William R. Hutchison – författare

In this comprehensive history of American foreign-mission thought from the colonial period to the current era, William R. Hutchinson analyzes the varied and changing expressions of an American "sense of mission" that was more than religious in its implications. His account illuminates the dilemmas intrinsic to any venture in which one culture attempts to apply its ideals and technology to the supposed benefit of another.

This book, awarded the Brewer Prize by the American Society of Church History, is a study of the efforts of the Transcendentalists of the New England Renaissance to reform the Unitarian Church. Scholarly interpreters have, in general, agreed on the basic religious orientation of the Transcendentalist Movement. Mr. Hutchison, however, believes that it was far more than a tendency to appraise the universe in terms of an intuitive faith. Most of the men closely associated with the Movement in New England were Unitarian ministers, and he has concentrated on their attempt to apply transcendental thinking to theology and to the everyday problems of the parish ministry. At the same time he has produced a sympathetic appraisal of the conservative Unitarian position in his review of the so-called Transcendentalist Controversy. Yale Historical Publications, Miscellany 71. Mr. Hutchison is associate professor of American civilization at The American University in Washington, D.C.

During the first six decades of the last century, the so-called mainline Protestant denominations in America were compelled to accommodate to the growing influences of diverse religions and growing secularization. In this book, twelve historians examine the nature of the American Protestant establishment and its response to the growing pluralism of the times. The goals of the establishment are first examined from the inside, as they were voiced from the pulpit, expressed in education and through the media, and applied in ecumenical and social-reforming ventures. The establishment is then viewed through the eyes of outsiders - Jews and Catholics - and those at the periphery of the establishment's core - and women. The authors conclude that the period surveyed forms a distinct epoch in the evolution of American Protestantism. The days when Protestant cultural authority could be taken for granted were certainly over, but a new era in which religious pluralism would be widely accepted had not yet arrived.

During the first six decades of the last century, the so-called mainline Protestant denominations in America were compelled to accommodate to the growing influences of diverse religions and growing secularization. In this book, twelve historians examine the nature of the American Protestant establishment and its response to the growing pluralism of the times. The goals of the establishment are first examined from the inside, as they were voiced from the pulpit, expressed in education and through the media, and applied in ecumenical and social-reforming ventures. The establishment is then viewed through the eyes of outsiders - Jews and Catholics - and those at the periphery of the establishment's core - and women. The authors conclude that the period surveyed forms a distinct epoch in the evolution of American Protestantism. The days when Protestant cultural authority could be taken for granted were certainly over, but a new era in which religious pluralism would be widely accepted had not yet arrived.

This anthology, originally published by Harper and Row in 1968, still stands alone as a collection of the classic statements of American liberal Protestantism in the heyday of that vitally significant movement.