Spiritual Home

Spiritual Home

Author: Charles D. Cashdollar

Publisher: Penn State Press

Published: 2010-11-01

Total Pages: 356

ISBN-13: 9780271043555

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A Spiritual Home explores congregational life inside British and American Reformed churches between 1830 and 1915. At a time when scholars have become interested in the day-to-day experience of local congregations, this book reaches back into the nineteenth century, a critically formative period in Anglo-American religious life, to examine the historical roots of congregational life.Taking the perspective of the laity, Cashdollar ranges widely from worship and music to fund-raising and administration, from pastoral care to social work, from prayer meetings to strawberry festivals, from the sanctuary to the kitchen. Firmly rooted in broader currents of gender, class, notions of middle-class respectability, increasing expectations for personal privacy, and patterns of professionalization, he finds that there was a gradual shift in emphasis during these years from piety to fellowship. Based on records, publications, and memorabilia from about 150 congregations representing eight denominations, A Spiritual Home gives us a comprehensive, composite portrait of religious life in Victorian Britain and America.


When Church Became Theatre

When Church Became Theatre

Author: Jeanne Halgren Kilde

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2002-07-11

Total Pages: 325

ISBN-13: 0199881723

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For nearly eighteen centuries, two fundamental spatial plans dominated Christian architecture: the basilica and the central plan. In the 1880s, however, profound socio-economic and technological changes in the United States contributed to the rejection of these traditions and the development of a radically new worship building, the auditorium church. When Church Became Theatre focuses on this radical shift in evangelical Protestant architecture and links it to changes in worship style and religious mission. The auditorium style, featuring a prominent stage from which rows of pews radiated up a sloping floor, was derived directly from the theatre, an unusual source for religious architecture but one with a similar goal-to gather large groups within range of a speaker's voice. Theatrical elements were prominent; many featured proscenium arches, marquee lighting, theatre seats, and even opera boxes. Examining these churches and the discussions surrounding their development, Jeanne Halgren Kilde focuses on how these buildings helped congregations negotiate supernatural, social, and personal power. These worship spaces underscored performative and entertainment aspects of the service and in so doing transformed relationships between clergy and audiences. In auditorium churches, the congregants' personal and social power derived as much from consumerism as from piety, and clerical power lay in dramatic expertise rather than connections to social institutions. By erecting these buildings, argues Kilde, middle class religious audiences demonstrated the move toward a consumer-oriented model of religious participation that gave them unprecedented influence over the worship experience and church mission.


Culinary Landmarks

Culinary Landmarks

Author: Elizabeth Driver

Publisher: University of Toronto Press

Published: 2008-01-01

Total Pages: 1326

ISBN-13: 0802047904

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Culinary Landmarks is a definitive history and bibliography of Canadian cookbooks from the beginning, when La cuisinière bourgeoise was published in Quebec City in 1825, to the mid-twentieth century. Over the course of more than ten years Elizabeth Driver researched every cookbook published within the borders of present-day Canada, whether a locally authored text or a Canadian edition of a foreign work. Every type of recipe collection is included, from trade publishers' bestsellers and advertising cookbooks, to home economics textbooks and fund-raisers from church women's groups. The entries for over 2,200 individual titles are arranged chronologically by their province or territory of publication, revealing cooking and dining customs in each part of the country over 125 years. Full bibliographical descriptions of first and subsequent editions are augmented by author biographies and corporate histories of the food producers and kitchen-equipment manufacturers, who often published the books. Driver's excellent general introduction sets out the evolution of the cookbook genre in Canada, while brief introductions for each province identify regional differences in developments and trends. Four indexes and a 'Chronology of Canadian Cookbook History' provide other points of access to the wealth of material in this impressive reference book.