A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada

by Mark A. Noll

Book Overview

A best-selling text thoroughly updated, including new chapters on the last 30 years"An excellent study that will help historians appreciate the importance of Christianity in the history of the United... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0802806511
• ISBN13: 9780802806512
• Release Date: August 1992
• Publisher: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company
• Length: 592 Pages
• Weight: 2.38 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.2" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

How religion in America escaped state control

This excellent, detailed history shows what was new about Christianity in the New World. It portrays the dramatic contrasts between official colonial churches and various refugee sects, with their different visions of how they might relate to each other. Where the first colonies, provinces or states usually had official state churches, Noll documents the issues of church relations on the borders or frontiers between these domains. Into these zones, dissidents of all stripes fled from state-backed religion. And in areas where no religious group had a majority, Noll records how people learned to meet their community needs and get along: "The result was a degree of interdenominational tolerance probably unknown anywhere else in the world at that time". (p. 89) Noll's statement may overlook the religious diversity of India or China, but for the Christian world it applied. Of course Noll's book holds far more, and is of interest to people of every denomination in Canada and the USA. I was just most impressed by the explanation of how religion in North America escaped state control.

A History of Christianity in the United States and Canada

This is a very good book for Church History. It is a single volume that is written on a fairly east-to-read level. If you've not read a Church History reference before, this would be a good choice with which to start. Mark Noll's works are always good.

History in America - The Religious History

This book helps us to remember the Christian Heritage of our country. By studying the Christian Heritage of our country we can see how the secular history has played out too and how they go hand in hand. This book by Mark A. Noll helps to bring this rich history in an easy to read format. This book is also a great resource for research and to help with illustrations for sermons and Sunday School lessons.

Excellent Story of Christian North American History!

I was required to read this book for a seminary class and instead of being intimidated or turned off by its over 500 pages, I found the book to be an extremely enjoyable read.Noll describes the spread of Christianity from the Roman Catholicism of the 1500s to today's pluralism. Particulary enjoyable were the chapters on: the Puritans, The Great Awakenings, Churches in the American Revolution, Evangelical America during the Civil War, Intellectual Challenges to the Christian Faith in the Early 1900s, certain personalities (Billy Graham, Martin Luther King, Fulton Sheen), and the Southern Baptist Convention.A very interesting read, I highly recommend the book to anyone interested in the history of Christianity in America!Read and enjoy and do not be turned off by the size of the book!

A great college text on North American Christian history

I think that this is a very thorough, enjoyable journey through the history of Christianity in the US and Canada. He not only focuses on events such as the two American Great Awakenings, but he pauses to discuss some of the more interesting and influential Christians of the times (Anne Hutchinson, Charles Finney, George Whitefield, Francis Asbury, Fulton Sheen, Billy Graham, et al). I highly recommend this book, but it is a long book, so be prepared for many hours of reading.