American Religious Democracy

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Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy

Robert Wuthnow

Author : Robert Wuthnow
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 326 pages
File Size : 50,7 Mb
Release : 2021-09-07
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9780691222646

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Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy by Robert Wuthnow Pdf

How the actions and advocacy of diverse religious communities in the United States have supported democracy’s development during the past century Does religion benefit democracy? Robert Wuthnow says yes. In Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy, Wuthnow makes his case by moving beyond the focus on unifying values or narratives about culture wars and elections. Rather, he demonstrates that the beneficial contributions of religion are best understood through the lens of religious diversity. The religious composition of the United States comprises many groups, organizations, and individuals that vigorously, and sometimes aggressively, contend for what they believe to be good and true. Unwelcome as this contention can be, it is rarely extremist, violent, or autocratic. Instead, it brings alternative and innovative perspectives to the table, forcing debates about what it means to be a democracy. Wuthnow shows how American religious diversity works by closely investigating religious advocacy spanning the past century: during the Great Depression, World War II, the civil rights movement, the debates about welfare reform, the recent struggles for immigrant rights and economic equality, and responses to the coronavirus pandemic. The engagement of religious groups in advocacy and counteradvocacy has sharpened arguments about authoritarianism, liberty of conscience, freedom of assembly, human dignity, citizens’ rights, equality, and public health. Wuthnow hones in on key principles of democratic governance and provides a hopeful yet realistic appraisal of what religion can and cannot achieve. At a time when many observers believe American democracy to be in dire need of revitalization, Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy illustrates how religious groups have contributed to this end and how they might continue to do so despite the many challenges faced by the nation.

Imagining Judeo-Christian America

K. Healan Gaston

Author : K. Healan Gaston
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 361 pages
File Size : 53,5 Mb
Release : 2019-11-15
Category : History
ISBN : 9780226663999

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Imagining Judeo-Christian America by K. Healan Gaston Pdf

“Judeo-Christian” is a remarkably easy term to look right through. Judaism and Christianity obviously share tenets, texts, and beliefs that have strongly influenced American democracy. In this ambitious book, however, K. Healan Gaston challenges the myth of a monolithic Judeo-Christian America. She demonstrates that the idea is not only a recent and deliberate construct, but also a potentially dangerous one. From the time of its widespread adoption in the 1930s, the ostensible inclusiveness of Judeo-Christian terminology concealed efforts to promote particular conceptions of religion, secularism, and politics. Gaston also shows that this new language, originally rooted in arguments over the nature of democracy that intensified in the early Cold War years, later became a marker in the culture wars that continue today. She argues that the debate on what constituted Judeo-Christian—and American—identity has shaped the country’s religious and political culture much more extensively than previously recognized.

The Religion of Democracy

Amy Kittelstrom

Author : Amy Kittelstrom
Publisher : Penguin
Page : 432 pages
File Size : 42,8 Mb
Release : 2015-04-21
Category : History
ISBN : 9780698192249

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The Religion of Democracy by Amy Kittelstrom Pdf

A history of religion’s role in the American liberal tradition through the eyes of seven transformative thinkers Today we associate liberal thought and politics with secularism. When we argue over whether the nation’s founders meant to keep religion out of politics, the godless side is said to be liberal. But the role of religion in American politics has always been far more nuanced and complex than today’s debates would suggest and closer to the heart of American intellectual life than is commonly understood. American democracy was intended by its creators to be more than just a political system, and in The Religion of Democracy, historian Amy Kittelstrom shows how religion and democracy have worked together as universal ideals in American culture—and as guides to moral action and the social practice of treating one another as equals who deserve to be free. The first people in the world to call themselves “liberals” were New England Christians in the early republic, for whom being liberal meant being receptive to a range of beliefs and values. The story begins in the mid-eighteenth century, when the first Boston liberals brought the Enlightenment into Reformation Christianity, tying equality and liberty to the human soul at the same moment these root concepts were being tied to democracy. The nineteenth century saw the development of a robust liberal intellectual culture in America, built on open-minded pursuit of truth and acceptance of human diversity. By the twentieth century, what had begun in Boston as a narrow, patrician democracy transformed into a religion of democracy in which the new liberals of modern America believed that where different viewpoints overlap, common truth is revealed. The core American principles of liberty and equality were never free from religion but full of religion. The Religion of Democracy re-creates the liberal conversation from the eighteenth century to the twentieth by tracing the lived connections among seven thinkers through whom they knew, what they read and wrote, where they went, and how they expressed their opinions—from John Adams to William James to Jane Addams; from Boston to Chicago to Berkeley. Sweeping and ambitious, The Religion of Democracy is a lively narrative of quintessentially American ideas as they were forged, debated, and remade across our history.

Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy

Robert Wuthnow

Author : Robert Wuthnow
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 326 pages
File Size : 51,6 Mb
Release : 2021-09-07
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780691222639

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Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy by Robert Wuthnow Pdf

"This book addresses the question of whether, and if so how, religion benefits American democracy. Scholarly views about the answer are divided, as is public opinion. Some hold that religion is beneficial where democracy is concerned; others view it as detrimental; and still others take the middle view that there is "good religion" and "bad religion", and that it all depends on kind is winning. As Robert Wuthnow argues in this new book, these ways of thinking about this topic paint with too broad a brush. Religion as we know it in the United States is vastly diverse, and it is this diversity that has mattered, and still matters. It has mattered not in the abstract, but concretely in the give and take that has mobilized faith communities to engage energetically in the pressing issues of the day -- an engagement that has often involved contesting the influence of other faith communities. Wuthnow's argument is that the deep diversity of religion in American has had, by & large, salutary political consequences. People of faith care about what happens in the country and are keen to mobilize to express their convictions and advocate for policy outcomes in line with their views. The diversity of religious groups in the U.S. contributes to democracy by reducing the chances of any one view becoming preeminent and by bringing innovative ideas to bear on public debate. The book shows empirically what diverse religious groups have done over the past century in advocating for particular democratic values. Individual chapters are case studies that explore important instances in which religious groups advocated against tyranny and on behalf of freedom of conscience; for freedom of assembly; in favor of human dignity; for citizenship rights in the case of immigrants; and for an amelioration of the wealth gap. Plenty of books have been written over the last few decades on religion and politics in the U.S. that have been salvos in the long-running American culture wars. Such books have often decried the involvement of religion in American politics, called for a firmer separation of church and state on the grounds that democracy is better when religion retreats, and criticized the Religious Right in particular. This book, by contrast, offers a more nuanced account of what diverse religious groups have done in the U.S. over the past century in advocating for particular democratic values"--

Religion and Democracy in the United States

Alan Wolfe,Ira Katznelson

Author : Alan Wolfe,Ira Katznelson
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 456 pages
File Size : 44,9 Mb
Release : 2010-08-30
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9781400836772

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Religion and Democracy in the United States by Alan Wolfe,Ira Katznelson Pdf

The United States remains a deeply religious country and religion plays an inextricably critical role in American politics. Controversy over issues such as abortion is fueled by opposition in the Catholic Church and among conservative Protestants, candidates for the presidency are questioned about their religious beliefs, and the separation of church and state remains hotly contested. While the examination of religion's influence in politics has long been neglected, in the last decade the subject has finally garnered the attention it deserves. In Religion and Democracy in the United States, prominent scholars consider the ways Americans understand the relationship between their religious beliefs and the political arena. This collection, a work of the Task Force on Religion and American Democracy of the American Political Science Association, thoughtfully explores the effects of religion on democracy and contemporary partisan politics. Topics include how religious diversity affects American democracy, how religion is implicated in America's partisan battles, and how religion affects ideas about race, ethnicity, and gender. Surveying what we currently know about religion and American politics, the essays introduce and delve into the range of current issues for both specialists and nonspecialists. In addition to the editors, the contributors are Allison Calhoun-Brown, Rosa DeLauro, Bette Novit Evans, James Gibson, John Green, Frederick Harris, Amaney Jamal, Geoffrey Layman, David Leal, David Leege, Nancy Rosenblum, Kenneth Wald, and Clyde Wilcox.

