As someone who is always on the look-out for suitable introductory texts to support a course I regularly teach on the recent world history of Christianity, I am delighted to have discovered Jeremy Morris’ contribution to the I. B. Tauris History of the Christian Church. Morris, an Anglican minister, is the dean of King’s College, Cambridge, and an active churchman as well as widely published historian. With The Church in the Modern Age, he brings off the near-impossible task of organizing the incredible welter of world ecclesiastical history over the last century in 15 spare chapters and just over 200 pages of text.
The Church in the Modern Age: The I.B.Tauris History of the Christian Church
I. B. Tauris & Company
256 pages
$63.98
The secret is expert use of a three-fold chronological division: from World War I to the end of World War II (“the crisis of imperialism”); then to the early 1970s (“the end of empire); and finally into the 21st century (“the rise of the global south”). For each section there is an abbreviated summary of main world events followed by succinct accounts of Catholicism, Orthodoxy (both Eastern Orthodoxy and the oriental Orthodox churches), and “worldwide Protestantism.” The first chronological period concludes with a chapter on ecumenism featuring the 1910 Edinburgh Missionary Conference, the second with an account of “independent churches and new religious movements,” and the third with “Pentecostalism.”
The format allows for attention to major organizational developments like the effects of the Cold War on the churches, the Second Vatican Council, and the rapid diffusion of variegated Pentecostal movements. At the same time, well-chosen details and brief character vignettes balance the use of statistical generalizations taken from the World Christian Encyclopedia. Given the selectivity mandated by the format, Morris still manages to convey telling insights. The successes of Billy Graham, for example, are interpreted as less spectacular than sometimes depicted, but also as demonstrating the presence of revival alongside the much-publicized decline of Western Protestant churches. Pope John Paul II is characterized as a doctrinal and institutional conservative whose pontificate troubled Catholicism in Europe, but also as a dynamic leader with advanced social views who grasped the increasing importance of Catholicism in the global South. Morris uses his knowledge of Anglicanism to good advantage to assess the weaknesses and strengths of one of the few Protestant movements with a genuinely worldwide presence. A well-chosen bibliography, with good coverage for Latin America, Asia, and Africa, offers up-to-date resources for those wanting to know more.
The other published volumes in this series are Morwenna Ludlow, The Early Church; G. R. Evans, The Church in the Early Middle Ages; Norman Tanner, The Church in the Later Middle Ages; and Frances Knight, The Church in the Nineteenth Century. Soon to come are Patrick Provost-Smith, Early Modern Christianity; and David Hempton, The Church in the Long Eighteenth Century.
Mark Noll is Francis A. McAnaney Professor of History at the University of Notre Dame. He is the author most recently of The New Shape of World Christianity: How American Experience Reflects Global Faith (InterVarsity Press).
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