field situation

In order to obtain insight into the American Southerners’ religious beliefs and practices, it would be beneficial to briefly recap the historical evolvement of the Southern religions. According to Sam Hill, Professor Emeritus in Religion, the University of Florida, in his April 2009 lecture, “Tell About the South: Why Are They So Religious?” (http://.fsu.edu/Volume12/SamHill%20Lecture.html) there are several factors found in the origins of the South that have shaped Southern religion. Hill states, “With two elementary facts of southern history that set it off from the rest of the nation . . .first, the presence of a pervasively bi-racial culture, African and European. . .and second, the significant absence of European immigrant sectors of the population, with their distinctive cultures” with some exceptions, such as Italians migrating to Galveston, Texas and southern Jews in Florida’s coastal cities.

The South’s original religious roots came from the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church. By 1700, other Protestant denominations of Quakers, Baptists and Presbyterians emerged. Other groups soon followed, including Methodists, Lutherans and Moravians. By 1739, the “First Great Awakening” swept across the American colonies, from New England to Georgia. This movement strengthened the small Baptist and Methodist congregations. Women especially accepted the teachings of the Awakening, although they were not allowed to preach. Bible teachings were preached to rich and poor people, educated and illiterate who were already churched and Blacks began the first Black Baptist churches. Preachers during this First Great Awakening highlighted Bible teachings that included equality among men and The American Revolution soon followed. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Great_Awakening)

From the time of the American Revolution to afterwards, the motives of the white man converting the black man to Christianity were questioned. The idea was that the white man was introducing the black man to Christianity for servitude purposes. The Southern White churches apparently rationalized these actions based on the Biblical Genesis 9:24-25 passage that depicts Noah cursing Canaan, after his son from Canaan, Ham, disrespected him. The passage quotes Noah cursing Canaan to become the “lowest of slaves.”   

Once the Civil War ended and emancipation began, the blacks and whites no longer shared the same churches. Each formed their own separate congregations and simultaneously, each church membership increased notably. The churches during the South’s Reconstruction Period were flourishing. However, the content of the sermons were not about racial injustice or civil rights, but rather personal salvation and righteous living. The churches at this time were not as concerned with impacting social issues, except for supporting prohibition, stressing “appropriate” Sunday behavior, such as stopping Sunday mail delivery, and condemning worldly indulgences. Southern religion was moving past casual worship to being a form of active and participatory worship.  

By the early twentieth century, farming was yielding less financial support for the family and people were moving to towns and cities to seek employment. The Industrial Revolution ushered in textile factories and mill towns. Upper-class mill owners were building the churches and the larger denominations (e.g. Baptist, Methodist and Presbyterians) owned them. Their buildings were elaborate and their organizations sophisticated with trained preachers and community leaders as members. The middle class took issue with this and started their own churches including Pentecostal and new Baptist. The poor and black people also had separate churches. The larger denominations began forming publishing houses and central headquarters and provided supplies to other churches. Thus, by 1910, some of the smaller churches and denominations were perceiving exclusion by the larger church organizations.  

Yet, church membership and religious devoutness continued to grow in the South in the 20’s and 30’s. Growth was especially seen in some of the smaller sects, such as the Pentecostal and Assemblies of God congregations, despite the onset of the Roaring Twenties and the Great Depression with subsequent adverse affects on the Northern churches.(Religion in the South, edited by Charles Reagan Wilson, Copyright 1985. The University Press of Mississippi, pgs. 77-78.) 

The World War bringing the increase in U.S. births (i.e. “Baby Boomers”), family ties and church attendance continued to rise in the 1940’s and 50’s. Then, the 60’s and early 70’s brought about social changes with a decline in moral values that threatened the South’s conservative values. This, in turn, prompted further appeal for conservative evangelicalism. According to Robert D. Putnam, author of American Grace –How Religion Divides and Unites Us (Publisher: Simon and Schuster, 2010, pgs 114-116), the civil rights movement, changing gender roles, Supreme Court decisions that widened the separation of Church and State and moral decadence/sexual permissiveness played some role in the rise of evangelicalism in the 1970’s and 1980’s.  This evangelical movement continues to active today.

To answer the question of how the Southern “Bible Belt” evangelical movement has continued to survive and grow throughout the decades, consideration must be given to the core beliefs of the evangelical members. Core to the religious beliefs of the Southern Christian evangelicals is the “Great Commission” spoken by Jesus and recorded in Matthew 28:19-20, which reads, “Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you.” Whether the South was experiencing economic trials, social issues, war, or threats to its conservative values, their religious response was to outreach to society in an evangelical manner.