Religion Commons^™

The Troubles On The Brink Of Recurrence: Northern Ireland In A Post-Brexit World, Emma K. Bohner

Student Publications

The Troubles were a difficult and trying time for Northern Ireland beginning in the 1960s. The subsequent decades were filled with turmoil and violence, mainly centered in Belfast amongst the Protestant and Catholic groups. In 1998, peaceful means to ending the Troubles were accomplished through the Good Friday Agreement. The accord established peace primarily through implementing a new power sharing government, ending direct rule by the British, disarming the paramilitary groups and creating a soft border between Ireland and Northern Ireland. The European Union was a critical asset in negotiating terms for peace. The aid of the European Union helped …

The Fall Of The Ikko Ikki: The Demise Of The Honganji In The Late Sengoku Period, Alexander M. Remington

Student Publications

During the late Sengoku Period Japan witnessed the fall of the Honganji, a sect of Pure Land Buddhism. The Honganji was a significant military, political, and economic power and commanded armies of commoners known as Ikko Ikki. The Honganji fell because it challenged the traditional social order of Japan, lacked unity, and stood against warlord Oda Nobunaga during his bid for hegemony. The fall of the Honganji resulted in consequential policies and impacted Japanese society going into the Tokugawa period.

The Unfinished Sermon: A Tribute To Rev. John Vannorsdall, Devin Mckinney

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

This volume is collected tribute to Reverend John Vannorsdall, who served as chaplain for Gettysburg College, 1962-1976. It includes excerpts of Vannorsdall's writings and interviews, as well as reflections from students, colleagues, and family.

Inward Baptism: The Theological Origins Of Evangelicalism, Baird L. Tipson

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

Inward Baptism analyses the theological developments that led to the great evangelical revivals of the mid-eighteenth century. Baird Tipson here demonstrates how the rationale for the "new birth," the characteristic and indispensable evangelical experience, developed slowly but inevitably from Luther's critique of late medieval Christianity.

Addressing the great indulgence campaigns of the late fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, Luther's perspective on sacramental baptism, as well as the confrontation between Lutheran and Reformed theologians who fastened on to different aspects of Luther's teaching, Tipson sheds light on how these disparate historical moments collectively created space for evangelicalism.

This leads to an …

"Here All Seems Security And Peace!": How Brookeville, Maryland Became United States Capital For A Day, Lindsay R. Richwine

Student Publications

When the British burned Washington D.C. during the War of 1812, the city’s civilians and officials fled to the surrounding countryside to escape the carnage. Fearful that the attack on the Capital could eventually spell defeat and worried for their city, these refugees took shelter in the homes and fields of Brookeville, Maryland, a small, Quaker mill town on the outskirts of Washington. These pacifist residents of Brookeville hosted what could have been thousands of Washingtonians in the days following the attack, ensuring the safety of not only the people of Washington, but of President Madison himself. As hosts to …

Ms – 231: Frederick Augustus Muhlenberg Keller, Class Of 1838, Karen Dupell Drickamer

All Finding Aids

The collection consists of four notebooks penned in Keller’s hand. Two of the notebooks contain notes taken by Keller while a student at the Seminary, 1838-1840, for courses taught by Samuel. S. Schmucker, founder and sole instructor at the Seminary (original).

The notes in MS #1 begin with a lecture on Chronology, (the application of periods of time to history) and moves through lessons on “Biblical History” as presented in the Hebrew Scripture from creation in Genesis to the kingships of David and Solomon in I & II Samuel. The notes in MS #2 cover two subjects, “Church Government & …

Ms – 230: Young Men’S Christian Association Of Pennsylvania College Papers, 1867-1872, Karen Dupell Drickamer

All Finding Aids

In 1867, President H. L. Baugher appointed Tutor Henry Eyster Jacobs (Class of 62) to chair a student committee to draw up a constitution for an organization through which students could learn about and support Christian missions. March 16, 1867, the Young Men’s Christian Association of Pennsylvania College was formed with Edward S. Breidenbaugh (Class of 1868) as its first president. With an early membership of 40, the association meet monthly, then quickly moved to weekly programs including prayer meetings, bible study, and lectures. Over the years, they supported the work of the Y. M. C.A. of Pennsylvania, several foreign …

