Waldmeir, John C. Lewiston, NY: The Edwin Mellen Press, 2002. xvi
+ 133 pp., $99.95 (USD). ISBN: 0-7734-7261-4.
[1] Poetry, Prose and Art in the American Social Gospel Movement,
1880-1910 - part of a monograph in the series entitled "Texts
and Studies in the Social Gospel" - provides valuable historical perspectives
for scholars of religion and popular culture. John Waldmeir
examines a range of artifacts and genres used by Social Gospel proponents
in the late nineteenth century, and sees how these works reflect the
complexities of social Christianity, despite their artistic shortcomings.
[2] The introductory chapter, "The Voice of God in the Story," suggests
that the logic of the Social Gospel movement - that social salvation
precedes individual salvation - called for artistic presentation of
its imagined future. The patent success of the anti-slavery
novel Uncle Tom's Cabin provided a potent model for the later
movement, resulting in over 1,300 novels by social Christians in the
period under study. Even the most prominent theologians in the
movement, Walter Rauschenbusch and Washington Gladden, produced works
related to artistic expression (3, 23, 26-35).
[3] Scholars of contemporary popular Christian culture will be immediately
drawn to Waldmeir's chapter on Charles Sheldon (37-54), the man who
bequeathed to us the cloying slogan "What Would Jesus Do" (WWJD).
Waldmeir means to rescue Sheldon from his present-day commodification
(though he does not approach this massive reappropriation directly).
He analyzes Sheldon's In His Steps, and other novels,
as revealing the lack of an easily definable moral code for Christians.
The question, "What would Jesus do?" places the burden on each reader
to answer from her own ethical imagination, precisely because Jesus
is not at hand to resolve moral ambiguity with pat answers.
Waldmeir treats Sheldon's work with literary and theological integrity,
though his emphasis stays on the work rather than Sheldon's social
and popular contexts.
[4] One of the more intriguing arguments in the book concerns the
difference in theological representation of the west and the east
in the Social Gospel movement (55-78). Here Waldmeir analyzes
some western regional painters (Joseph Hitchins, George Harvey), as
well as William Jennings Bryan's "Cross of Gold" speech. He
suggests they contain more images of God's transcendence and intervention
in history than corresponding works about the urban east. The
pictures under discussion are nicely reproduced in colour plates.
This discussion seemed to need more room in which to fully bloom,
but remains provocative in its current form.
[5] This is obviously a book for specialists: its price and highly
embedded topical approach weigh against it being used in the classroom
or by casual readers. But scholars eager to trace the history
of American popular culture and religion will find much to mine here.
Waldmeir uses previous scholarship on the Social Gospel comprehensively,
starting from key works by Martin Marty and William R. Hutchinson,
to gems of bibliographic excavation, like Wallace Evans Davies' 1959
article on late 19th century religious novels from the Bulletin
of the John Rylands Library.
[6] Waldmeir admits his polemics: the book ends with open advocacy
of Social Gospel ideals. The movement's relevance and cultural
importance are proved, as usual, by connecting the late 19th century
moment to its most famous progeny, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
(105-110). But having established this connection (via Benjamin
May), Waldmeir turns from the "I Have a Dream" speech to Elizabeth
Stuart Phelps Ward's (now obscure) 1883 novel, Beyond the Gates,
in order to demonstrate an ongoing affection for everyday life and
the temporal realm in the imagination of Christian social reformers
(110-112). Waldmeir's ability to negotiate this leap may not
be shared by all readers, but exemplifies his immersion in the material,
scholarly skill, and commitment to extending the insights of the Social
Gospel movement as a valuable American tradition.
Jennifer Rycenga
San José State University
jrycenga@earthlink.net
