinary academic networking initiative coordinated by experts on Pentecostal and Charismatic movements at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, the University of Basel, the University of Birmingham, the University of Cambridge, the University of Heidelberg, SOAS University of London, and the University of Uppsala.

We are interested in:

• Networking active research about Pentecostal and Charismatic movements worldwide, with a special focus on Africa, Asia, and Latin America
• Promoting scientific exchange through our conferences, our journal PentecoStudies, our mailing list, and our website
• Giving scholars a wider platform to introduce their work in Pentecostal Studies by providing bibliographies, papers, news, and links
• Providing academic information about global Pentecostalism to the European academia
• Providing study resources for the scholarly community, such as our dedicated GloPent Web Search Engine on Pentecostal and Charismatic Movements
• Facilitating discussion on theory and method in Pentecostal Studies
• Stimulating academic publications in Pentecostal Studies

Link

A separate Canaan

Why so many postcolonial churches today? One reason may be that the "universalism of the Gospel" taught by Europeans did not always translate/lead into a redefinition of social, economic, status boundaries.

Result: enslaved or colonized people remained both "connected and separated by the Christian faith".

A "separate Canaan"....

Without challenging systemic injustice and economic exploitation.

To bring light on this issue from a Colonial North-American perspective, let's remind this brilliant book published in 1998 by John Sensbach:

"Based on German church documents, including dozens of rare biographies of black Moravians, A Separate Canaan is the first full-length study of contact between people of German and African descent in early America. Exploring the fluidity of race in Revolutionary era America, it highlights the struggle of African Americans to secure their fragile place in a culture unwilling to give them full human rights. In the early nineteenth century, white Moravians forsook their spiritual inclusiveness, installing blacks in a separate church. Just as white Americans throughout the new republic rejected African American equality, the Moravian story illustrates the power of slavery and race to overwhelm other ideals".

Link

Protestantism in Spain: tribute to Frances Luttikhuizen

As Protestantism (mainly Evangelical/Pentecostal) is growing in Spain, let's not forget Frances Luttikhuizen, an English Philology lecturer, writer, and researcher of Protestantism, who passed away in Barcelona this last summer 2022.

Her main fields of interest included the history of translation, linguistic awareness, Cervantes' works, and the Spanish Reformation.

Among Luttikhuizen’s most important works is the book España y la Reforma Protestante (Spain and the Protestant Reformation, 2018, 468p (link), of which Spanish theologian José Moreno Berrocal has said it is “a work that represents a before and after in the studies of the Reformation in Spain (...).

There is a wealth of data and ideas that will make this book a constant and obligatory reference work”. 

Some reviews of this book are available, mostly in Spanish, including in this History of Philosophy publication (link)

Thank you Evangelical Focus for this obituary (link)

The New Apostolic Reformation (Weaver)

While doing research on the New Apostolic Reformation, a growing movement already studied, from a French-speaking perspective, by Prof. André Gagné and Prof. Philippe Gonzalez, I found this book.

Its title is : The New Apostolic Reformation: History of a Modern Charismatic Movement (2016).

The author, John Weaver, is not the typical social science researcher.

However, his synthesis is remarkable, and a must-read. The NAR is a movement dedicated to the restoration of the so-called fivefold gospel of Ephesians, in which the roles of apostles, and prophets in particular, are restored to the contemporary Evangelical church.

 

Link.

Prayer and the Political Praxis of Spiritual Warfare in Nigeria

Combining religious studies with ethnography, Powerful Devices (forthcoming) explores Nigerian Pentecostals and US Evangelicals’ praxis of transnational spiritual warfare.

By closely studying spiritual warfare prayers as a “device,” Powerful Devices shows how the rituals of prayer enable an apprehension of time, paradigms of self-enhancement, and the subversion of politics and authority.  

Abimbola Adunni Adelakun explores charismatic Christianity’s relationship to science and secular authority, technology and temporality, neoliberalism, and reactionary ideology.

Link.

"French secularism and the fight against separatism" (Nancy Lefevre)

French lawyer Nancy Lefevre serves as in-house legal counsel to the Conseil national des Evangéliques de France (CNEF), the main French Evangelical network (officialized in 2010).

She is also considered as a prominent defender of religious freedom in that country.

Published last year in the International Journal for Religious Freedom, this insightful article discusses the historical roots and conceptions of laicity underlying the 2021 reform.

It also focuses on the impact on religious organisations resulting from the state’s greater control over religious groups’ activities

A must-read.

Aimee Semple McPherson

Within my current researches on Prosperity Gospel, I am in the process of reading Matthew Avery Sutton's book:   

Aimee Semple McPherson and the Resurrection of Christian America, Harvard University Press (May 31, 2009)

"Her life marked the beginning of Pentecostalism's advance from the margins of Protestantism to the mainstream of American culture. Indeed, from her location in Hollywood, McPherson's integration of politics with faith set precedents for the religious right, while her celebrity status, use of spectacle, and mass media savvy came to define modern evangelicalism".