God And Mr. Lincoln, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

On the day in April 1837 that Abraham Lincoln rode into Springfield, Illinois, to set himself up professionally as a lawyer, the American republic was awash in religion. Lincoln, however, was neither swimming nor even bobbing in its current. “This thing of living in Springfield is rather a dull business after all, at least it is so to me,” the uprooted state legislator and commercially bankrupt Lincoln wrote to Mary Owens on May 7th. “I am quite as lonesome here as [I] ever was anywhere in my life,” and in particular, “I’ve never been to church yet, nor probably shall …

The Letters Of Stewart Winfield Herman Jr. An American Pastor In Berlin, 1936-1941, Lucy A. Marks

Student Publications

This paper provides an analysis of the experiences of Stewart Herman Winfield Jr based on a collection of his letters on loan to Gettysburg College from the Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary. This paper discusses Herman’s experiences as a student in Strasburg and Gottingen, and as the pastor of the American church of Berlin from 1936 – 1941. Born in Harrisburg, Herman attended Gettysburg College, and the Gettysburg Lutheran Seminary. Herman’s letters provide both a pastoral and an American perspective on the start of WWII and Nazism in Germany. Herman traveled frequently and witnessed the changes that Berlin faced during World War …

Religion And The State: The Influence Of The Tokugawa On Religious Life, Thought, And Institutions, Savannah A. Labbe

Student Publications

This paper describes the influence of the Tokugawa government on religious life in Japan. It focuses on the religious traditions of Buddhism, Shintoism, and Neo-Confucianism and how the state used these religions to their advantage. The Tokugawa had strict control over all aspects of Japanese life including religion and this paper explores that.

Ms – 208: The Jim Henderson Papers, Class Of 1971, Devin Mckinney

All Finding Aids

This collection contains documents, photographs, and other material, mostly relating to Jim Henderson’s career at Gettysburg College. There are various writings, and a scrapbook with images covering Henderson’s life from just before to just after his time in Gettysburg. A significant subset of material concerns Henderson’s commencement address, and the subsequent controversy. The bulk of the material is in the form of handwritten scores and program notes created for various musical performances between 1966 and 1973. Most of these are rock or jazz arrangements of religious themes, and most premiered at Gettysburg College.

Special Collections and College Archives Finding Aids …

Realtors, Resistance, And White Roses, Casey Trattner

SURGE

I remember driving to school with my mother, eyes wide. I thought, as we passed by buildings and stores and little cafes with seats outside, that the small suburban town we were driving through was beautiful.

And when I told my mom, she looked at me out of the corner of her eyes and told me:

“Did I ever tell you how Dad and I were going to move here?”

“Here?” I said. “No… I don’t think so.”

“We were looking at a house that we both liked, but when I asked the real estate agent about how I heard …

Muslim Head Coverings, Raven C. Waters

Student Publications

I researched female head coverings in the Muslim culture, to see how the veils affected society and society's response to the covering.

Did Religion Make The American Civil War Worse?, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

If there is one sober lesson Americans seem to be taking out of the bathos of the Civil War sesquicentennial, it’s the folly of a nation allowing itself to be dragged into the war in the first place. After all, from 1861 to 1865 the nation pledged itself to what amounted to a moral regime change, especially concerning race and slavery—only to realize that it had no practical plan for implementing it. No wonder that two of the most important books emerging from the Sesquicentennial years—by Harvard president Drew Faust, and Yale’s Harry Stout—questioned pretty frankly whether the appalling costs …

The Nature Of Food: Indigenous Dene Foodways And Ontologies In The Era Of Climate Change, David S. Walsh

Religious Studies Faculty Publications

Climate change leading to a drastic decline in caribou populations has prompted strict hunting regulations in Canada’s Northwest Territories since 2010. The Dene, a subarctic indigenous people, have responded by turning to tradition and calling for more respectful hunting to demonstrate respectful reciprocity to the caribou, including a community-driven foodways project on caribou conservation and Dene caribou conservation which I co-facilitated in 2011. In these ways the caribou is approached as a person. Dene responses to caribou decline can best be understood by ontological theories of an expanded notion of indigenous personhood. However, I argue these theories are inadequate without …

