Date of Award

5-2013

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Arts in Theology

Department

Theology

First Advisor

William McDonough

Department/School

Theology

Abstract

This thesis emerges from my experience with conservative evangelical Christianity. I come from a conservative evangelical Christian background, raised in a Baptist church that dropped the word Baptist from its name, preferring instead to be known as a non-denominational church. It was there that I observed that a church’s success is measured, in large part, by the number of new converts it brings to Christianity. I became disillusioned by the superficiality in the worship services. For example, I heard from a church employee that one music director was hired because, in addition to having a Master’s Degree in music, he just looked really good when he was conducting the choir.

A desire to preserve the faith tradition as they believe it has been practiced in earlier periods of history and the certainty about God, humanity, and salvation that is provided to its believers have led me to examine in greater detail how the conservative evangelical understanding of faith compares with my own beliefs and with those of other Christian theologians.

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