Billy Graham: American Pilgrim - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 019068352X ISBN 13: 9780190683528

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2017

Synopsis

Billy Graham stands among the most influential Christian leaders of the twentieth century. Perhaps no single doctrine, practice, political position, or preacher has united the sprawling and diverse world of evangelicalism like Billy Graham. Throughout his six-decade career, Graham mainstreamed evangelicalism and through that tradition brought about major changes to American Christianity, global Christianity, church and state, the Cold War, race relations, American manhood, intellectual life, and religious media and music. His life and career provide a many-paned window through which to view the history and character of our present and recent past.

Billy Graham: American Pilgrim offers groundbreaking accounts of Graham's role in shaping these phenomena. Graham stayed true to evangelical precepts yet journeyed to positions in religion, politics, and culture that stretched his tradition to its limits. This book's distinguished contributors capture Graham's evolution and complexity. Like most people, he grew in fits and starts. But Graham's growth occurred on an international stage, influencing the world around him in ways large and small. This book delves into this influence, going beyond conventional subjects and taking a fresh and nuanced look at the complex life and legacy of one of the most important figures of the last century.

About this title

About the Author

Andrew Finstuen is Dean of the Honors College at Boise State University. He is the author of Original Sin and Everyday Protestants: The Theology of Reinhold Niebuhr, Billy Graham, and Paul Tillich in an Age of Anxiety and a co-producer of the documentary film An American Conscience: The Reinhold Niebuhr Story (2017).

Anne Blue Wills is Associate Professor of Religion at Davidson College. She is currently writing a biography of Ruth Bell Graham.

Grant Wacker is the Gilbert T. Rowe Professor Emeritus of Christian History at Duke Divinity School. He is the author of Heaven Below: Early Pentecostals and American Culture (2001), and America's Pastor: Billy Graham and the Shaping of a Nation (2014).

Review

"This is a useful collection of essays on the foremost evangelist of his age whose career offers an important lens through with to view America's own pilgrimage in the post-World War II era." -- Mark Silk, Journal of Ecclesiastical History

"This volume is as balanced an assessment of the man and his work as is currently available." -- John Darch, Anvil

"This collection of articles constitutes a most useful and welcome addition to the burgeoning scholarship on Billy Graham. Much has been written about Graham, but this book shows again that much has also remained unexplored and is still to learn ... as scholars engage these contexts and evaluate the outcomes they would be seriously amiss if they chose to ignore this fine book's insights." -- Markku Ruotsila, Journal of Transatlantic Studies

"This anthology is remarkably successful in interpreting Graham's work from the perspective of his own theological and cultural context For a nuanced, highly perceptive, historical exploration of Graham's work and legacy, this book is unsurpassed."--Daniel K. Williams, Reading Religion

"Billy Graham, say this book's editors, belongs on the Mount Rushmore of greatness in American religion. But with several strong biographies already written about him, what more is there to know about his legacy? The talented authors of this book prove that Billy Graham's pilgrimage has more dimensions than one might imagine. Far from than offering the final word on Graham's ministries, they open up fresh questions about Christianity in America-and the world beyond its shores." -Joel Carpenter, Director of the Nagel Institute for the Study of World Christianity, Calvin College

"Billy Graham's emergence as a religious celebrity provided legitimacy for the entire movement we know today as evangelicalism. In this remarkable volume, a stellar lineup of contributors provides fresh insight into the most famous and influential evangelical of the twentieth century." -Randall Balmer, author of Evangelicalism in America and producer of Crusade: The Life of Billy Graham

"The multi-faceted career of Billy Graham deserves the kind of multi-faceted consideration that this fine book delivers. Those who think they know Graham will be surprised by many fresh insights; those who need an introduction could not find a better place to start. It is a memorable book about the United States' most memorable public Christian." -Mark A. Noll, author of In the Beginning Was the Word: The Bible in American Public Life, 1492-1783

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 019068352X
• ISBN 13: 9780190683528
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 344
• Editor: Finstuen Andrew, Wacker Grant, Wills Anne Blue