The Bosnian Muslims And The Irish Perspective, Gabriel C. Kelly

Student Publications

The conflict in Bosnia-Herzegovina can be understood in multiple ways, however, the focus of this paper is to examine the perspective of Ireland on the Bosnian Muslims at different levels of society--ranging from the population to international level--from June 01, 1992 to January 31, 1996. Through an analysis of letters to the editor in "The Irish Times," parliamentary debate transcripts, and the Barbara Sloan European Union Document Collection located at the University of Pittsburgh's Hillman Library, I have been able to reveal how complex perspectives within a state on a particular issue can be, and how they can vary between …

Discussion Of Iran Awakening By Shirin Ebadi, Musselman Library

Iran: Beyond the Headlines

In preparation for our book discussion on Iran Awakening by Shirin Ebadi for our Iran: Beyond the Headlines series, we created some of our own discussion questions about the book. Please feel free to use for your own book discussion!

Hartford Puritanism: Thomas Hooker, Samuel Stone, And Their Terrifying God, Baird L. Tipson

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

Statues of Thomas Hooker and Samuel Stone grace downtown Hartford, Connecticut, but few residents are aware of the distinctive version of Puritanism that these founding ministers of Hartford's First Church carried into the Connecticut wilderness (or indeed that the city takes its name from Stone's English birthplace). Shaped by interpretations of the writings of Saint Augustine largely developed during the ministers' years at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, Hartford's church order diverged in significant ways from its counterpart in the churches of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Hartford Puritanism argues for a new paradigm of New England Puritanism. Hartford's founding ministers, Baird Tipson …

I Am Who I Am: The Book Of Exodus And African American Individuality, Joseph L. Kirkenir

Student Publications

Scholars often attempt to construct collective ideologies in order to generalize the beliefs and views of entire populations, with one target population frequently being the African American community during the latter half of the nineteenth century. Unfortunately, doing so fails to recognize the individuality of the population’s members and, especially in the case of the country’s oppressed Blacks, establishes a system where assumed notions and ignorant ideas abound. One might argue that the popularity of the book of Exodus in the time’s African American expressive outlets indicates that there did exist a collective ideology based upon the biblical narrative. However, …

The National Muslim Forum Nepal: Experiences Of Conflict, Formations Of Identity, Megan Adamson Sijapati

Religious Studies Faculty Publications

With Nepal's recent transition to state secularism, the politicization of Muslim religious identity has emerged with increasing vitality. One particular pan-Nepali Muslim organization, the Rastriya Muslim Mane Nepal (National Muslim Forum Nepal), offers a window into the complex relationship between national and religious identity that animates this politicization. Through analysis of the National Muslim Forum's earliest discourses, produced between 2005 and 2006, both immediately before and after the people's revolution that resulted in the declaration of Nepal as a secular state, this essay highlights the ways that experiences of conflict coupled with a national political transition shape and contribute to …

After Edwards: Original Sin And Freedom Of The Will, Allen C. Guelzo

Civil War Era Studies Faculty Publications

Book Summary: Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758) is widely regarded as one of the major thinkers in the Christian tradition and an important and influential figure in American theology. After Jonathan Edwards is a collection of specially commissioned essays that track his intellectual legacies from the work of his immediate disciples that formed the New Divinity movement in colonial New England, to his impact upon European traditions and modern Asia. It is a unique interdisciplinary contribution to the reception of Edwardsian ideas, with scholars of Edwards being brought together with scholars of New England theology and early American history to produce a …

This House Which I Have Built: The Foundation Of The Brattle Street Church In Boston And Transformations In Colonial Congregationalism, Cara Elliott

The Gettysburg Historical Journal

On December 24, 1699, a small gathering of men and women met "for public Worship in [their] pleasant new-built house," a simple wooden structure in Brattle Close, a section of Boston near the town dock. The newly appointed Reverend Benjamin Colman preached from Chronicles 2, chapter vi, verse 18, "But will God in very deed dwell with men on the earth? Behold, heaven, and the heaven of heavens, cannot contain thee; how much less this house which I have built." This first public meeting of the Brattle Street Church occurred amidst a heated theological debate among New England Congregational clergymen, …