Have a Little Faith

Benjamin Justice,Colin Macleod

Author : Benjamin Justice,Colin Macleod
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 189 pages
File Size : 51,8 Mb
Release : 2016-11-09
Category : Education
ISBN : 9780226400594

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Have a Little Faith by Benjamin Justice,Colin Macleod Pdf

It isn’t just in recent arguments over the teaching of intelligent design or reciting the pledge of allegiance that religion and education have butted heads: since their beginnings nearly two centuries ago, public schools have been embroiled in heated controversies over religion’s place in the education system of a pluralistic nation. In this book, Benjamin Justice and Colin Macleod take up this rich and significant history of conflict with renewed clarity and astonishing breadth. Moving from the American Revolution to the present—from the common schools of the nineteenth century to the charter schools of the twenty-first—they offer one of the most comprehensive assessments of religion and education in America that has ever been published. From Bible readings and school prayer to teaching evolution and cultivating religious tolerance, Justice and Macleod consider the key issues and colorful characters that have shaped the way American schools have attempted to negotiate religious pluralism in a politically legitimate fashion. While schools and educational policies have not always advanced tolerance and understanding, Justice and Macleod point to the many efforts Americans have made to find a place for religion in public schools that both acknowledges the importance of faith to so many citizens and respects democratic ideals that insist upon a reasonable separation of church and state. Finally, they apply the lessons of history and political philosophy to an analysis of three critical areas of religious controversy in public education today: student-led religious observances in extracurricular activities, the tensions between freedom of expression and the need for inclusive environments, and the shift from democratic control of schools to loosely regulated charter and voucher programs. Altogether Justice and Macleod show how the interpretation of educational history through the lens of contemporary democratic theory offers both a richer understanding of past disputes and new ways of addressing contemporary challenges.

American Religious Democracy

Bruce Ledewitz

Author : Bruce Ledewitz
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Page : 265 pages
File Size : 51,8 Mb
Release : 2007-03-30
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781567207200

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American Religious Democracy by Bruce Ledewitz Pdf

The most significant, public religious issue confronting America today is the relationship between Church and State. Secular opinion holds that the rise of religion in the public square is a threat to our democracy that must be resisted. American Religious Democracy argues that this position, although understandable, is misguided. American political life after the 2004 Presidential election is best understood as a religious democracy, though not of a fundamentalist variety. This book explains the decline of secular democracy, describes some of the legal, political and religious implications of this new religious democracy and, finally, invites secular voters to participate in religious democracy. The 2004 election clearly showed that a substantial number of voters in America now vote the way they do for what they consider to be religious reasons and that, as a result of their voting, government policy is changing to reflect their religious commitments. The result has been the creation of a religious democracy. However,taking part in a religious democracy, for Americans especially, requires a new understanding of what religion means in a public and political sense. Ledewitz takes a reasoned, yet lively approach to the subject, promoting a a new understanding of what religious democracy is and how secularists can and should participate. Looking at the Constitution, the current nature of politics and religion, and public attitudes toward capitalism, the environment, technology, women's rights, and international relations, the author is able to construct a clearer picture of the religious and political landscape in America today.

