Thomas, George M. Revivalism and Cultural Change: Christianity, Nation Building, and the Market in the Nineteenth-century United States. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989.

While scanning the list of terms on the review street, I settled on the Protestant Reformation as a starting point for my book search. To hone in my search even more, I thought about the historical implications of the Protestant Reformation. The United States, having been settled by Protestant’s fleeing persecution, has been greatly influenced by Protestantism. One of the prime examples of this is the Great Awakening. I logged onto the Lafayette Library website and searched “The Great Awakening” in the library Catalog. This search proved to be too specific as I was not able to find an entire book dedicated to that subject currently in the library (they did offer a few through the Interlibrary loan system). I broadened my search to “Christianity in America” and was able to find a book called Revivalism and Cultural Change by George M. Thomas.

This time proved to be much more fruitful than the last; I was actually able to find the one I was looking for amongst the sea of books. The book was a plain yellow-orange color with the title on the spine; both the front and the back were empty. Its contents were divided into 6 sections: introduction, institutional model of culture change and social movements, an institutional analysis of market penetration, the social meaning of revivalism and republicanism, political-economic aspects of revivalism, and towards a general theory of religious movements. I opened to a random page and began to read. It was a subsection within the Social Meaning of Revivalism and Republicanism section titled perfectionism. The book described the roots of Perfectionism in Wesleyanism during the second Great Awakening. Perfectionism was a result of full obedience to the Holy Spirit. Christian scripture teaches that the Holy Spirit wants to give “full and abundant life to everyone”. Mediocrity is a result of not accepting the Holy Spirit’s gifts.

The book’s calculated and empirical approach to studying religion intrigued me. It contained plenty of evidence, including numerical, while presenting its case. All of this data could be used when writing an essay on Christianity in 19th century America. Additionally, It goes into great detail describing the social, economic, and political impacts of religion. Located near this book were others about religion’s effect on American history and civil society. Examples of such books include Sermons at Court and Missionary Trail.