Book Review: The Ordeal Of Thomas Barton: Anglican Missionary In The Pennsylvania Backcountry, 1755-1780, David L. Preston

Adams County History

The Ordeal of Thomas Barton is a highly informative read that I recommend for anyone interested in the history of eighteenth-century Pennsylvania. Scholars will find the book useful for its many connections to the histories of settlement, religion, politics, Indian diplomacy, and warfare on the Pennsylvania frontier. The book's author, Gettysburg College English professor James P. Myers, Jr., has written the most deeply researched account of Barton's importance in eighteenth-century religion and politics, and has contributed some of the finest overall scholarship on early Pennsylvania in recent years. Based in Huntington Township in what is now Adams County, and later …

Adams County History 2010

Adams County History

No abstract provided.

Ms-106: J.G. Morris & Morris-Hay Family Diaries, Kate Boeree

All Finding Aids

This collection contains 10 diaries ranging from 1827 to 1890, two of which are written by John Gottleib Morris and eight by M.A. Hay. These diaries contain church membership and donation records as well as Morris' personal thoughts on the ministerial profession, and his duty to the church. He speaks on personal matters like his marriage and his children who have died. One diary also includes his note on the formation of the Lutherville Female College.

Special Collections and College Archives Finding Aids are discovery tools used to describe and provide access to our holdings. Finding aids include historical and …

Ms-097: Robert B. Fortenbaugh Papers, Christine M. Ameduri

All Finding Aids

This collection consists mainly of material related to his professional careers as a Lutheran minister and professor of history. Other than the two photo/scrapbooks, there are few materials related to his personal and family life. One scrapbook contains mostly ephemera collected while a student at Gettysburg College, (1909 – 1913), and the second one contains material documenting his work as a minister in Syracuse, NY, between 1916 and 1920. Both scrapbooks contain numerous family and personal photos.

Special Collections and College Archives Finding Aids are discovery tools used to describe and provide access to our holdings. Finding aids include historical …

Edwards On The Will: A Century Of American Theological Debate, Allen C. Guelzo

Gettysburg College Faculty Books

Jonathan Edwards towered over his contemporaries--a man over six feet tall and a figure of theological stature--but the reasons for his power have been a matter of dispute. Edwards on the Will offers a persuasive explanation. In 1753, after seven years of personal trials, which included dismissal from his Northampton church, Edwards submitted a treatise, Freedom of the Will, to Boston publishers. Its impact on Puritan society was profound. He had refused to be trapped either by a new Arminian scheme that seemed to make God impotent or by a Hobbesian natural determinism that made morality an illusion. He …

Adams County History 2008

Adams County History

No abstract provided.

Book Review: Expanding Horizons For American Lutherans: The Story Of Abdel Ross Wentz, Charles Hambrick-Stowe

Adams County History

Abdel Ross Wentz (1883-1976) of the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Gettysburg joked about his small physical stature but he was a giant of American Lutheranism, noted religious historian and theological educator, and exemplar of a great generation of church leaders working in national and world arenas from the 1920s through the 1950s. This biography by his son, himself a historian and seminary professor and president, traces Wentz’s life from childhood in Lineboro, Maryland through his significant career in Gettysburg and much wider circles to his retirement near the Seminary campus. Obviously a labor of love and written in a style …

Ms-093: John Henry Wilbrand Stuckenberg Papers, Tara R. Wink

All Finding Aids

The John Henry Wilbrand Stuckenberg collection consists of materials relating to the life and works of J.H.W. and Mary Gingrich Stuckenberg. This material includes correspondence, publications, articles, newspaper clippings, and personal papers—such as diaries, biographical material, and photographs of both J.H.W. and Mary Gingrich Stuckenberg.

Special Collections and College Archives Finding Aids are discovery tools used to describe and provide access to our holdings. Finding aids include historical and biographical information about each collection in addition to inventories of their content. More information about our collections can be found on our website https://www.gettysburg.edu/special-collections/collections/.