Another moment of reckoning
American Christianity has faced theological-political crises before. Repeatedly, visions of what is possible for the nation have fallen short of reality. In the past, periods of change pushed faithful people to reconsider what they believed, not only about the nation but also about the meaning of God’s call to justice. In each critical moment, for good or ill, Americans altered their religious views, and the horizon of what was possible expanded or contracted.
In revolutionary America, disunity resulted from debates over whether faith required obedience to the king or a revolt. In the 19th century, slavery drove apart both the nation and the churches. Theological weapons were launched on all sides. The abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison hurled insults against the “spirit of slavery” that had “infested every pulpit” and “invaded every sanctuary.” Garrison believed that the world could be different and that slavery was not divinely ordained. For many others, however, the end of the Civil War did not settle this dispute.
At the turn of the 20th century, the pressures of an industrial boom found workers on the verge of a new form of slavery, which instigated the social gospel among the working class. Walter Rauschenbusch articulated a vision of the kingdom of God against the “wedge of inequality” that divided comfortable middle-class churches from workers.
