Father Divine Movement Analysis

In this first chapter you discover the peaceful movement of the cult created by George Baker later known as Father Divine. Some terms that were mentioned in the text were alienation, apostates, norm, stereotype, and mores that provided some structure for understanding. The author covered lots of material over this aging religion including, an introduction into their God, beliefs, their form of worship known as the communions banquets, George Baker’s history and coming to being as a God, the locations of the movement, the issues they ran into as a group, the rules to abide by, as well as the positives and negatives that the group attributed to the community as a whole. As strange and strict as this movement was the community did a lot of good for American people during this time of struggle and downfall in the states. It provided unity and a sense of equality in an oppressive time for blacks in white communities as well as fed and housed the poor. The religious community even took in criminals and helped them find work and a peaceful path to live by. What came with these positives were strict rules to abide by for example, sex and marriage were forbidden and your pay was handed over to Father Divine to …show more content…
The Father Divine movement I find probably the most interesting of all the new religions we have covered this far as it set up not only its own community, but its own working form of government. Father Divine had created a small communist religious government within each state he was in at the time. As strange and terrifying as this may at first sound to an American, he was very successful and created one of the closest ideal situations to a completely peaceful community that I’ve ever heard of in American history. But, as all good things go, they all end eventually and so follows Father Divine’s religious community as it slowly ages and loses