American Evangelicals and the 1960s

Acknowledgments

ix Ac­ knowl­ edg­ ments The ma­ jor­ ity of es­ says in this vol­ ume were first pre­ sented at a col­ lo­ quium on “New Per­ spec­ tives on ­ American Ev­ an­ gel­ i­ cal­ ism and the 1960s: Re­ vis­ it­ ing the ‘Back­ lash,’” or­ ga­ nized by the David Bruce Cen­ ter for ­ American Stud­ ies at Keele Uni­ ver­ sity, ­ United King­ dom, in April 2011. In the syl­ van en­ vi­ rons of North Staf­ ford­ shire, close to the “pot­ ter­ ies” fa­ mous for ce­ ram­ ics ­ brands such as Wedg­ wood, Min­ ton, Spode, and Royal Doul­ ton, the col­ lo­ quium ­ brought to­ gether a group of pri­ mar­ ily ­ younger Eu­ ro­ pean and North ­ American schol­ ars who in re­ cent years have pi­ o­ neered the re­ inter­ pre­ ta­ tion of the New Chris­ tian Right in the ­ United ­ States. As be­ hooves a meet­ ing of this kind, the ­ four-day event also in­ cluded a trip to the ­ nearby Eng­ le­ sea Brook ­ Chapel and to Mow Cop, the sight of the first camp meet­ ing that led to the emer­ gence of Prim­ i­ tive Meth­ od­ ism in Brit­ ain in 1807. The schol­ ars fea­ tured in this vol­ ume have been at the ­ cutting edge of ques­ tion­ ing and re­ vis­ ing one of the most en­ trenched as­ sump­ tions about re­ sur­ gent ev­ an­ gel­ i­ cal­ ism, ­ namely, that it was ­ grounded in the ­ so-called back­ lash­ against the ­ broader so­ ci­ ocul­ tu­ ral and po­ lit­ i­ cal trans­ for­ ma­ tions that em­ a­ nated from the 1960s. By re­ vis­ it­ ing the ­ fraught re­ la­ tion­ ship ­ between this icon­ o­ clas­ tic­ decade and con­ ser­ va­ tive Prot­ es­ tant­ ism, the par­ tic­ i­ pants of­ fered new in­ sights into the or­ i­ gins and mean­ ing of the New Chris­ tian Right. They ­ argued that the ­ movement’s cul­ tural at­ trac­ tive­ ness, or­ gan­ iza­ tional ­ strength, and po­ lit­ i­ cal ef­ fi­ cacy, ­ rather than being based on its vocal op­ po­ si­ tion to the in­ iq­ uities of the six­ ties, de­ rived from its abil­ ity to ap­ pro­ pri­ ate, ­ co-opt, and sub­ vert the­ decade’s trans­ for­ ma­ tive im­ pulses. They ex­ plored how ­ changes in ev­ an­ gel­ i­ cal at­ ti­ tudes to, for ex­ am­ ple, sex­ u­ al­ ity, the wel­ fare state, and ­ foreign pol­ icy that began in the 1960s ­ opened up the nec­ es­ sary space for forg­ ing new co­ ali­ tions­ between for­ mer ad­ ver­ sar­ ies. Fi­ nally, they ­ showed that the cul­ tural, po­ lit­ i­ cal, and socio­ -economic ­ depth-charges ­ dropped by the 1960s did not so much ex­ plode the lib­ eral cap­ i­ tal­ ist order as ex­ pose its in­ her­ ent contra­ dic­ tions, open­ ing x E acknowledgments up op­ por­ tu­ nities for the New Chris­ tian Right and its par­ tic­ u­ lar com­ bi­ na­ tion of­ anti-establishmentarianism and re­ leg­ i­ tim­ iza­ tion of core myths of ­ American so­ ci­ ety. When it comes to the study of ­ American ev­ an­ gel­ i­ cal­ ism, one of the schol­ ars whose name even cas­ ual ob­ serv­ ers en­ coun­ ter early on is Paul S. Boyer, the em­ i­ nent his­ to­ rian, pro­ lific ­ scholar, and lead­ ing au­ thor­ ity in the field of ­ American cul­ tural, in­ tel­ lec­ tual, and re­ li­ gious his­ tory. We all felt very priv­ i­ leged when he­ agreed to join us as the key­ note ­ speaker. What we ­ didn’t know at the time was that this was to be one of his last inter­ na­ tional com­ mit­ ments. While pre­ par­ ing the es­ says for pub­ li­ ca­ tion in the ­ Spring of 2012, we heard the sad news that Paul had died. He was an in­ spi­ ra­ tion for our group and ­ touched us all with his wit and wis­ dom, kind­ ness and gen­ e­ ros­ ity, ­ fierce in­ tel­ lect and ac­ a­ demic bril­ liance. Being gen­ er­ ous to a fault with ad­ vice and in­ sights, Paul even man­ aged to res­ cue our...