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Robert S. Ellwood. 1950: Crossroads of American Religious Life. Louisville, Kentucky: Westminster John Knox, 2000. Pp. xi + 244. No Price Listed.
Rehwaldt-Alexander, Jeremy
Rehwaldt-Alexander, Jeremy
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"In 1950: Crossroads of American Religious Life, Robert S. Ellwood argues that 1950 was a year that "hung suspended between old and new, looking both ways without decision" (9). It was a "pivotal" year, as the zeitgeist of the country shifted from post-war optimism to Cold War pessimism. This change was visible in the political sphere - with the commencement of the Korean War and the rise of McCarthyism - as well as in religious communities, as they responded to changes in the broader culture. [2] Ellwood's central theme is that in a crisis-ridden and anxiety-laden time, people sought stability and comfort in the religious life of the past. Ellwood writes that "by 1950 religion was raising up monuments to postwar prosperity as though the future were nothing but glowing, while in its spiritual life it paraded the past, using the latest technology to advance the doctrines of medieval monks and pioneer revivalists" (44). The inclination toward religious conservatism was tied up with the future - not only technologically, but also intellectually, as religious leaders drew on contemporary psychology and existentialist philosophy. [3] The tension between the past and the future is only one of the tensions faced by religious adherents at mid-century. Another touchstone for understanding life in 1950 is the response to communism and the accompanying fear and anxiety that cut across religious traditions. The divide between communism and democracy was a pressing issue, an issue tied to the deeper divide between collectivism and individualism. This concern was woven throughout the culture, visible in the anti-communism of Joseph McCarthy, the concern about "mass society" in such sociological classics as William Whyte's The Organization Man, and in the reigning philosophical perspective of existentialism. [4] Ellwood makes his argument first by sketching the historical context in the 1930s and 1940s that shaped the world of 1950, then turning to the prominent intellectual movements and political events that shaped religious life. He moves chapter by chapter through the primary religious traditions in the US at that time: mainline Protestantism, Roman Catholicism, Evangelicalism, Judaism, and African-American religious traditions. Ellwood points out how religious communities responded to key external events, as well as how they influenced the broader society through their own action. For instance, the Korean War elicited a wide-ranging and dynamic response from religious communities. Ellwood elaborates the positions and the changes, such as the editorial stance of The Christian Century, which moved from initial support of the police action to later criticism of the US's focus on military force alone (161)."(pg 1)
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2000
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With permission of the license/copyright holder