More Money, More Ministry: Money and Evangelicals in Recent North American History
Over the last century and a half, Eskridge and Noll assert in the introduction to this fine collection, evangelical Protestants have displayed at least "two attitudes toward money and its role in believers' lives." Some have depended with such confidence on divine providence that they haven't bothered to save, plan or be otherwise financially prudent; others have embraced the market, believing that God will provide through soaring stocks. These essaysAmost of which were first presented at a 1998 Wheaton College conferenceAexplore both strategies. Many evangelicals, argues Gary Scott Smith in a scintillating look at evangelicals' encounter with corporate capitalism from 1880 to 1930, criticized consumerism and responded to it by advocating "biblical stewardship." Peter Dobkin Hall says that early 20th-century economic transformations contributed as much to the breaking of American Protestants into liberal and conservative camps as, say, the Scopes trial. In "Unpaid Debts," the collection's most creative essay, Ted Ownby asks whether Southern sectarian groups, composed of "people who were self-consciously plain and in many cases relatively poor," offered religiously based critiques of capitalism. The sleeper of the bunch is Robert Burkinshaw's comparison of how Canadians and Americans funded Christian colleges and universities after World War II. (The editors may have been straining too much to get "North" in the subtitle.) This collection fills a gulch in our understanding of American evangelicalism; it should be read by every Christian, and every capitalist. (Nov.)Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.