The Chance of Salvation: A History of Conversion in America

. Mullen is Assistant Professor of History and Art History at George Mason University. Lincoln A

American Jews largely resisted evangelism while at the same time winning converts to Judaism. In the nineteenth century, as Americans confronted a growing array of religious options, pressures to convert altered the basis of American religion. The Chance of Salvation traces the history of the distinctively American idea that religion is a matter of individual choice.Lincoln Mullen shows how the willingness of Americans to change faiths, recorded in narratives that describe a wide variety of conversion experiences, created a shared assumption that religious identity is a decision. Evangelical Protestants emphasized conversion as a personal choice, while Protestant missionaries brought Christianity to Native American nations such as the Cherokee, who adopted Christianity on their own terms. The United States has a long history of religious plur

. About the Author Lincoln A. Mullen is Assistant Professor of History and Art History at George Mason University