CHURCH PLANTING: PAST AND PRESENT IN AMERICA!

Abstract

In the book, Pilgrims in Their Own Land: 500 Years of Religion in America, Martin E. Marty states, “While the story of native American religion began thousands of years before Europeans ‘discovered’ the New World, American religion as we know it was imported by European discoverers.”  In other words, it was the European immigrants’ faith that shaped the religious beliefs of North America in its modern form. As many of the early settlers left Europe, “for some, the dream meant escape from imprisonment, slavery, indebtedness, low status, or poverty. For others, it drew upon the lure of freedom from harassment and persecution, often of a religious character. Still others, tragically, were forced into slavery by their move to the New World. In almost every case, the people made sense of their movements by reference to religious stories and symbols.”