Customer Reviews

A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada

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I was required to read this book for a seminary class and instead of being intimidated or turned off by its over 500 pages, I found the book to be an extremely enjoyable read.

Noll describes the spread of Christianity from the Roman Catholicism of the 1500s to today's pluralism. Particulary enjoyable were the chapters on: the Puritans, The Great Awakenings, Churches in the American Revolution, Evangelical America during the Civil War, Intellectual Challenges to the Christian Faith in the Early 1900s, certain personalities (Billy Graham, Martin Luther King, Fulton Sheen), and the Southern Baptist Convention.

A very interesting read, I highly recommend the book to anyone interested in the history of Christianity in America!

Read and enjoy and do not be turned off by the size of the book!

I think that this is a very thorough, enjoyable journey through the history of Christianity in the US and Canada. He not only focuses on events such as the two American Great Awakenings, but he pauses to discuss some of the more interesting and influential Christians of the times (Anne Hutchinson, Charles Finney, George Whitefield, Francis Asbury, Fulton Sheen, Billy Graham, et al). I highly recommend this book, but it is a long book, so be prepared for many hours of reading.

This excellent, detailed history shows what was new about Christianity in the New World. It portrays the dramatic contrasts between official colonial churches and various refugee sects, with their different visions of how they might relate to each other. Where the first colonies, provinces or states usually had official state churches, Noll documents the issues of church relations on the borders or frontiers between these domains. Into these zones, dissidents of all stripes fled from state-backed religion. And in areas where no religious group had a majority, Noll records how people learned to meet their community needs and get along: "The result was a degree of interdenominational tolerance probably unknown anywhere else in the world at that time". (p. 89) Noll's statement may overlook the religious diversity of India or China, but for the Christian world it applied.

Of course Noll's book holds far more, and is of interest to people of every denomination in Canada and the USA. I was just most impressed by the explanation of how religion in North America escaped state control.

-author of Correcting Jesus

During the past decades a Wheaton College professor, Mark Noll, emerged as one of the nation's finest evangelical church historians. He's confirmed that standing with the recent publication of A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, c. 1992), a readable, up-to-date survey, a textbook which should enjoy a wider audience than the colleges and seminaries which offer courses on American church history.
Noll tells an important story, a story largely untold in the typical textbooks used in high schools and colleges in America--where more space is sometimes devoted to Native American religious practices than to Christian communities, where the Pilgrims and Puritans may be mentioned without a word concerning their religious faith and godly concerns. Just as the millions of church-going Americans rarely appear in today's media, so earlier church-goers rarely appear on the pages of authorized school textbooks. Censorship is alive and well in academia! But Christians, at least, should know some truths about their heritage. For. unfortunately, when they're told about this nation's religious background in church they're too often fed some patriotic pablum, filled with ideologically-fueled examples which distort the historical record. Just as academic historians err by omitting the truth, Christian propagandists (seeking to make this nation a thoroughly "Christian" nation) err by over-stating it. True, the United States is, in some ways, a "Christian" country. But, truth to tell, in perhaps more ways, the United States has failed to really be Christian. To get at the real story, we need historians like Noll to clear the record!
Noll divides his study, the "plot" of which follows "the rise and decline of Protestant dominance in the United States" (p. 4) into five parts: 1) "Beginnings"--seventeenth century transplants of European churches; 2) "Americanization"--the eighteenth century emergence of a distinctively American church, shaped by the Great Awakening and War for Independence; 3) The "Protestant Century"--the nineteenth century, distinguished by the Second Great Awakening's evangelicalism; 4) The "Emergence of Religious Pluralism"--late nineteenth and early twentieth century developments responding to immigration, industrialism, and intellectual challenges such as Darwinism and biblical criticism; and 5) "Wilderness Once Again?"--the turbulent twentieth century's dislocating impact on a Protestant hegemony which seemed secure a century ago.
Each chapter begins with a religious song of the era to be considered--a nice touch which gives one a feeling for the period. The author (with his publisher's assistance) includes ample pictures, maps, etc., which add to the book's readability and comprehension. Brief bibliographical entries at the end of each chapter point to the latest research available to scholars. For years I've used Ahlstrom's monumental study in my course on American Christianity, but it's now dated and is always something of a hurdle (1000 pages!) for students. Noll's new book would now be my choice for that course.

This is a very good book for Church History. It is a single volume that is written on a fairly east-to-read level. If you've not read a Church History reference before, this would be a good choice with which to start.

Mark Noll's works are always good.

This book helps us to remember the Christian Heritage of our country. By studying the Christian Heritage of our country we can see how the secular history has played out too and how they go hand in hand. This book by Mark A. Noll helps to bring this rich history in an easy to read format. This book is also a great resource for research and to help with illustrations for sermons and Sunday School lessons.

ok, I'm a slow reader. I also tend to read 3 books at a time. I checked this out at my local library and wanted a copy of it. It seems to be very well written and i am very interested in the early history of the United states (cause college sure didn't teach this stuff!).

This is a nice read for history books. A lot of information. This is also good for someone who is studying American Literature because it is a good background source.

This is thorough and comprehensive coverage of the history of Christianity in the United States and Canada from the first colonists, up to the date of publication in 1992. It also serves to provide additional insight into the history taught in schools and experienced by all of us. It is from these religious roots that the moral fiber of our culture arises, shaping all events. This book tracks the multitude of divisions and changes that have taken place in our religious landscape during the almost 400 year history of European peoples in North America. It makes it obvious that change is the only consistent factor.

Most of it is clearly and concisely written. It does a good job in explaining major differences between denominations in a given time frame. At times, it does become somewhat muddy as the author tries to explain lesser differences between denominations. I believe that is not the result of a lack of skill on the part of the author, but because those differences themselves are muddy.

The author maintains a consistent level of objectivity throughout the book and is not being a flack for any particular religious point of view.

No page numbers to reference as source for classes. Book is useless to a student who needs to reference this book as a source.