Mainline Protestant Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==History== {{See also|History of Protestantism in the United States}} [[File:First Parish in Hingham MA.jpg|thumb|upright=0.9|[[Old Ship Church]], an old [[Puritan]] meetinghouse currently used by a [[Unitarian Universalist]] congregation]] While the term "mainline" was not applied to churches until the 20th century, mainline churches trace their history to the [[Protestant Reformation]] of the 16th century. The largest and most influential Protestant denominations in Britain's [[Thirteen Colonies]] were the [[Anglican]]s (after the American Revolution called Episcopalians) and the [[Congregationalism in the United States|Congregationalists]] (from which the [[American Unitarian Association|Unitarians]] would later split).{{Sfn | Lantzer | 2012 | p = 19}} These were later surpassed in size and influence by the evangelical denominations: the Baptists, Presbyterians and Methodists. Sharing a common Reformation heritage with Episcopal and Congregational churches, these denominations together created the mainline.{{Sfn | Lantzer | 2012 | p = 29}} It was, according to historian Jason Lantzer, "the emerging evangelical movement that would help forge the Seven Sisters and which provides a core to the wide variety of theological and doctrinal differences, shaping them into a more coherent whole."{{Sfn | Lantzer | 2012 | p = 19}} The [[Great Awakening]] ignited controversy within Protestant churches between [[Old and New Light|Old Lights and New Lights]] (or [[Old Side–New Side Controversy|Old Side and New Side]] among Presbyterians). Led by figures such as the Congregationalist minister [[Charles Chauncy (1705–1787)|Charles Chauncy]], Old Lights opposed the evangelical [[Christian revival|revivalism]] at the heart of the Awakening, while New Lights, led by fellow Congregationalist minister [[Jonathan Edwards (theologian)|Jonathan Edwards]], supported the revivals and argued for the importance of having a [[Religious conversion|conversion]] experience. By the 1800s, Chauncy's followers had drifted toward forms of theological liberalism, such as [[Universalism]], [[Unitarianism]] and [[Transcendentalism]].{{sfn|Balmer|Winner|2002|pp = 14-5}} [[File:Lady Chapel Altar, Church of the Good Shepherd (Rosemont, Pennsylvania).jpg|thumb|left|[[Lady Chapel]] in [[Church of the Good Shepherd (Rosemont, Pennsylvania)|Church of the Good Shepherd]], a 19th-Century [[Anglo-Catholic]] Episcopal Church in [[Pennsylvania]]]] The [[Second Great Awakening]] would inaugurate a period of evangelical dominance within American mainline Protestantism that would last over a century.{{Sfn | Lantzer | 2012 | p = 29}} The Second Great Awakening was a catalyst for the reform of society. Efforts to improve the rights of women, reforming prisons, establishing free public schools, prohibiting alcohol, and (in the North) abolishing slavery were promoted by mainline churches.{{Sfn | Lantzer | 2012 | p = 31}} After the [[American Civil War|Civil War]], however, tensions between evangelicals and non-evangelicals would re-emerge. As the practice of [[historical criticism]] spread to the United States, conflict over [[biblical inspiration]] erupted within Protestant churches. Conservative Protestants led by [[A. A. Hodge]], [[B. B. Warfield]] and other [[Princeton Theology|Princeton theologians]] argued for [[biblical inerrancy]], while liberal theologians such as [[Charles Augustus Briggs|Charles A. Briggs]] of [[Union Theological Seminary (New York City)|Union Theological Seminary]] were open to using historical criticism to understand the Bible.{{sfn|Balmer|Winner|2002|p = 19}} As 19th–century evangelicals embraced [[dispensational premillennialism]] and retreated from society in the face of mounting social problems caused by industrialization, urbanization and immigration, liberal Protestants embraced the [[Social Gospel]], which worked for the "regeneration of society" rather than only the conversion of individuals.{{sfn|Balmer|Winner|2002|p = 15}} The [[Fundamentalist–Modernist Controversy]] of the 1920s widened the division between evangelical and non-evangelical Protestants as the two sides fought for control over the mainline denominations. The [[Christian fundamentalism|fundamentalists]] lost these battles for control to the modernists or liberals.{{sfn|Balmer|Winner|2002|p = 19}} Since the 1920s, mainline churches have been associated with liberal Protestantism.{{sfn|Balmer|Winner|2002|p = 15}} [[Episcopal Church (United States)|Episcopalians]] and [[Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)|Presbyterian]] [[White Anglo-Saxon Protestant|WASPs]] tend to be considerably wealthier<ref name="THE EPISCOPALIANS">{{cite news|author=B.DRUMMOND AYRES Jr. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/1981/04/28/us/the-episcopalians-an-american-elite-with-roots-going-back-to-jamestown.html |title=THE EPISCOPALIANS: AN AMERICAN ELITE WITH ROOTS GOING BACK TO JAMESTOWN |newspaper=The New York Times |date=2011-12-19 |access-date=2012-08-17}}</ref> and better educated than most other religious groups in America,<ref>Irving Lewis Allen, "WASP—From Sociological Concept to Epithet," ''Ethnicity,'' 1975 154+</ref> and are disproportionately represented in the upper reaches of American [[business]],{{sfn|Hacker|1957|p=1011}} law and politics, and for many years were especially dominant in the [[History of the United States Republican Party|Republican Party]].{{sfn|Baltzell|1964|p=9}} Numbers of the [[Old money|wealthiest and most affluent American families]], such as the [[Vanderbilts]] and [[Astor family|Astors]], [[Rockefeller family|Rockefeller]], who were Baptists,<ref name="W. Williams">{{cite book|title=Religion, Art, and Money: Episcopalians and American Culture from the Civil War to the Great Depression|first=Peter|last= W. Williams|year= 2016| isbn= 978-1-4696-2698-7| page =176|publisher=University of North Carolina Press|quote=The names of fashionable families who were already Episcopalian, like the Morgans, or those, like the Fricks, who now became so, goes on interminably: Aldrich, Astor, Biddle, Booth, Brown, Du Pont, Firestone, Ford, Gardner, Mellon, Morgan, Procter, the Vanderbilt, Whitney. Episcopalians branches of the Baptist Rockefellers and Jewish Guggenheims even appeared on these family trees.}}</ref> [[Du Pont family|Du Pont]], [[Roosevelt family|Roosevelt]], [[Forbes family|Forbes]], [[Ford family|Fords]],<ref name="W. Williams"/> [[Mellon family|Mellons]],<ref name="W. Williams"/> [[Whitney family|Whitneys]], the [[Morgan family|Morgans]] and Harrimans are Episcopalian and Presbyterian families.<ref name="THE EPISCOPALIANS"/> Through the 1940s and 1950s, [[neo-orthodoxy]] had become the prevailing theological approach within the mainline churches. This neo-orthodox consensus, however, gave way to resurgent liberal theologies in the 1960s and to [[liberation theology]] during the 1970s.{{Sfn | Hutcheson | 1981 | p = 20}} Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page