“I Thank God We're Rich”: Justifying Economic Inequality in an Evangelical Congregation
Christianity has been the inspiration for a variety of responses to economic inequality in the United States and beyond. However, evangelicalism has been associated in the literature with consistent justification of unequal economic circumstances. To investigate how evangelical leaders confront the...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Journals Online & Print: | Drawer...
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| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2025
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| In: |
Journal for the scientific study of religion
Year: 2025, Volume: 64, Issue: 3, Pages: 303-316 |
| Further subjects: | B
economic inequality
B inequality justification B Evangelicalism |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (kostenfrei) Volltext (kostenfrei) |
| Summary: | Christianity has been the inspiration for a variety of responses to economic inequality in the United States and beyond. However, evangelicalism has been associated in the literature with consistent justification of unequal economic circumstances. To investigate how evangelical leaders confront the conflict between inequality and egalitarian passages of the Bible, I conducted a sermon analysis study of New River, a Midwestern suburban megachurch, leveraging their sermon archive of 395 recorded messages spanning 10 years. New River's pastors justified economic inequality in several ways: proclaiming that God did not condemn ownership of vast wealth; minimizing domestic inequality in comparison to global inequality; selectively spiritualizing economic passages of the Bible; and saying that God owns everything and thus the status quo distribution is justified. My findings provide a detailed portrait of the process of evangelical clergy inequality justification and discussion of the social forces that incentivize justifying inequality. |
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| ISSN: | 1468-5906 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal for the scientific study of religion
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| Persistent identifiers: | DOI: 10.1111/jssr.70001 |
