Among the great challenges that emerged during the 1960s, many found their way into the Church. In an era which facilitated expressions of individualism and reservations about authority, the religious “status quo” facilitated by mainline Protestantism and Roman Catholicism found itself in question. Declines in membership and commitments to the clergy only steepened as the decade continued. However, these declines only account for a couple of the challenges that faced the Church. Underneath these declines resided a growing conviction that the Church's theological message no longer spoke to the needs of the people the Church was called to serve. While these challenges are well documented, few books express in great detail how they emerged and what lasting impact they facilitated. In an effort to meet this need, Hugh McLeod offers The Religious Crisis of the 1960s. Rich in normative, qualitative, and quantitative detail, McLeod's work offers an impressive picture of the 1960s that is sure to capture the attention of anyone seeking to understand how this tumultuous era impacted the Church not only during the 1960s but even today.
In a comprehensive book form, McLeod's work has few competitors. One comparable book may be Ronald B. Flowers' Religion in Strange Times: The 1960s and 1970s (Mercer University Press, 1984)—a work he does not cite. However, this work is almost 25 years old and much has changed since that time in terms of how we understand the 1960s. Other comparable efforts include the studies of religious faith since World War II conducted by Robert Wuthnow. In particular, Wuthnow's books on this topic include After Heaven: Spirituality in America Since the 1950s (University of California Press, 1998) and The Restructuring of American Religion: Society and Faith Since World War II (Princeton University Press, 1988). Although McLeod cites Wuthnow's work at length, he has broader geographical interests in mind. In particular, while Wuthnow focuses on the religious experiences of Americans, McLeod wants to expand this picture to include also the religious experiences of the North Atlantic population as a whole and even the Australasian population to some extent.
Part of the reason McLeod chooses to expand this picture resides in his conviction that “In the 1960s trends on the two sides of the Atlantic were very similar” (p.3). Situating his work in terms of time, McLeod chooses to “use Arthur Marwick's concept of a ‘long 1960s’, lasting from about 1958 to 1974” (p.1). The trends that developed during this era not only had an impact on a generation but also linger in some form or another in relation to subsequent generations. In essence, the religious challenges of the 1960s are the religious challenges of today and perhaps even tomorrow. As a result, McLeod's book offers an understanding of “the main religious changes across the Western world” while also offering an understanding of “how these changes were experienced by ‘ordinary people’” (p.4). McLeod cites the works of a number of leading figures from the 1960s. However, part of what brings his book to life is the way he weaves the voices of these “ordinary people” into it.
One of the ways McLeod offers a voice to these “ordinary people” is by citing a variety of oral histories. For example, in his chapter entitled “Affluence,” McLeod introduces his audience to Alan Timson and Carol Adams. Rising levels of affluence brought competing interests into the lives of people who otherwise spent great portions of their Sundays in Church. Timson spoke about how financial deprivation drew people together while affluence allowed them to separate from one another. As a result, Timson noted that once people began to own cars, they would spend time going to the coast of England. Adams made a similar observation, that the introduction of the automobile made Sunday a day for leisure. For her family, they would drive to a particular locale in the English countryside and then go for a hike. In essence, people spent less time in Church because they could now afford to spend time elsewhere.
Framing these vignettes, McLeod also includes a host of statistics. For example, in his chapter entitled “Late Christendom,” McLeod offers tables in relation to the number of Easter communicants and the number of confirmations (both per 1,000). As part of his effort to offer a more expansive understanding of the 1960s, McLeod cites numbers from 1934 to 1973 in relation to Easter communicants and from 1934 to 1974 in relation to confirmations. In both cases, one notices steady declines. These declines, however, are just more significant statistically over the course of the 1960s. In essence, McLeod is proposing that when one thinks of the 1960s, one needs to have not only a long view of this era (for example, from 1958 to 1974), but also a longer view of the trends that only became more pronounced in this era. As a result, many of the occurrences that took place in the 1960s “have a prehistory going back at least to the 1930s” (p. 220).
Drawing on both oral expressions of history and statistical evidence, McLeod organizes his chapters in both a chronological and a topical fashion. This slate of eleven chapters begins with “The Decline of Christendom” and ends with a chapter that asks if Christendom has come to an end. “The Early 1960s” and “1968” each receive their own chapters. However, the previously mentioned chapters on “Late Christendom” and “Affluence” each provide important pieces of the larger picture of the 1960s McLeod is seeking to present. One of the most sensational chapters falls in the middle of this lineup, a chapter entitled “New Worlds.” According to McLeod, “Here we meet the 1960s of legend in its fullest flowering—a world in which relatively few people fully participated, but which nonetheless left its mark on the wider society, as it demonstrated new possibilities, previously undreamt of, from which the wider world drew selectively” (p. 124). In these pages McLeod offers details concerning groups ranging from Wicca to the Jesus Movement. Drawing on the work of Robert Wuthnow, McLeod says that despite their differences these groups each shared in a spirit of seeking, whereas previous generations of religious movements were defined by a spirit of dwelling.
The mixed-methodology present in McLeod's treatment of the 1960s offers an expanded understanding of this generation in a readable and engaging style. Many seminal works are cited. Oral history vignettes bring to life the ideas and the challenges that faced this generation and statistics are used to frame the largest possible set of pictures of what was occurring. Far from being a dry academic history, McLeod offers his audience a sense that they truly know something on both a macro- and a micro-level about the 1960s. The religious history of this era is about a transformation of ideas. However, this transformation also impacted how “ordinary people” ordered their lives. Changes such as the mass introduction of the automobile offered populations of people previously disposed to attend Church on Sunday with other possibilities. In essence, the strength of McLeod's book is that it offers a robust picture of not only leading events but also the lasting points of impact of the 1960s.
If McLeod's book possesses any real weakness, it may be that he is trying to do too much. Certain groups, as a result, receive insufficient attention. Evangelicals, for example, only receive passing references. While the emergence of evangelicals predates the 1960s, several influential movements within this group came to prominence during this time. Two such groups that operated on college campuses include Campus Crusade and InterVarsity. Campus Crusade receives no mention in McLeod's book. Drawing information from a dissertation by Steve Bruce, InterVarsity is mentioned briefly as a comparative reference point to the Student Christian Movement (SCM) in Britain. However, several other important works are available concerning InterVarsity, most recently A. Donald MacLeod's C. Stacey Woods and the Evangelical Rediscovery of the University (InterVarsity Press, 2007). In relation to Campus Crusade, John Turner's Bill Bright & Campus Crusade for Christ: The Renewal of Evangelicalism in Postwar America (University of North Carolina Press, 2008) offers a well-detailed history. Information concerning InterVarsity and Campus Crusade as well as other evangelical efforts would make welcome additions to McLeod's book.
Regardless of the need to add discussions concerning evangelical efforts such as InterVarsity and Campus Crusade, The Religious Crisis of the 1960s proves to be necessary reading for anyone seeking to understand the great challenges that faced the Church during this era. By establishing a long view of history, McLeod is able to fuel his convincing argument that the challenges that emerged during the 1960s did not surface overnight. The impact of these challenges is not only felt today but will likely be felt for years to come. As a result, McLeod's important book is not simply an introduction to the spirit of our past but also the spirit of our present and future ages.
