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[German Version] I. General 1. Geography. The northern half of the American double continent (America) comprises the North American Arctic including Greenland (Danish), the Canadian Arctic Archipelago north of the mainland, the French overseas Département Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon off the east coast of Canada, the British Bermuda Islands in the Atlantic, and the continent itself, divided today into the countries of Canada and the United States of America, south to the northern boundary of Mexico. The territory of North America covers 21.5 million km2 and has roughly 274 milli…

[German Version] (Nov 29, 1727, North Haven, CT – May 12, 1795, New Haven, CT), Congregationalist minister and college president, entering the ministry (1755) as pastor of the Second Congregational Church in Newport, Rhode Island. There he opposed the slave trade and engaged in a variety of scientific and literary ¶ pursuits. He became president of Yale in 1778. His life-long support of liberty led him to oppose schemes to send an Anglican bishop to the colonies. He prophesied a great future for the independent United States. Mark A. Noll Bibliography E.S. Morgan, The Gentle Puritan: A …

[German Version] (Aug 28, 1774, New York – Jan 4, 1821, Emmitsburg, MD), founder of a religious community. Seton traveled to Italy in 1803, where she was introduced to the Roman Catholic Church. Following her husband’s death and her return to the United States in 1804, she continued to study the Catholic faith and on Mar 14, 1805, entered the church. After moving to Maryland in 1808, she opened a school for girls and then joined the Sisters of Charity of Saint Joseph, whose first American director…

[German Version] (Dec 24, 1772, near Port Tobacco, MD – Nov 9, 1844, Hannibal, MO), leader of the American Restoration Movement, was ordained as Presbyterian, but early on began to doubt aspects of traditional Presbyterian practice. In 1801 he was the ¶ key figure in the great Cane Ridge revival meeting in Kentucky (Revival/Revival movements: II). In an active career as preacher, writer ( Last Will and Testament of the Springfield Presbytery, 1804), and editor, he promoted an apocalyptic vision of Christian faith, the practice of baptism by immersion, and the resto…

[German Version] Mind-cure movements, which arose in several places in the United States throughout the 19th century, shared a common commitment to metaphysical idealism and a belief in the ability of the mind to overcome physical illness. They were anticipated by aspects of animal magnetism supported by F.A. Mesmer and the spiritual biblical hermeneutics of E. Swedenborg. An earlier proponent was W.F. Evans (1817–1887), author of The Primitive Mind Cure (1885). Even more important was P.P. Quimby (1802–1866), who viewed God as a personified First Cause and perso…

[German Version] The Evangelical Union was formed in Scotland in May 1843 by James Morison and several other theological Arminians who had been excluded from the United Secession Church for promoting a theology of universal atonement, human free will, Congregational polity, and the Bible alone without ¶ creeds. The Union was influenced in many of its views by the American revivalist Charles G. Finney. It enjoyed particular success in urban ministry, where it was known for a firm stand against t…

[German Version] (Jun 1650, Leuchars, Scotland – Jun 13, 1678, Aberdeen, Scotland), was appointed professor of divinity at King’s College, Aberdeen, in 1673. His The Life of God in the Soul of Man, or, The Nature and Excellency of the Christian Religion (1677) stressed the necessity for “true Christianity” in contrast to ecclesiastical formalism. He had great influence on the Wesley brothers and other leading figures of the 18th-century evangelical movement. Mark A. Noll Bibliography The Works of the Rev. Henry Scougal, 1818 D. Butler, Henry Scougal and the Oxford Methodists, 1899.

[German Version] (May 8, 1895, El Paso, IL – Dec 1, 1979, NY), the leading public voice for American Roman Catholicism for much of the 20th century. He was ordained a priest in 1919 and then did doctoral study at Louvain, Rome, and Washington, DC. From 1926 to 1950 he lectured in philosophy at the Catholic University of America, and from 1966 to 1969 he served as bishop of Rochester, New York. Sheen’s public renown began in 1930 as the featured speaker on “Catholic Hour Broadcasts” for NBC radio. …

[German Version] (Nov 23, 1803, Hampton, CT – Feb 3, 1895, Hyde Park, MA) was a leading opponent of slavery (Abolitionism); he was converted in 1826 under the preaching of C.G. Finney. In 1834 he led a group of students out of Lane Seminary, Cincinnati, in order to found Oberlin College, the nation’s first institution of higher learning to welcome women. From the mid-1830s Weld was one of America’s best-known abolitionist orators; he made converts but also generated mob opposition. Worn out by his…