"What Would Jesus Do?": The Social Gospel and the Literary Marketplace

One of the first tasks of a history of reading that hopes to understand the varieties of the paradigmatic figure of the reader as poacher is . . . to ascertain the networks of reading practices and the rules for reading proper to the various communities of readers—spiritual, intellectual, professional and so forth.

—Roger Chartier¹

Frank Luther Mott, esteemed scholar of bestsellers in America, argues that "[o]ne cannot dip into the popular literature of the first two decades of the twentieth century without being impressed by the emphasis on the church and its problems."² Much of this literature was part of the social gospel, an ecumenical Protestant movement in North America in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries that sought to transform social institutions according to Christian principles. Sometimes called the "Third Great Awakening," the social gospel was a response by liberal Protestants to the problems caused by industrialization, massive immigration, and urbanization. The religious expression of the Progressive movement, the social gospel had a major influence on the policies of Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson. It advocated for workers' rights to collective bargaining; federal regulation of wages, hours, and working conditions; protective labor legislation for women and children; and the formation of a welfare state to mitigate the negative effects of unbridled capitalism. In part, social gospel policies were designed to bring working men and women into the church, but they were also part of a sincere desire to found the kingdom of God (i.e., a just social order) here on earth.³

Although the social gospel is usually discussed through the nonfiction writings of its most prominent leaders, liberal Protestant ministers Washington Gladden, Richard Ely, and Walter Rauschenbusch, there is a sizable body of social gospel fiction that popularized the doctrines of these leaders. About one hundred social gospel novels were published around the turn of the twentieth century. Between 1886 and 1914, roughly three or four social gospel novels appeared every year.⁴ The most popular American novels include Charles Sheldon's In His Steps (1897), Harold Bell Wright's That Printer of Udell's (1903), and Winston Churchill's Inside of the Cup (1913). All of these novels are self-consciously about print culture, making clear that founding the kingdom of God here on earth depends on making appropriate use of books and literacy. These novels are rich resources, then, for uncovering the rules of reading and the networks of reading practices authors, ministers, and publishers urged on their social gospel readers in turn of the-century America. Moreover, the commentary and controversy they engendered offer testimony to some of the ways social gospel readers appropriated these texts as "equipment for living" their everyday lives.⁵

In these texts, appropriate use of books invariably moves readers to social action. That is, one reads not in order to contemplate abstract ideas or to improve oneself, but in order to change the world. In social gospel fiction, poverty, drunkenness, crime, and urban blight are no match for the right kind of books in the hands and minds of the right kind of readers. Although many popular social gospel novels engage deeply with the theological divisions of their day—embracing modern Biblical criticism and the extensive reading of new books bringing faith to bear on the problems of contemporary life—perhaps the best-known social gospel novel, Reverend Charles M. Sheldon's In His Steps: What Would Jesus Do?, sidesteps theological controversy and critiques the modern, mass literary marketplace. Although Sheldon's book is also self-consciously engaged with questions about reading, writing, and social action, his brand of "untheological Christianity" makes his work appropriable by new generations of believers in ways most social gospel novels are not.⁶

This essay looks closely at three of the most popular social gospel novels, Mrs. Humphry Ward's Robert Elsmere (1888), Sheldon's In His Steps, and Winston Churchill's Inside of the Cup, all of which self-consciously represent different models of reading and writing in order to demonstrate the porousness of the boundaries between literature and life...