Rachel Wheeler – författare

Two Northeast Indian communities with similar histories of colonization accepted Congregational and Moravian missionaries, respectively, within five years of one another: the Mohicans of Stockbridge, Massachusetts (1735), and Shekomeko, in Dutchess County, New York (1740). In To Live upon Hope, Rachel Wheeler explores the question of what "missionary Christianity" became in the hands of these two native communities.The Mohicans of Stockbridge and Shekomeko drew different conclusions from their experiences with colonial powers. Both tried to preserve what they deemed core elements of Mohican culture. The Indians of Stockbridge believed education in English cultural ways was essential to their survival and cast their acceptance of the mission project as a means of preserving their historic roles as cultural intermediaries. The Mohicans of Shekomeko, by contrast, sought new sources of spiritual power that might be accessed in order to combat the ills that came with colonization, such as alcohol and disease.Through extensive research, especially in the Moravian records of day-to-day life, Wheeler offers an understanding of the lived experience of Mohican communities under colonialism. She complicates the understanding of eighteenth-century American Christianity by demonstrating that mission programs were not always driven by the destruction of indigenous culture and the advancement of imperial projects. To Live upon Hope challenges the prevailing view of accommodation or resistance as the two poles of Indian responses to European colonization. Colonialism placed severe strains on native peoples, Wheeler finds, yet Indians also exercised a level of agency and creativity that aided in their survival.

Two Northeast Indian communities with similar histories of colonization accepted Congregational and Moravian missionaries, respectively, within five years of one another: the Mohicans of Stockbridge, Massachusetts (1735), and Shekomeko, in Dutchess County, New York (1740). In To Live upon Hope, Rachel Wheeler explores the question of what "missionary Christianity" became in the hands of these two native communities.The Mohicans of Stockbridge and Shekomeko drew different conclusions from their experiences with colonial powers. Both tried to preserve what they deemed core elements of Mohican culture. The Indians of Stockbridge believed education in English cultural ways was essential to their survival and cast their acceptance of the mission project as a means of preserving their historic roles as cultural intermediaries. The Mohicans of Shekomeko, by contrast, sought new sources of spiritual power that might be accessed in order to combat the ills that came with colonization, such as alcohol and disease.Through extensive research, especially in the Moravian records of day-to-day life, Wheeler offers an understanding of the lived experience of Mohican communities under colonialism. She complicates the understanding of eighteenth-century American Christianity by demonstrating that mission programs were not always driven by the destruction of indigenous culture and the advancement of imperial projects. To Live upon Hope challenges the prevailing view of accommodation or resistance as the two poles of Indian responses to European colonization. Colonialism placed severe strains on native peoples, Wheeler finds, yet Indians also exercised a level of agency and creativity that aided in their survival.

2021 Catholic Media Association Award honorable mention award in spirituality - classicalIn Desert Daughters, Desert Sons, professor Rachel Wheeler argues that a new reading of the texts of the Christian desert tradition is needed to present the (often) anonymous women who inhabit the texts. Though these women may have been included by storytellers to provide a foil to the exemplary men in the stories' foreground, Wheeler demonstrates how women's persistence in places they were not welcome witnesses to truths about where wisdom may be sought and found. In this book, Wheeler allows these women's stories to critique the desert impulse that can create a spiritual life devoid of social relationships and responsibility.

2026 Catholic Media Association Second Place Award, Edited Collections – Contemporary/Modern AuthorsHow do Catholic university faculty attend to and support the prophetic imaginations of their students? Among the treasures of the Catholic intellectual tradition, two are especially vital for contemporary Catholic education: the sacramental imagination and prophetic imagination. A sacramental imagination, as illuminated in this book’s companion Becoming Beholders, posits that God is made manifest in all the academic life. But that reality of beauty and goodness must be held in tension with the prophetic imagination—a worldview that is acutely attuned to injustices and looks with creative eyes towards a more peaceful and equitable world.      Composed of essays by faculty in Catholic higher education in various fields, Beneath the Roar and Tumult addresses this tension, with insight into practical strategies for attending to the prophetic imagination in the classroom. In the classroom, educators are called on to create spaces for their students to grapple with inequalities and to dream of an actionable way forward while cultivating a more wholistic vision of academic life in solidarity with the world outside of it. Beneath the Roar and Tumult offers practical guidance for fostering inclusion and belonging in college classrooms to provide a space where the prophetic imagination is embraced.

2026 Catholic Media Association Second Place Award, Edited Collections - Contemporary/Modern AuthorsHow do Catholic university faculty attend to and support the prophetic imaginations of their students?Among the treasures of the Catholic intellectual tradition, two are especially vital for contemporary Catholic education: the sacramental imagination and prophetic imagination. A sacramental imagination, as illuminated in this book's companion Becoming Beholders, posits that God is made manifest in all the academic life. But that reality of beauty and goodness must be held in tension with the prophetic imagination-a worldview that is acutely attuned to injustices and looks with creative eyes towards a more peaceful and equitable world. Composed of essays by faculty in Catholic higher education in various fields, Beneath the Roar and Tumult addresses this tension, with insight into practical strategies for attending to the prophetic imagination in the classroom. In the classroom, educators are called on to create spaces for their students to grapple with inequalities and to dream of an actionable way forward while cultivating a more wholistic vision of academic life in solidarity with the world outside of it. Beneath the Roar and Tumult offers practical guidance for fostering inclusion and belonging in college classrooms to provide a space where the prophetic imagination is embraced.