Religious Revival

After reading Chapter 10 on Revival and Religious Change my views on religion in America changed. I discovered that the Second Great Awakening created a lot of excitement among people over religion. Religious groups grew from the excitement created by the Second Great Awakening. The Second Great Awakening united people into groups. Some groups grew more than others during this time. The Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyterians grew the most out of all the religious groups. This revival of religion caused people to abandon the more formal style of worship in the Congregationalist and Episcopalian churches for more exciting forms of worship that included the spontaneous jumping, shouting, and gesturing found in new and alternative denominations. The religious revival grew so much that one part of New York State was nicknamed the Burned - Over District. The most successful denomination was Methodism.The Methodist denomination grew from fewer than one thousand members at the end of the eighteenth century to thirty-four percent of all American church membership by the mid-nineteenth century. The Second Great Awakening brought about revivalists who tried to appeal to people's emotions. For example, Charles Grandison Finney, put theological issues aside and evangelized by appealing to worshippers’ hearts and emotions. Another example, Lyman Beecher of the Congregational church, appealed to younger generations of Americans by adopting a less orthodox approach to Calvinist doctrine. These men preached that all souls are equal in salvation and that all people can be saved by surrendering to God. This became known as the idea of spiritual egalitarianism. It became one of the most important transformations to emerge out of the Second Great Awakening. The Second Great Awakening was a religious revival based on what the people wanted. It is the reason why there are so many different branches of churches today.