Evangelicals and Democracy in America

Steven G. Brint,Jean Reith Schroedel,Steven Brint

Author : Steven G. Brint,Jean Reith Schroedel,Steven Brint
Publisher : Russell Sage Foundation
Page : 382 pages
File Size : 44,9 Mb
Release : 2011-09
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780871540126

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Evangelicals and Democracy in America by Steven G. Brint,Jean Reith Schroedel,Steven Brint Pdf

Separation of church and state is a bedrock principal of American democracy, and so, too, is active citizen engagement. Since evangelicals comprise one of the largest and most vocal voting blocs in the United States, tensions and questions naturally arise. In the two-volume Evangelicals and Democracy in America, editors Steven Brint and Jean Reith Schroedel have assembled an authoritative collection of studies of the evangelical movement in America. Religion and Politics, the second volume of the set, focuses on the role of religious conservatives in party politics, the rhetoric evangelicals use to mobilize politically, and what the history of the evangelical movement reveals about where it may be going. Part I of Religion and Politics explores the role of evangelicals in electoral politics. Contributor Pippa Norris looks at evangelicals around the globe and finds that religiosity is a strong predictor of ideological leanings in industrialized countries. But the United States remains one of only a handful of post-industrial societies where religion plays a significant role in partisan politics. Other chapters look at voting trends, especially the growing number of higher-income evangelicals among Republican ranks, how voting is influenced both by "values" and race, and the management of the symbols and networks behind the electoral system of moral-values politics. Part II of the volume focuses on the mobilizing rhetoric of the Christian Right. Nathaniel Klemp and Stephen Macedo show how the rhetorical strategies of the Christian Right create powerful mobilizing narratives, but frequently fail to build broad enough coalitions to prevail in the pluralistic marketplace of ideas. Part III analyzes the cycles and evolution of the Christian Right. Kimberly Conger looks at the specific circumstances that have allowed evangelicals to become dominant in some Republican state party committees but not in others. D. Michael Lindsay examines the "elastic orthodoxy" that has allowed evangelicals to evolve into a formidable social and political force. The final chapter by Clyde Wilcox presents a new framework for understanding the relationship between the Christian Right and the GOP based on the ecological metaphor of co-evolution. With its companion volume on religion and society, this second volume of Evangelicals and Democracy in America offers the most complete examination yet of the social circumstances and political influence of the millions of Americans who are white evangelical Protestants. Understanding their history and prospects for the future is essential to forming a comprehensive picture of America today.

Christianity and American Democracy

Hugh Heclo

Author : Hugh Heclo
Publisher : Harvard University Press
Page : 312 pages
File Size : 46,7 Mb
Release : 2009-07-01
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780674027053

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Christianity and American Democracy by Hugh Heclo Pdf

Exploring the tension at the heart of America’s culture wars, this is “a very fine book on a very important subject” (Mark A. Noll, author of The Civil War as a Theological Crisis). Christianity, not religion in general, has been important for American democracy. With this bold thesis, Hugh Heclo offers a panoramic view of how Christianity and democracy have shaped each other. Heclo shows that amid deeply felt religious differences, a Protestant colonial society gradually convinced itself of the truly Christian reasons for, as well as the enlightened political advantages of, religious liberty. By the mid-twentieth century, American democracy and Christianity appeared locked in a mutual embrace. But it was a problematic union vulnerable to fundamental challenge in the Sixties. Despite the subsequent rise of the religious right and glib talk of a conservative Republican theocracy, Heclo sees a longer-term, reciprocal estrangement between Christianity and American democracy. Responding to his challenging argument, Mary Jo Bane, Michael Kazin, and Alan Wolfe criticize, qualify, and amend it. Heclo’s rejoinder suggests why both secularists and Christians should worry about a coming rupture between the Christian and democratic faiths. The result is a lively debate about a momentous tension in American public life.

