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neadodsI've listened to the first lecture of American Religious History by Dr. Allitt. He's the same one who gave the Victorian Britain course I enjoyed so much, and it looks like this one's going to be even better. He starts right off by discussing America's unique positions as both the only one to have codified church/state religious separation and the only very religious world power. (He thinks these things directly relate to each other; it is his view, having grown up in England, that mandating a state religion weakens actual faith in that religion.)
But mainly, and what I'm *really* looking forward to, is the topic he elaborated in the second half of the opening lecture - how America's assorted faiths have politically shaped the country, from the makeup of the original states to the Moral Majority's hand in the 1980 election. (The lecture itself dates to the WWJD fad; he notes those armbands in his opening statements.) Already I've learned one thing I had not known - that there is a historical precedent to the argument that the First Amendment applies only to federal law and not to state law. Apparently that was how things were... until the Civil War, and the consequent strengthening of the federal government.
An overview of topics covered is here. There are 24 lectures, including:
- The European Background
- Colonial Religious Diversity
- Darwin and Other Dilemmas
- Judaism in the 19th Century
- Twentieth-Century Catholicism
- The Civil Rights Movement
- The Counterculture and Feminism
- Asian Religions
and
- Church and State
Since we're coming up on the Federally Mandated Religious Biggie, I'm going to make a theme out of my next set of "classes" - first this, then The Making of the New Testament Canon, and finally Bible and World Literature. By then it will be time to start listening to the courses for the self-taught Tudor class.
But mainly, and what I'm *really* looking forward to, is the topic he elaborated in the second half of the opening lecture - how America's assorted faiths have politically shaped the country, from the makeup of the original states to the Moral Majority's hand in the 1980 election. (The lecture itself dates to the WWJD fad; he notes those armbands in his opening statements.) Already I've learned one thing I had not known - that there is a historical precedent to the argument that the First Amendment applies only to federal law and not to state law. Apparently that was how things were... until the Civil War, and the consequent strengthening of the federal government.
An overview of topics covered is here. There are 24 lectures, including:
- The European Background
- Colonial Religious Diversity
- Darwin and Other Dilemmas
- Judaism in the 19th Century
- Twentieth-Century Catholicism
- The Civil Rights Movement
- The Counterculture and Feminism
- Asian Religions
and
- Church and State
Since we're coming up on the Federally Mandated Religious Biggie, I'm going to make a theme out of my next set of "classes" - first this, then The Making of the New Testament Canon, and finally Bible and World Literature. By then it will be time to start listening to the courses for the self-taught Tudor class.
