{"product_id":"american-crusade-christianity-warfare-and-national-identity-1860-1920-hardback-9781501763946","title":"American Crusade; Christianity, Warfare, and National Identity, 1860–1920 (Hardback) 9781501763946","description":"\u003cfont face=\"Georgia\"\u003e\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"6\"\u003eAmerican Crusade\u003c\/font\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\r\n\u003cfont size=\"5\"\u003eChristianity, Warfare, and National Identity, 1860–1920\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"4\"\u003eBenjamin J. Wetzel (Author)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e9781501763946\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003eHardback, published 15 June 2022\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e228 pages, 10 b\u0026amp;w halftones - 10 Halftones, black and white\u003cbr\u003e22.9 x 15.2 x 2.4 cm, 0.907 kg\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cem\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cp\u003eThis well-written, powerfully argued book demonstrates the almost incestuous link between politics, power, and religion.\u003c\/p\u003e (Choice) \u003cp\u003eAmerican Crusade is a fascinating history about how Christian duty and patriotic citizenship became intertwined during the three major wars between 1860 and 1920. It is a multisided history that draws on counterexamples to show that while these were prevailing ideas of the time, they were also challenged and shaped by marginalized groups within the United States.\u003c\/p\u003e (H-net) \u003cp\u003eOverall, though, Wetzel's engaging book makes a convincing case that this was a distinctive era of Protestant thought, one in which the mainline sanctified the nation's military endeavors, but in the process, spurred other Christians to offer new visions of the nation.\u003c\/p\u003e (AMERICAN CATHOLIC STUDIES) \u003cp\u003eThe most important contribution of\u003ci\u003e American Crusade\u003c\/i\u003e to studies of religion, war, and Christian nationalism is Wetzel's thoughtful and complex examination of the dissenters to Christian nationalism. These views necessarily revealed a more complicated picture.\u003c\/p\u003e (H-Net) \u003cp\u003e\u003ci\u003eAmerican Crusade\u003c\/i\u003e is a well-ordered and very readable book filled with evocative and often poignant quotations from a range of primary sources. In each chapter, Wetzel addresses the existing scholarship and describes the \"new insights\" his analysis offers.\u003c\/p\u003e (H-Net) \u003cp\u003eThe United States' national identity has been foundationally shaped by warfare. It has also, of course, been so shaped by Christian religion. And yet relatively few historians have systematically examined American Christian leaders' interpretations of national identity through the lens of major American wars. Benjamin Wetzel's challenge, then, in his new survey of American Christian responses to the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, and World War I, is to find some texture amidst the smooth monotony of wartime moralizing. In\u003ci\u003e American Crusade\u003c\/i\u003e, Wetzel approaches the problem by juxtaposing a more-or-less uniform center with a diverse periphery.\u003c\/p\u003e (Fides et Historia)\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/em\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\u003cp align=\"justify\"\u003e\u003cstrong\u003e\u003cfont size=\"3\"\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eWhen is a war a holy crusade?\u003c\/b\u003e And when does theology cause Christians to condemn violence? In \u003ci\u003eAmerican Crusade\u003c\/i\u003e, Benjamin Wetzel argues that the Civil War, the Spanish-American War, and World War I shared a cultural meaning for white Protestant ministers in the United States, who considered each conflict to be a modern-day crusade.\u003cbr\u003e  \u003cbr\u003e \u003ci\u003eAmerican Crusade\u003c\/i\u003e examines the \"holy war\" mentality prevalent between 1860 and 1920, juxtaposing mainline Protestant support for these wars with more hesitant religious voices: Catholics, German-speaking Lutherans, and African American Methodists. The specific theologies and social locations of these more marginal denominations made their ministries highly critical of the crusading mentality. Religious understandings of the nation, both in support of and opposed to armed conflict, played a major role in such ideological contestation. Wetzel's book questions traditional periodizations and suggests that these three wars should be understood as a unit. Grappling with the views of America's religious leaders, supplemented by those of ordinary people, \u003ci\u003eAmerican Crusade\u003c\/i\u003e provides a fresh way of understanding the three major American wars of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003c\/font\u003e\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u003c\/font\u003e","brand":"Cornell University Press","offers":[{"title":"Brand New","offer_id":52607822266648,"sku":"9781501763946","price":36.99,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"url":"https:\/\/freshlyprintedbooks.co.uk\/products\/american-crusade-christianity-warfare-and-national-identity-1860-1920-hardback-9781501763946","provider":"Freshly Printed Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}