Religion, Secularism, and Constitutional Democracy

Jean L. Cohen,Cécile Laborde

Author : Jean L. Cohen,Cécile Laborde
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 465 pages
File Size : 42,8 Mb
Release : 2015-12-22
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780231540735

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Religion, Secularism, and Constitutional Democracy by Jean L. Cohen,Cécile Laborde Pdf

Polarization between political religionists and militant secularists on both sides of the Atlantic is on the rise. Critically engaging with traditional secularism and religious accommodationism, this collection introduces a constitutional secularism that robustly meets contemporary challenges. It identifies which connections between religion and the state are compatible with the liberal, republican, and democratic principles of constitutional democracy and assesses the success of their implementation in the birthplace of political secularism: the United States and Western Europe. Approaching this issue from philosophical, legal, historical, political, and sociological perspectives, the contributors wage a thorough defense of their project's theoretical and institutional legitimacy. Their work brings fresh insight to debates over the balance of human rights and religious freedom, the proper definition of a nonestablishment norm, and the relationship between sovereignty and legal pluralism. They discuss the genealogy of and tensions involving international legal rights to religious freedom, religious symbols in public spaces, religious arguments in public debates, the jurisdiction of religious authorities in personal law, and the dilemmas of religious accommodation in national constitutions and public policy when it violates international human rights agreements or liberal-democratic principles. If we profoundly rethink the concepts of religion and secularism, these thinkers argue, a principled adjudication of competing claims becomes possible.

God's Democracy

Emilio Gentile

Author : Emilio Gentile
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing USA
Page : 206 pages
File Size : 47,5 Mb
Release : 2008-09-30
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780313353376

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God's Democracy by Emilio Gentile Pdf

In God's Democracy, Emilio Gentile argues that the presidency of George W. Bush sought to alter the way religion functions in American political life. Prior to the events of 9/11, the national government operated under a civil religious regime that placed a sacred umbrella over the entire country and its leading political figures. American civil religion was not only an inclusive faith, but one that provided ample room for citizens with different politics and different world views. But in the wake of 9/11, President Bush used religion to differentiate Americans on partisan lines. Relying heavily on his evangelical Christian base, he attempted to substitute for the inclusivism of the traditional American civil religion an exclusivist political religion in which Democrats were portrayed as hostile to religious values and incapable of dealing with the country's foreign enemies. This book provides the historical context for this attempted transformation, and shows in a detailed way how the Bush administration pursued it. Gentile concludes by posing the question of whether this radical shift in the way Americans understand themselves religiously will prove permanent. Unlike other works that strive to show how religion has generally come to be treated in American politics, this new book looks more squarely at the Bush Administration and its attempt to shut out Democrats from the political process by invoking religious language and ideals. He goes on to consider the political exclusivism and whether or not it will persist beyond Bush's tenure.

Faith in Action

Richard L. Wood

Author : Richard L. Wood
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 366 pages
File Size : 43,7 Mb
Release : 2002-09-15
Category : Political Science
ISBN : 9780226905969

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Faith in Action by Richard L. Wood Pdf

Over the past fifteen years, associations throughout the U.S. have organized citizens around issues of equality and social justice, often through local churches. But in contrast to President Bush's vision of faith-based activism, in which groups deliver social services to the needy, these associations do something greater. Drawing on institutions of faith, they reshape public policies that neglect the disadvantaged. To find out how this faith-based form of community organizing succeeds, Richard L. Wood spent several years working with two local groups in Oakland, California—the faith-based Pacific Institute for Community Organization and the race-based Center for Third World Organizing. Comparing their activist techniques and achievements, Wood argues that the alternative cultures and strategies of these two groups give them radically different access to community ties and social capital. Creative and insightful, Faith in Action shows how community activism and religious organizations can help build a more just and democratic future for all Americans.

