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Reforming Christendom: Transatlantic Networks and the German-American Protestant Exchange

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Multipolarität und bipolare Konfrontationen

Part of the book series: Transatlantische Beziehungen ((TRANSBE))

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Zusammenfassung

This chapter examines the development of two different Protestant “theopolitical” worlds in the United States and Germany and the transatlantic religious networks that developed between them. It does so through sketching the historical development of “formal Christendom” and “informal Christendom” in Germany and the United States, two modes of church-state relations that advanced differing interpretations of political theology and ecclesiology. Through tracing their historical development and intersection, this chapter illustrates how the transatlantic flow of religious actors and ideas reshaped “theopolitcal imaginations” on both sides of the Atlantic. Furthermore, it demonstrates how this underacknowledged history of exchange informed the post-1945 emergence of a transnational Protestant consensus around ecumenism, democracy, and religious activism in the public sphere.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Herman (1943, p. 106).

  2. 2.

    McCleod (2007) defines Christendom as “a society where there are close ties between leaders of the church and secular elites; where the laws purport to be based on Christian principles; where, apart from certain clearly defined outsider communities, everyone is assumed to be Christian; and where Christianity provides a common language, shared alike by the devout and the religiously known” (p. 18).

  3. 3.

    Cavanaugh (2002).

  4. 4.

    Noll (2015, pp. 3–5).

  5. 5.

    Wright (2010).

  6. 6.

    Laffin (2016, p. 106–111). Nessan (2005, p. 302–311).

  7. 7.

    On these “unintended” consequences of the Reformation, see: Gregory (2012).

  8. 8.

    For more background on the origins of Pietism and its development, see: Shantz (2012, 2015).

  9. 9.

    On the transatlantic character of Pietism, see: Ward (2002), Lehmann et al. (2009). For more on transnational Pietist networks, see Pietrinka (2018).

  10. 10.

    Roeber (1993, p. 342n).

  11. 11.

    Following German Lutheran settlements, Germany’s Reformed Protestants proved the most sizeable German immigrant group in colonial America. Philadelphia’s German Reformed Church formed in 1725 under the direction of John Philip Boehm, a school teacher who immigrated to Pennsylvania in 1720. Due to a lack of Reformed ministers, the German Reformed immigrants of Philadelphia invited Boehm to pastor their congregation due to his education and piety. By 1727, the Rev. George Michael Weiss of the Palatinate arrived with 400 other German Reformed migrants and assumed leadership of the congregation. Weiss opposed Boehm’s unsanctioned ministry, illustrating an early ecclesiological tension many German settlers faced. As Boehm was ordained by the Dutch Reformed Church in 1729, Weiss returned to Europe in 1730 in order to raise funds for the fledgling congregation, indicating the importance of continental supporters in this initial wave of settlement.

  12. 12.

    Granquist (2015, p. 87–111).

  13. 13.

    Roeber (1993, p. 291, 274).

  14. 14.

    Noll (2002, p. 410).

  15. 15.

    Granquist (2015, pp. 113–138).

  16. 16.

    Hatch (1989, p. 1–9).

  17. 17.

    The Revolution separated church and state where the Church of England had been established. Congregationalist religious establishments remained intact in Vermont, Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Massachusetts. Through the early nineteenth century, however, advocacy by secularists and religious minorities led to the formal disestablishment of churches in these states.

  18. 18.

    Howe (2009, p. 165).

  19. 19.

    Hatch (1989).

  20. 20.

    Noll (2002).

  21. 21.

    Howe (2009, p. 166).

  22. 22.

    Noll (2015, pp. 3–5).

  23. 23.

    Hatch (1989, pp. 5556).

  24. 24.

    Hatch (1989).

  25. 25.

    Schmucker (1834, pp. 272–275).

  26. 26.

    Schmucker (1839).

  27. 27.

    Tocqueville (2002).

  28. 28.

    Stievermann (2018).

  29. 29.

    Olson and Winn (2015, p. 114). Hansen (2011).

  30. 30.

    Hammer (2008), Gerhardt (2002).

  31. 31.

    Carter (2018).

  32. 32.

    For more on the partnership between conservative Protestantism and monarchism, see: Correll (2014) and Blackbourn (2003), Conway (1992).

  33. 33.

    Brose (2013, pp. 239–258).

  34. 34.

    Duden (1834).

  35. 35.

    Todd (2000).

  36. 36.

    Nelson (1980, p. 97).

  37. 37.

    Jahr (1943, p. 2).

  38. 38.

    Wyneken (1982).

  39. 39.

    Wyneken (1982).

  40. 40.

    Herbst (1965, pp. 1–2); Diehl (1978).

  41. 41.

    Marsden (1994, p. 104).

  42. 42.

    Purvis (2014, pp. 650–683).

  43. 43.

    Smucker (1994, p. 15).

  44. 44.

    Dorrien (2003, p. 118).

  45. 45.

    Evans (2015, pp. 51–58).

  46. 46.

    Littlefield (2013, p. 24).

  47. 47.

    Carter (2015).

  48. 48.

    Lindner (2007, p. 8).

  49. 49.

    Rodgers (2000).

  50. 50.

    Hutchinson (1993, p. 135).

  51. 51.

    Strasburg (2016).

  52. 52.

    Jenkins (2014).

  53. 53.

    Siegmund-Schultze (1915).

  54. 54.

    Donahue (2015).

  55. 55.

    Todd (2000, p. 105).

  56. 56.

    Frick (1922, p. 352).

  57. 57.

    Frick (1922, p. 392).

  58. 58.

    Warren (1997).

  59. 59.

    Strasburg (2018).

  60. 60.

    Jahr (1943, p. 2).

  61. 61.

    Michelfelder (1945).

  62. 62.

    Strasburg (2018).

  63. 63.

    Keller (1942, pp. 225–226, 228).

  64. 64.

    On the postwar transformation of German Protestantism, see: Greschat (1994, 2002, 2010) and Hockenos (2004).

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  1. Heidelberg, Deutschland

    James Strasburg

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  1. Universität der Bundeswehr München, Wiesbaden, Germany

    Dietmar Schössler

  2. Universität Heidelberg , Heidelberg, Baden-Württemberg, Germany

    Michael Plathow

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Strasburg, J. (2019). Reforming Christendom: Transatlantic Networks and the German-American Protestant Exchange. In: Schössler, D., Plathow, M. (eds) Multipolarität und bipolare Konfrontationen. Transatlantische Beziehungen. Springer VS, Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-22927-6_6

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