Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
Cowboy Christians examines the long history of cowboy Christians in the American West, focusing on the cowboy church movement of the present day and closely related ministries in racetrack and rodeo settings. Early chapters move from the postbellum period through the twentieth century, tracing religious life among cowboys on the range as well as its representation in popular imagery and the media. The central chapters focus on the modern cowboy church and examine its structure, theology, and method of perpetuation, and explore future challenges the institution may face, such as its relegation of women to subordinate participant roles. The final chapter considers present day incarnations of rodeo and racetrack ministries as examples of the cowboy Christian proclivity for blending the secular and the sacred in leisure environments. Woven throughout the text is a discussion of the religious significance of the cowboy church movement, particularly relative to twenty-first century evangelical Protestantism.
Marie W. Dallam demonstrates that the cowboy church's antecedents and influences include muscular Christianity, the Jesus movement, and new paradigm church methodology. With interdisciplinary research that blends history and sociology, Cowboy Christians draws on interviews with leaders from cowboy churches, traveling rodeo ministries, and chaplains who serve horse racing and bull riding environments, as well as incorporating Dallam's own experiences as a participant observer.
Synopsis
Cowboy Christians examines the long history of cowboy Christianity in the American West, with a focus on the present-day cowboy church movement. Based on five years of historical and sociological fieldwork in cowboy Christian communities, this book draws on interviews with leaders of cowboy
churches, traveling rodeo ministries, and chaplains who serve horse racing and bull riding communities, along with the author's first-hand experiences as a participant observer.
Marie W. Dallam traces cowboy Christianity from the postbellum period into the twenty-first century, looking at religious life among cowboys on the range as well as its representation in popular imagery and the media. She examines the structure, theology, and perpetuation of the modern cowboy
church, and speculates on future challenges the institution may face, such as the relegation of women to subordinate participant roles at a time of increasing gender equality in the larger society. She also explores the cowboy Christian proclivity for blending the secular and the sacred in leisure
environments like arenas, racetracks, and rodeos. Dallam locates the modern cowboy church as a descendant of the muscular Christianity movement, the Jesus movement, and new paradigm church methodology. Cowboy Christians establishes the religious significance of the cowboy church movement,
particularly relative to twenty-first-century evangelical Protestantism, and contributes to a deeper understanding of the unique Christianity of the American West.