Lutheranism and American Culture

<p>Timothy D. Grundmeier's <i>Lutheranism and American Culture</i> examines the transformation of the nation's third-largest Protestant denomination over the course of the nineteenth century. In the antebellum era leading voices within the church believed that the best way to become American was by modifying certain historic doctrines deemed too Catholic and cooperating with Anglo-evangelicals in revivalism and social reform. However by the mid-1870s most Lutherans had rejected this view. Though they remained proudly American most embraced a religious identity characterized by a commitment to their church's confessions isolation from other Christians and a conservative outlook on political and social issues. <p/>Grundmeier shows that this transformation did not happen in a vacuum. Throughout the Civil War and early years of Reconstruction disputes over slavery and politics led to quarrels about theology and church affairs. During the war and immediately after the Lutheran church in the United States experienced two major schisms both driven by clashing views on the national conflict. In the postbellum years Lutherans adopted increasingly conservative positions in theology and politics mainly in reaction to the perceived radicalism of the era. By the final decades of the nineteenth century Lutherans had established a rigorously conservative and definitively American form of the faith distinct from their coreligionists in Europe and other Protestants in the United States. <p/>Although Grundmeier focuses on a single religious tradition his study has implications for several areas of Civil War scholarship. First it demonstrates how the Lutheran experience diverged from that of other Protestant groups thereby expanding our understanding of how American Christians responded to the era's crises including slavery sectionalism and national identity. In addition his work reinforces and extends many of the findings in other historical fields: the political culture of the Mid-Atlantic and Midwest the views of German and Scandinavian immigrants and the various forms of conservatism among white northerners. Grundmeier's most significant contribution however is examining a previously unexplored subject. In the vast corpus of works on the Civil War era and American religious history scholars have almost entirely overlooked the views and experiences of Lutherans. <i>Lutheranism and American Culture</i> seeks to remedy that neglect and serve as the starting point for understanding the formative decades of this distinctive faith.</p>