American Religions and the Family

Don S. Browning,David A. Clairmont

Author : Don S. Browning,David A. Clairmont
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Page : 290 pages
File Size : 48,9 Mb
Release : 2006-12-19
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780231510820

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American Religions and the Family by Don S. Browning,David A. Clairmont Pdf

Religions respond to capitalism, democracy, industrialization, feminism, individualism, and the phenomenon of globalization in a variety of ways. Some religions conform to these challenges, if not capitulate to them; some critique or resist them, and some work to transform the modern societies they inhabit. In this unique collection of critical essays, scholars of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Native American thought explore the tension between modernization and the family, sexuality, and marriage traditions of major religions in America. Contributors examine how various belief systems have confronted changing attitudes regarding the meaning and purpose of sex, the definition of marriage, the responsibility of fathers, and the status of children. They also discuss how family law in America is beginning to acknowledge certain religious traditions and how comparative religious ethics can explain and evaluate diverse family customs. Studies concerning the impact of religious thought and behavior on American society have never been more timely or important. Recent global events cannot be fully understood without comprehending how belief systems function and the many ways they can be employed to the benefit and detriment of societies. Responding to this critical need, American Religions and the Family presents a comprehensive portrait of religious cultures in America and offers secular society a pathway for appreciating religious tradition.

America and the Will of God

Carlos A. Mojica

Author : Carlos A. Mojica
Publisher : Xlibris Corporation
Page : 159 pages
File Size : 55,6 Mb
Release : 2007-08-29
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9781465320926

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America and the Will of God by Carlos A. Mojica Pdf

This book examines an important issue facing America today the increasing influence of evangelical Christians in our Federal government and the erosion in the separation between Church and State. The election of George W. Bush secured a representative for the Christian right who was willing to effect government policies to reflect Christian values on issues such as gay marriage, stem-cell research, abortion, and others. More significantly, the importance of securing this group of voters was not lost on any of the presidential candidates in the upcoming 2008 election. From now on, every candidate will have to publicly express their faith and how it influences their lives and decisions. This book explores several questions posed by this shift in the balance between Church and State: Can we derive a moral code independent of God? Would a strong evangelical influence strengthen our government? Are democratic principles compatible with a theocracy? And more fundamental, does God really exist? How do we know?

Democratic Religion

Gregory A. Wills

Author : Gregory A. Wills
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 208 pages
File Size : 53,7 Mb
Release : 2003-03-13
Category : History
ISBN : 9780195160994

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Democratic Religion by Gregory A. Wills Pdf

No American denomination identified itself more closely with the nation's democratic ideal than the Baptists. Most antebellum southern Baptist churches allowed women and slaves to vote on membership matters and preferred populists preachers who addressed their appeals to the common person. Paradoxically no denomination could wield religious authority as zealously as the Baptists. Between 1785 and 1860 they ritually excommunicated forty to fifty thousand church members in Georgia alone. Wills demonstrates how a denomination of freedom-loving individualists came to embrace an exclusivist spirituality--a spirituality that continues to shape Southern Baptist churches in contemporary conflicts between moderates who urge tolerance and conservatives who require belief in scriptural inerrancy. Wills's analysis advances our understanding of the interaction between democracy and religious authority, and will appeal to scholars of American religion, culture, and history, as well as to Baptist observers.

American Religious Democracy

Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy by Robert Wuthnow Pdf

Imagining Judeo-Christian America by K. Healan Gaston Pdf

The Religion of Democracy by Amy Kittelstrom Pdf

Why Religion Is Good for American Democracy by Robert Wuthnow Pdf

Religion and Democracy in the United States by Alan Wolfe,Ira Katznelson Pdf

Have a Little Faith by Benjamin Justice,Colin Macleod Pdf

American Religious Democracy by Bruce Ledewitz Pdf

Evangelicals and Democracy in America by Steven G. Brint,Jean Reith Schroedel,Steven Brint Pdf

Christianity and American Democracy by Hugh Heclo Pdf

Religion, Secularism, and Constitutional Democracy by Jean L. Cohen,Cécile Laborde Pdf

God's Democracy by Emilio Gentile Pdf

Faith in Action by Richard L. Wood Pdf

American Religions and the Family by Don S. Browning,David A. Clairmont Pdf

America and the Will of God by Carlos A. Mojica Pdf

Democratic Religion by Gregory A. Wills Pdf

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