Visions of Giving 
      
in

the Protestant Story of “Stewardship”

1820s to 1920s

Robert Wood Lynn

 

An Anthology of Readings,                                       Eighteen resources for the
Accompanied by Essays                                          “visionsofgiving.org” website,
                                                                                 2005 Edition

Contents    
               
Part I: The Next Great Idea: Intimations of a Grand Future -- the
           1820s to the 1850s

 RESOURCE 4.1
 Introduction: A Republic of Benevolence

 RESOURCE 4.2 
 Lyman Beecher -- Capital Enough to Evangelize the World

 RESOURCE 4.3 
 Pharcellus Church -- A Movement in Trouble

 RESOURCE 4.4
 Catherine Beecher -- No Duty More Difficult to Fix by Rule

 RESOURCE 4.5 
 Samuel Harris -- An Antidote to Covetousness

 RESOURCE 4.6
 Abel Stevens -- The Next Great Idea

 RESOURCE 4.7
 Anonymous -- The Battleground of Parish Life

Part II: The Steady Ascent of Progress -- the 1870s to the 1920s

 RESOURCE 4.8
 Introduction: The Good Steward

 RESOURCE 4.9
 Mary Abigail Dodge -- Grace and Greenbacks

 RESOURCE 4.10
 Josiah Strong -- Vision and Money  

 RESOURCE 4.11
 Andrew Carnegie -- An Alternative Perspective

 RESOURCE 4.12 
 Washington Gladden -- Money, Tainted and Consecrated

 RESOURCE 4.13
 Harvey Reeves Calkins -- A New Generation and Its Hopes

 RESOURCE 4.14
 Ralph S. Cushman -- Going on to Perfection

 RESOURCE 4.15
 Reinhold Niebuhr -- Is Stewardship Ethical?

Part III: Postscript -- "Tradition" and "Traditionalism" after the 1920s

 RESOURCE 4.16                                                     
 Introduction -- "Tradition" and "Traditionalism" after the 1920s

 RESOURCE 4.17
 Richard S. Emrich -- New Time, New Tithe

 RESOURCE 4.18 
 Joseph Fletcher -- Stewardship in the ‘Affluent Society’

 

 

Preface:  A Note About Resources 4.1 through 4.18

In the 1990s I spent time exploring the hidden history of the idea of "stewardship" in American life. Although this concept enjoyed its greatest popularity in the twentieth century, its larger meaning can not be understood apart from its origins in the ambitions and anxieties of some Protestants in nineteenth century America. So my trail of inquiry led me to roam over 160 or so years of American history.

Out of those explorations emerged a story, a drama in two acts. The opening act was set in the ante-bellum years where some envisioned America as the "Republic of Benevolence." Then came the discovery and celebration of the "Good Steward" and the promise of dazzling progress in the years from the 1870s to the 1920s. I have added an epilogue in which I reflect ever so briefly on the strange career of “stewardship” after the 1920s.

In retrospect, I have come to understand this tale as a way of introducing a few of the varied visions of giving in American society. And so we (Susan Wisely and I) have included this anthology on our website as a set of resources for opening a discussion about the traditions of giving in America. The story of “stewardship” was often a search for rules of giving. That quest for standards, in turn, sometimes reflected responses to certain images of the future. And certainly the advocates of “stewardship” worried about the tyranny of greed and covetousness in American life. The reader will soon discover that the “big-tent” notion of “stewardship” - or its predecessor, “benevolence” - included diverse visions of giving.

Those visions of giving, in turn, helped  to shape popular American views of giving. For instance, one of the most widely shared images of the “good giver” in the United States is the tither. Some advocates of tithing (in various forms, of course) do not ground their teachings in religious texts.

But - and it is a big “but” - this anthology represents a bare beginning in exploring Protestant perspectives upon giving. And the Protestant experience, of course, is one of the many strands in the larger history of American visions of giving. Much remains to be done.

---

Now for a personal word: I want to mention various colleagues and institutions that have helped me along the way.  I begin my litany of gratitude by thanking the Lilly Endowment.  My years at the Endowment (1976 – 1989) aroused my interest in exploring teachings about giving. Later the Endowment supported a research grant at Bangor Theological Seminary in support of that inquiry. I am grateful to the late Thomas H. Lake and to others at the Lilly Endowment.  While associated with Bangor Theological Seminary, I appreciated the help of Clifton Davis and Janet Beaulieu.

Finally I salute two staunch companions who made an enormous difference in my work. My friendship with Glenn T. Miller spans thirty-five years. I am deeply grateful for his constancy as an adviser, for shrewd advice and gentle guidance when I seemed to be straying beyond my line of inquiry or outside the limits of my competence. In a different way, D. Susan Wisely was equally important. Her interest in the project sustained me during bouts of weariness and self-doubt.  Even more significant, Susan’s questions opened up new vistas. “Who were the teachers of giving,” she once asked.  Although I have not yet done justice to that apt query, I believe this set of resources points in the right direction.

       Robert Wood Lynn