Religion and the Civil War

American Religious History

Religion and abolitionism

ˇ   Readying America for the millennium

ˇ   Evangelization: American Tract Society, 1825

ˇ   American Temperance Society, 1825

ˇ   American Antislavery Society, 1833

ˇ  Slavery = America’s biggest sin

ˇ  No protection for women or families
ˇ  No curbs on power of slaveowners
ˇ  Contradicts the overall sense of the Bible

ˇ   Northern evangelists support abolition

Religion and the defense of slavery

ˇ   Slavery is Biblical

ˇ   No passage condemns slavery

ˇ   Ephesians 6:5, Colossians 3:22

ˇ  “Servants, obey in all things your masters”

ˇ   Gen. 17:12; Deut. 20:10-11; 1 Cor. 7:21; Rom. 13:1,7; 1 Tim. 6:1-2

ˇ   The curse of Ham, Gen. 9:25-27

ˇ  His descendants to be servants to his brothers

ˇ   Slavery is moral

ˇ   Slaves taken care of, protected, Christianized

ˇ   Masters like the patriarchs of the Old Testament

Slaves and religion

ˇ   Denmark Vesey conspiracy, 1821

ˇ   African Methodists implicated

ˇ   Methodists nearly banned

ˇ   All-slave congregations outlawed

ˇ   Slaves in white churches

ˇ   On plantations, masters attend services

ˇ   “Hush arbors”: meeting in secret

Denominations split over slavery

ˇ   1845: Methodist Episcopal Church and Methodist Episcopal Church, South

ˇ   1845: American Baptists and Southern Baptists

ˇ   1861: Presbyterian Church in the USA and Presbyterian Church in the CSA (later US)

ˇ   Disciples of Christ & Churches of Christ (1907)

ˇ   Episcopalians maintain unity

ˇ   Catholics also united, but pro-Southern

ˇ   Common-sense reading of Bible a terrible failure

Religion and the Civil War, 1861-1865

ˇ   Both sides appeal to God

ˇ   Southern Constitution explicitly invokes God

ˇ   Religion: important consolation to soldiers

ˇ   Many revivals in camps of both sides

ˇ   What did this terrible war mean?

ˇ   Northerners: God punished the South for slavery

ˇ   Lincoln: The nation was punished for slavery

ˇ   Southerners: Why did God allow defeat?

ˇ   Punished for their sins (but not for slavery!)

Religion and Reconstruction

ˇ  Whites control Southern churches; blacks leave

ˇ  Creation of black churches without whites

ˇ  Independent, mainly Baptist in the countryside

ˇ  Successful urban AME and AMEZ missionizing

ˇ  Free to have own style of religion

ˇ  White churches support segregation, white rule

ˇ  Blacks “naturally” immoral

ˇ  Protect “true” Christianity & pure white women

ˇ  Ku Klux Klan; lynching, torture, violence, terror

ˇ  For North, new sins: alcohol, prostitutes, Catholics