33 - Piety and Practice in North America to 1800

Summary

A Narragansett woman beseeches the spirits of her ancestors to protect her newborn son. A Puritan carpenter prays to his God to help him avoid the temptation of sin after a long day of work. An Anglican couple in Virginia celebrates the baptism of their daughter within their humble home. African slaves in South Carolina solemnize the funeral of one of their companions by praying that her soul will return to Africa.

These imagined scenes illustrate the range of piety and religious practices in colonial North America, yet none of them takes place within a church. For the ordinary men and women of this period, the church represented only one landmark in a religious geography marked by numerous sites of engagement with the supernatural world. Yet this was not a changeless religious landscape. Over time many groups in colonial North America became increasingly influenced by Christianity.

This judgment draws on changes within the field of American religious history. At one time, many understood colonial America as synonymous with New England and Puritanism. More recently, historians of religion in early America have employed a broader geographical focus and have included laypeople as significant actors, drawing American Indians, Africans, and others into the narratives. This essay's analysis of the religious practices of ordinary men and women reflects this expanded scholarly agenda. Even among the groups examined here, however, the coverage is not encyclopedic.