A remarkable book about one of the most influential women in contemporary Christian america.

Link

French Evangelical Armenians

Did you know ? There is a vibrant Armenian diaspora in France. Among them, many Evangelicals, strongly attached to Biblical orthodoxy (as they understand it) and Christian orthopraxy. 

On the occasion of the 175th Anniversary of the Armenian Evangelical Church (worldwide), French Armenians, oganized within the Union of Armenian Evangelical Churches in France,  have recently updated they website with a very detailed narrative about their History and identity in Contemporary France.

Thank you for that, Pastor Joel Mikaelian.

Link.

Nepali Pentecostal Christians

Let's thank Samuele POLETTI for this remarkable piece of research just released in the TERRAIN review :

"Miracles matter and the matter of miracles, The miraculous reshaping of world and self among Nepali Pentecostal Christians".

The author skillfully demonstrates how the overlapping of everyday life with the biblical narrative acts as an imaginary device that supports the conversion of unprivileged people in a context in which they do not enjoy much freedom of choice.

Fulfilling the promise of a better life, the production of the miracles that I present provides a glimpse of what it might mean to “live in a book”.

Link

African Pentecostalism in India: Being Born Again in the Diaspora

Over the past four decades, since the 1960s, there has been a steady flow of Africans moving to India for short-term activities: education, medical treatment and trade.

 

This just released article explores how debates and rituals in primarily Pentecostal- Charismatic churches – which have emerged as the focal point of community interaction for contemporary Africans in India – become crucial in shaping, reconfiguring and showcasing the markers of an imagined Africanness. 

 

Link

Faithful Deliberation: Rhetorical Invention, Evangelicalism, and #MeToo Reckonings

While often perceived as an insular enclave with a high level of in-group agreement about political and social issues, predominantly white evangelicalism includes prominent voices urging deliberation about appropriate responses to sexual abuse, domestic violence, and the discourses surrounding these traumas. In Faithful Deliberation: Rhetorical Invention, Evangelicalism, and #MeToo Reckonings (University of Alabama Press, 2022), T J Geiger II examines theologically reflective rhetorical invention that reconfigures trauma-minimizing commonplaces in order to facilitate community-internal deliberation.

Link

History of French Baptist Churches, a video serie to follow

Did you know that Baptist chiurches started in France before they started in Texas ?

If you master just a little bit of French, please try to follow this video, which is the first of a serie of short History videos retracing the long story of Baptist Churches in France from 1810 to 1950 (based upon a PhD).

 

Evangelical missionary & accusations of souperism in Ireland

Good news ! Under the title of "Education, Famine, and Conversion: Evangelical missionary strategies and accusations of souperism in Ireland, 1800-1853", Karina Wendling (PSL / EPHE, GSRL) completed her PhD.

It will be defended on the 13th of June, 2022.

Professors Peter Gray and Patrick Cabanel directed the thesis.

In the particular context of Protestant Ascendancy, Catholics perceived Protestant charity during the Great Irish Famine (1845-51) not as genuine relief but as Souperism - or the bribing of souls. This thesis comes within the framework of preceding research that has focused on the cultural and political implications of this fight for souls and examines overlooked aspects of the context in which these accusations appeared to better understand how missionary strategies disrupted the religious territoriality in a time of growing Irish nationalism.

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Evangelical belonging and Migrant experience (USA)

In the Hands of God: How Evangelical Belonging Transforms Migrant Experience in the United States

Johanna Bard Richlin

Why do migrants become more deeply evangelical in the United States and how does this religious identity alter their self-understanding? In the Hands of God examines this question through a unique lens, foregrounding the ways that churches transform what migrants feel.

Drawing from her extensive fieldwork among Brazilian migrants in the Washington, DC, area, Johanna Bard Richlin shows that affective experience is key to comprehending migrants' turn toward intense religiosity, and their resulting evangelical commitment.

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"Protestants continue to support Macron" (interview)

Amid fear and polarisation, French evangelicals share “hope” as “churches continue to multiply”, says historian

Uncertainty and discontentment give the far-right a chance to win the Presidential election on Sunday.

But Protestants continue to support Macron, says researcher Sebastien Fath.

Link

Nigerian Pentecostalism and Development

Some scholars suggest that the combination of an enchanted worldview, an emphasis on miracles and prosperity teaching, and a preoccupation with evangelism discourages effective political engagement and militates against development. However, Nigerian Pentecostalism and Development argues that there is an emerging movement within contemporary Nigerian Pentecostalism which is becoming increasingly active in development practices.

This book goes on to explore the increasingly transnational approach that churches take, often seeking to build multicultural congregations around the globe, for instance in Britain and the United States. 

Link