The Great Awakening was an intense religious revival that occured in the 1730s and 1740s. It took place in Colonial America, originating from a town named Northhampton, in Massachusetts. This was the home of the preacher Jonathan Edwards, author of the famous sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God." Edwards believed that we were all vile sinners and the mercy of God, who "abhors you," was the only thing saving us from the fires of eternal damnation. As you can imagine, this had a great effect on the colonists of America, whose spiritual vitality had been decreasing constantly over the past century. As apposed to Edwards, the parson George Whitefield used his harmonious voice to enthrall colonists, reportedly able to make people cry with but a single word. Whitefield preached of our helplessness and how only the all powerful God could save us. Between the two of them, as well as countless imitators, these preachers were able to move thousands and thousands of colonists to intense spiritual conversion. For the first time, religion became something that occured inside a person's heart instead of inside a church.
As religion grew to be a more personal experience, colonists began to resent state controlled churches. Religion in the colonies was consistantly becoming less denominational. The number of colonists actually attending church shrunk dramatically, a number which was already low. When orthodox clergymen, or "old lights," didn't approve of the personal, emotional spirituality that the Great Awakening was envoking, many members of Congregational and Presbyterian denominations simply left for other smaller, more open ones. The "old lights" and the "new lights" disagreed on many issues, causing two of the major denominations to become divided, furthering the fragmentation of the policy of established religion. As religion became an emotional, personal experience instead of a communal one, places like Rhode Island, which did not have an established church, probably seemed more inviting to many colonists. They didn't want to have to pay for something that wasnt benefiting them. In this period just before the revolution, separation of church and state became a more and more inviting policy. In fact, by the late 1780's, all of the middle and southern colonies had disestablished their previously established churches (New England colonies following suit within 50 years).
The deep emotionalism of the Great Awakening caused religion to have a very awkward, infringing position in the state. People wanted the government to have less and less to do with what they believed, and as this became the widespread opinion, separation of Church and State became a reality.
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ReplyDeleteI think I know what you're getting at when you say people were becoming "less denominational" -- that they were just less loyal or interested in their church (which, typically) was some denomination, but there were not in fact fewer denominations. As you point out later in the essay, the diversity of individual religious experience will actually result in MORE denominations, or a drift into religious experience in which one's denominational affiliation was not so central.