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The modernish/ fundamentalist controversy was heating up in the early 1900s. Conservatives saw this coming a long way off but could not stop modernism from taking control of seminaries and popular pulpits. It was everywhere. It all came to a head with WWI.Theological conservatives saw WWI as evidence that the world was getting worse. To them, it was a chance to fight for patriotic reasons. Modernists were also pro-war because they thought this was the "war to end all wars". There would be no more war after this and democracy would take over the world. The liberals fired the first shots in this theological battle because they thought that premillennialism encouraged people to root for the end of the world.William Jennings Bryan was Secretary of State in the US during this time and did his best to keep us out of the war.This episode features the voices of George Marsden (author of "Fundamentalism and American Culture") and Michael Kazin, professor at Georgetown University and author of "What it Took to Win".

Sources:

Fundamentalism and American Culture by George Marsden

The Evangelicals by Frances Fitzgerald

A Godly Hero by Michael Kazin

What it Took to Win by Michael Kazin

These Truths by Jill Lepore

To End All Wars by Adam Hochschild

Dead Wake by Erik Larson (about The Lusitania)

Woodrow Wilson's second inauguration

Short article about Billy Sunday

Discussion Questions:

What was the purpose of WWI? What caused it?

Would you have been for or against the war in the 1900s?

How can pre and post-millenniallism shape a person's view of the world? Does it have to?

How does social Darwinism tie into WWI and WWII?

Is WWI an outcome of changing morality?

How would you tell a large audience of Christians to adapt to changing morality?

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