cover image Slammin' Sam

Slammin' Sam

George Mendoza, Sam Snead. Dutton Books, $17.95 (238pp) ISBN 978-0-917657-87-0

While sectarians sneered at the World's Parliament of Religions, held in Chicago in 1893, liberal Protestant progressives saw the congress as a beacon of cosmopolitanism that united Muslims, Buddhists and believers from other faiths. Taking this event as a starting point, Marty, professor at the University of Chicago, contrasts religionists who rejected the modern world with those who sought to adapt traditions to social change. The first installment in a four-volume history, this densely written, opaque survey is devoted largely to the ""core culture'' of mainstream Christianity, although it devotes short sections to Native Americans, Jews, black churches, Hispanics, Eastern Orthodoxy and Asians. The irony of the volume title refers to movements that contradicted the intent of their leaders; for example, the ecumenical movement generated scores of new denominations. A crowning irony is the way American politicians grafted religious symbols onto imperialistic missions in 1898 and 1917. (December)