Healing in the History of Christianity Presidential Address, January 2002 American Society of Church History

2002 ◽  
Vol 71 (2) ◽  
pp. 227-242
Author(s):  
Amanda Porterfield
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Address ◽  
Church History ◽  
Church Of Christ ◽  
Divine Love ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
Knowing That ◽  
Healing Power ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
The Church

In 1866, after a fall on the ice left her in despair of ever being able to walk again, Mary Baker Patterson (later Mary Baker Eddy) picked up her Bible and began reading stories of the healings performed by Jesus. As she lay in bed, picturing Jesus commanding the lame to rise and demons to be gone, her own sense of the power of Divine Love became so strong that she stood up and walked, knowing that she was completely healed. Free from the weakness, pain, and fear that had plagued her life for decades, Eddy became a forceful and successful leader, the founder of the Church of Christ, Scientist who devoted the rest of her life to teaching others to know the healing power of Divine Love.

Divine Imperium and the Ecclesiastical Imaginary: Church History, Transnationalism, and the Rationality of Empire

2014 ◽  
Vol 83 (4) ◽  
pp. 1003-1008
Author(s):  
Sylvester A. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Church History ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
Cape Coast ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
The Family ◽  
Cultural Themes ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
City State ◽  
The Church

Laurie Maffly-Kipp's address to the American Society of Church History proffers the challenge of engaging seriously with the “church” in church history. She notes that scholarship on Christianity has increasingly focused on broader cultural themes in lieu of a more strict concern with churches as institutions in their own right. Maffly-Kipp's challenge reminded me of a particular context in the history of Christianity: the eighteenth-century city-state of Ogua (or, more familiarly, Cape Coast), in present-day Ghana. In the 1750s, the family of a local youth sent their child, Philip Quaque, to study abroad in London under the auspices of the Anglican Church. The young Quaque spent the next eleven years of this life cultivating expertise in Anglican liturgy, Christian theology, and British mores. Before returning home in his early twenties, he was ordained to the Anglican priesthood—the first African to have done so.

Henry Boynton Smith and Church History in Nineteenth-Century America

2016 ◽  
Vol 85 (2) ◽  
pp. 302-327 ◽  
Author(s):  
Annette G. Aubert
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Church History ◽  
Church Of Christ ◽  
Central Position ◽  
Nineteenth Century America ◽  
German Education ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Doctrine ◽  
American Society ◽  
The Church

Henry Boynton Smith (1815–1877) was one of the few nineteenth-century American scholars committed to disseminating German methods of ecclesiastical historiography to a country known for its anti-historical tendencies. However, modern scholars have generally overlooked his significant contributions in this area. Hence exploring his scholarly reception and specifically his History of the Church of Christ, in Chronological Tables will fill a niche in the historiography of church history.Philip Schaff (1819–1893), the renowned church historian and founder of the American Society of Church History, was one of the few contemporaries of Smith who understood that Smith's scholarship was on a par with that being produced in Germany. Schaff specifically praised Smith's chronological tables—evidence of Smith's German education among some of the best German historians of the period, including Leopold von Ranke and August Neander. This essay reviews Smith's History of the Church of Christ, in Chronological Tables in the context of the newly emerging scientific history and describes his contribution to nineteenth-century American scholarship. Smith is worthy of attention for establishing a central position for the history of doctrine and for promoting the field of church history and the use of chronological tables in nineteenth-century America.

On Teaching the History of Christianity: Traditions and Presuppositions

2003 ◽  
Vol 72 (2) ◽  
pp. 237-250
Author(s):  
E. Brooks Holifield
Keyword(s):  
Social Movements ◽  
Presidential Address ◽  
Church History ◽  
Theological Seminary ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
Moral Capacity

In his presidential address to the American Society of Church History in 1920, Robert Hastings Nichols observed that he had discovered, in his reading of previous addresses, “no mention of the reading of a paper dealing with what is the occupation of almost half of our members, the teaching of Church History,” or, as he preferred to call it, the teaching of “Christianity in History.” He decided, therefore, to talk about pedagogy. He devoted most of his address to answering the question why history should be taught in the theological seminary, arguing that it trained students to weigh evidence, calculate motives, trace causes, and estimate the power of social movements. It nurtured a certain kind of intellectual and moral capacity.

Joseph Milner and his Editors: Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Evangelicals and the Christian Past

2017 ◽  
Vol 69 (1) ◽  
pp. 86-104 ◽  
Author(s):  
PAUL GUTACKER
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
English Language ◽  
Church History ◽  
Church Of Christ ◽  
Historical Narratives ◽  
Religious Identities ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church

Joseph Milner's ‘History of the Church of Christ’ (1794–1809) was the most popular English-language church history for half a century, yet it remains misunderstood by many historians. This paper argues that Milner's Evangelical interpretation of church history subverted Protestant historiographical norms. By prioritising conversion over doctrinal precision, and celebrating the piety of select medieval Catholics, Milner undermined the historical narratives that undergirded Protestant exceptionalism. As national religious identities became increasingly contested in the 1820s and 1830s, this subversive edge was blunted by publishers who edited the ‘History’ to be less favourable toward pre-Reformation Christianity.

