“My God and My Good Mother”: The Irony of Horace Bushnell‘s Gendered Republic

The impact of Horace Bushnell on American religion has been well documented, but the cultural significance of his life and thought has not been fully appreciated. A Congregationalist and pioneering ecumenist, Bushnell has been cast as the father of evangelical liberalism by theologians and religious...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Edwards, Mark 1962- (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Cambridge University Press 2003
In: Religion and American culture
Year: 2003, Volume: 13, Issue: 1, Pages: 111-137
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Summary:The impact of Horace Bushnell on American religion has been well documented, but the cultural significance of his life and thought has not been fully appreciated. A Congregationalist and pioneering ecumenist, Bushnell has been cast as the father of evangelical liberalism by theologians and religious historians. His numerous published sermons and treatises on child nurture, religious language, and the atonement were widely read during the nineteenth century and made him a celebrated and often controversial figure. Though vehemently opposed to Darwinian naturalism later in life, he nevertheless oversaw the collapse of Calvinist transcendence into the confines of historical and cultural development—which has been the definitive characteristic of liberal Protestant spirituality since the 1870s. Yet, during an age of social transformation, is Bushnell better understood as a laissez-faire liberal or an organicist social conservative? Better still, how might we characterize the relationship between his mediating theology and ambiguous social thought?
ISSN:1533-8568
Contains:Enthalten in: Religion and American culture
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1525/rac.2003.13.1.111