Changes

These leaders encouraged religious revivals across the country. These revivals dramatically altered Christian theology in the United States by emphasizing self-improvement, self-reliance, and self-determination. The Second Great Awakening fundamentally changed the Christian faith in America.

Samuel Hopkins (1721-1803) was a prominent New England preacher and theologist who developed a new understanding of God's nature called the New Divinity. Hopkins was not alone in the endeavor; both Jonathan Edwards and Joseph Bellamy contributed to the New Divinity development, but Hopkins has become most associated with these religious beliefs. The New Divinity upended long-held Calvinist beliefs and argued that people had the right and ability to choose right from wrong. Additionally, a person's holiness and sinfulness belonged to them personally. Hopkins emphasized the importance of a free will. People's choices mattered and determined whether or not they would be saved. Hopkins died just as the Second Great Awakening began to get underway, but several preachers, including Charles Finney, spread a modified version of Hopkins' beliefs to the masses.