How Second Great Awakening Changed America

The Second Great Awakening marked an incredibly important change in American life, as it promoted a more optimistic view of the human position, relating to god. This changed shift that 1783 did not mark the end of the revolution. Movements such as these and that of the Benevolent Empire acted as a revolution in the young United States and led to a change significant enough to compete with the original American revolution. The spark for this revolution was so significant that it can only be compared to that of the original American Revolution. In fact, some religious groups believed a change in perspective is so necessary that if an “ awakening” did not occur, there would be no redemption for their souls. This inspired Americans to overall live a greater life, as we move closer to the religious makeup of the world today.

The Second Great Awakening marked an underlying transition in American devotional life, in part because religion was separated from the control of our country's leaders. A series of religious revivals swept the United States from the 1790s and into the 1830s that forever changed the religious makeup of the country. Studied by many today, the Second Great Awakening, acted as a spiritual resurrection which essentially altered the character of American religion. This movement stressed that individuals could assert their 'free will' in preference to being saved and by suggesting that saving was open to all human beings, this awakening of religion hugged a more optimistic view of the human condition, relating to their afterlife. It was not something that the nation was aware of, but something that happened to them, a genuine, intensely emotional event that society would move through and experience.

This nationwide psychological transformation left them with a primarily altered sense of unmixed, a likeness as a modern ideology of a Christian. This was similar to the impact of trancedalism which is in many aspects, one of the first notable American mental evolutions. It has inspired consequence generations of American intellectuals, as well as some educated movements. It is originally affected by personal freedom. At the start of the Revolution, the largest religious groups consisted of Congregationalists, Anglicans, and Quakers, but by 1800, evangelical Methodism and Baptists were the fasting-growing religions in the nation. Eighteenth-century Calvinists like Jonathan Edwards had stressed the sinful nature of humans and their total unfitness to overcome this nature without the immediate action of the grace of God working through the Holy Spirit. The spread of these ideals was deliberately orchestrated and deployed a plethora of spiritual practices to provoke conversions especially among the youth (men and women between 15 and 30). The religious revival was primarily invented in the eighteenth century to describe a new event in which the modern church bloomed with an unexpected 'awakening' of pure concern, based on a special and mysterious outpouring of God's exception grace, which led to unprecedented numbers of conversions that reanimated the perspective and command of the church and state.

A closer look at the Second Great Awakening shows society that it was truly an exact commitment to social reform by elite and middle-class citizens. These groups can be combined under the title of “The Benevolent Empire. Motivated by a concept of religious benevolence that encouraged them to try and improve the plight of spiritually ruin followers, these religious reformers created a national reticulation of religious institutions in the decennium after 18155. Among the most remarkable leaders of the Second Great Awakening was a Presbyterian named Charles Grandison Finney, who led a myriad of revivals in the improved areas along the Erie Canal in upstate New York. For example, he would exclaim statements such as, “Hear then O sinner, I beseech you and obey the word of the Lord make you a new heart and a new spirit, for why will ye die?”

He also relied centrally on women, including his wife Lydia, as keystone forces in pulling others to convert. Finney's efforts in Rochester, like the work of the Benevolent Empire more commonly, had its greatest brunt among profession leadership and centrical-place folks who had help from the increased test of living brought helter-skelter by the not late Industrial Revolution. His work climaxed with a six-moon campaign in Rochester in 1830 where he pulpit maid and improved momentous unworn techniques such as assembly prayer meetings within family homes. Work like Finney’s inspired other members of the Benevolent Empire and caused a spread of these ideals over the young nation. Although typically headquartered in the major cities of the northeast, groups probable the American Bible Society, American Sunday School Union, and the American Tract Society were among the very first institutions to organize on a national scale. These ideals would spread further and introduce aid to a religious revival that would revolutionize the young nation.

In conclusion, the events that occurred during the religious revolution, including the second great awakening and the impacts of the benevolent empire forever changed America. Although less physical, emotional and mental states of society forever changed. The second great awakening caused a boom in religion and introduced an unfavorable ideal into the nation. For once, the church endorsed the idea that sins may be forgiven. The same can be noted for the benevolent empire, which encompassed the power of middle and upper-class citizens. Overall, the switch to modern religion would further change the country's sociology, similar to that of the change of the American Revolution.