Transatlantic Methodists: British Wesleyanism and the Formation of an Evangelical Culture in Nineteenth-Century Ontario and Quebec

The author argues that Methodists in nineteenth-century Ontario and Quebec existed as satellites of an influential empire. He examines how the Methodist ministry and laity in these colonies, whether they were British, American, or native-born, came to define themselves as transplanted Britons and Wesleyans, in response to their changing, often contentious relationship with the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Britain. He argues that a transatlantic perspective is necessary to understand the process of cultural formation among nineteenth-century Methodists. He shows that the Wesleyan Methodists in Britain played a key role in determining the identities of their colonial counterparts through disputes over the meaning of political loyalty, how Methodism should be governed, who should control church finances, and the nature and value of religious revivalism. At the same time, the author contends, Methodists in Ontario and Quebec threatened to disrupt the Wesleyan Methodist Church in Britain and helped to trigger the largest division in its history.

Montreal and Kingston

McGill-Queen's University Press

2013

xiv-236p.

en

978-0-7735-4204-4