During the early 1730s New England colonies shifted from a heavily based Puritan society into a business oriented society. Life for colonists at this time became more solely focused around working and about business, leaving no time for practicing Puritanism. Religion soon became something of a past time, in which people would attend church less frequently and with less deeply-felt convictions as before. The Great Awakening was the result of a spiritual dryness among Protestant believers in the colonies. Noticing this lack of commitment, ministers set out to restore and renew the people’s faith. As a result, they traveled throughout the colonies preaching to the people a sense of guilt and their need of salvation by Christ.
This religious …show more content…
As the Great Awakening gained more momentum, tension between the revivalists and established congregations began to appear. The message advocated by the revivalists’ conflicted with the original Protestant doctrine known as the predestination, causing division among the church. Predestination is the belief that a person’s salvation is not determined by his or her actions in life to earn it, but is completely determined by God during birth. In her article about the Great Awakening, Christine Leigh Heyrman, a former fellow at the National Humanities Center, summed up the …show more content…
Some would go as far as to criticize and reject their past churches or ministers for not being Christian enough, and others would challenge the validity of state-controlled or state-supported churches. In the late eighteenth century many religious groups felt strongly about the issue regarding how much say the government should have in person’s individual religious beliefs and which church a person joins. People were worried that an active alliance between a church and the state would cause problems in the nation’s stability. As an unit, the colonies were monitored loosely under the King’s rule. Instead of directly dictating over the colonies, the King gave that power to businesses; even then the colonies were not ran tightly. Turning this ideal goal into reality would risk political and social struggles within each state, seeing as though state legislatures regulated religion more closely that on a national level. Although it was not an easy process, separating church and state was a task American colonists strived to meet. Freedom of religion would later become an important principle to Americans that would represent one of the most remarkable achievement of the newly forming
This religious …show more content…
As the Great Awakening gained more momentum, tension between the revivalists and established congregations began to appear. The message advocated by the revivalists’ conflicted with the original Protestant doctrine known as the predestination, causing division among the church. Predestination is the belief that a person’s salvation is not determined by his or her actions in life to earn it, but is completely determined by God during birth. In her article about the Great Awakening, Christine Leigh Heyrman, a former fellow at the National Humanities Center, summed up the …show more content…
Some would go as far as to criticize and reject their past churches or ministers for not being Christian enough, and others would challenge the validity of state-controlled or state-supported churches. In the late eighteenth century many religious groups felt strongly about the issue regarding how much say the government should have in person’s individual religious beliefs and which church a person joins. People were worried that an active alliance between a church and the state would cause problems in the nation’s stability. As an unit, the colonies were monitored loosely under the King’s rule. Instead of directly dictating over the colonies, the King gave that power to businesses; even then the colonies were not ran tightly. Turning this ideal goal into reality would risk political and social struggles within each state, seeing as though state legislatures regulated religion more closely that on a national level. Although it was not an easy process, separating church and state was a task American colonists strived to meet. Freedom of religion would later become an important principle to Americans that would represent one of the most remarkable achievement of the newly forming