The Idea of the Church in Christian History

1952 ◽  
Vol 21 (3) ◽  
pp. 191-214 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wilhelm Pauck
Keyword(s):  
Social Context ◽  
Special Kind ◽  
Church History ◽  
Christian Faith ◽  
Special Importance ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church ◽  
Christian History

It is customary to describe and interpret the history of Christianity as church history. To be sure, most church historians do not emphasize the special importance of the “church” in the Christian life they study and analyse; indeed, they deal with the idea of the church, with ecclesiological doctrines and with ecclesiastical practices as if they represented special phases of the Christian life. But, nevertheless, the fact that all aspects of Christian history are subsumed under the name and title of the “church” indicates that the character of Christianity is held to be inseparable from that of the “church”; the very custom of regarding Christian history as church history indicates that the Christian mind is marked by a special kind of self-consciousness induced by the awareness that the Christian faith is not fully actualized unless it is expressed in the special social context suggested by the term “church.”

Forum on Antebellum American Protestantism

2015 ◽  
Vol 84 (3) ◽  
pp. 608-609
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Address ◽  
Religious Studies ◽  
Church History ◽  
American Religious History ◽  
Antebellum America ◽  
Traditional Church ◽  
American Protestantism ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
Theoretical Developments

At the 2015 Winter Meeting of the American Society of Church History, the panel “Futures of the American Religious Past” examined two of the most provocative and influential recent analyses of antebellum American protestantism—Mark A. Noll's America's God and John Lardas Modern's Secularism in Antebellum America. In one sense, the pairing is odd. The two books appear drastically different, stylistically and methodologically. Modern's highly original monograph constructs a genealogy of antebellum American secularism, illuminating ways in which this cultural force haunted the historicity of American protestantism. His analysis interweaves the theoretical and discursive approaches of cultural studies and religious studies. Noll's book, on the other hand, constructs a more traditional, though deeply creative, history of protestant religious ideas, attentive to the agency of individual thinkers and institutions. Both books are brilliant, yet they exist at two opposite disciplinary poles in the study of American religions. Their juxtaposition embodies what Laurie Maffly-Kipp in her 2013 American Society of Church History Presidential Address called our “transitional moment” in American religious history, as theoretical developments of religious studies confront traditional church history paradigms.

scholarly journals Ekumenisiteit as ’n Skrifgefundeerde raamwerk vir kerklike eenheid – ook op die gebied van sendingwerk

2006 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
C. J. Smit
Keyword(s):  
Roman Catholic ◽  
Church Of Christ ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
Reformed Tradition ◽  
Missionary Work ◽  
The Core ◽  
History Of ◽  
Core Characteristics ◽  
The Church

Ecumenicism as a Scripturally-founded framework for ecclesiastical unity – also in missionary work In this article the foundations of a Scripturally-based ecumenicism utilised as a framework within which the dilemma of church division, also in missionary work, can be approached are investigated. The article identifies these foundations as the attributa ecclesiae (the core characteristics of the church), namely unity, catholicity, apostolicity and holiness. The conclusion arrived at is that the purpose of ecumenicism is the unity of the church, because of the catholicity of the church, based on the apostolicity of the church and aimed at the holiness of the church. Within this framework, missionary work should rather focus on cooperation than on emphasising ecclesiastical differences. The concluding issue concerns the boundaries of ecclesiastical cooperation, also in missionary work. Is it possible that different churches within the Reformed tradition can cooperate in missionary fields? Is it furthermore possible that the boundaries can be extended to encompass more than the approach of the Reformed tradition? In which way can churches from the Reformed tradition also cooperate with, for instance, churches from the Lutheran tradition, or with churches from the charismatic or even Roman Catholic traditions? The conclusions arrived at point to the notae ecclesiae (the core marks of the church) as the widest boundary for ecclesiastical cooperation. This approach accommodates the diversity of culture and ethos within the boundaries of the core marks of the church which determine what the church should be like in order to be church of the Lord. In the currently rising ecumenical phase of the history of Christianity the emphasis will increasingly fall on unifying rather than on dividing aspects of the church. The conclusion indicates that the unity of the church, also in missionary work, can only be attained and maintained within the framework of the core characteristics of the church (the attributa ecclesiae) – and that ecumenicism is no longer possible if a church is not recognisable as church of Christ and does not function within the core marks set for the church (the notae ecclesiae).

Introduction

2011 ◽  
Vol 80 (2) ◽  
pp. 352-353
Author(s):  
Martha L. Finch
Keyword(s):  
American Academy ◽  
Annual Meeting ◽  
Panel Discussion ◽  
Church History ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
Look Back ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Society ◽  
Over Time

It has been more than one hundred years since the American Society of Church History (ASCH) began publishing its Papers in 1889, followed in 1932 by the journal Church History. To commemorate these one hundred–plus years of publication, the History of Christianity Section of the American Academy of Religion (AAR) invited four current and past editors of Church History and, for an “outsider's” perspective, one historian who has not served as editor to participate in a panel discussion at the AAR's 2009 annual meeting in Montreal. We asked the panelists to look back on changes to Church History over time and how those changes have both mirrored and stimulated changes in the broader field of history of Christianity. We also wanted them to reflect on where they see scholarship in the field headed in the next five years or so.

The Inescapability of “Church” in the History of Christianity

2014 ◽  
Vol 83 (4) ◽  
pp. 997-1002
Author(s):  
Brad S. Gregory
Keyword(s):  
Church History ◽  
Small Contribution ◽  
History Of Christianity ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Church ◽  
Forward Looking

Laurie Maffly-Kipp's insightful address about the perils and promise of church history concludes with an invitation “to begin a conversation” about how “the ‘church history’ of this new century can be both creatively forward-looking and respectful of the lineages that have brought us here.” I offer here some brief remarks on her address as a small contribution to that conversation.

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