Princeton University Press
Bible Nation: The United States of Hobby Lobby
Key Metrics
- Candida R Moss
- Princeton University Press
- Hardcover
- 9780691177359
- 9.3 X 6.4 X 1.1 inches
- 1.15 pounds
- Religion > Christianity - Protestant
- English
Secure TransactionBook Description
How the billionaire owners of Hobby Lobby are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to make America a Bible nation
Like many evangelical Christians, the Green family of Oklahoma City believes that America was founded on a biblical worldview as a Christian nation. But the Greens are far from typical evangelicals in other ways. The billionaire owners of Hobby Lobby, a huge nationwide chain of craft stores, the Greens came to national attention in 2014 after successfully suing the federal government over their religious objections to provisions of the Affordable Care Act. What is less widely known is that the Greens are now America's biggest financial supporters of Christian causes--and they are spending hundreds of millions of dollars in an ambitious effort to increase the Bible's influence on American society. In Bible Nation, Candida Moss and Joel Baden provide the first in-depth investigative account of the Greens' sweeping Bible projects and the many questions they raise.
Bible Nation tells the story of the Greens' rapid acquisition of an unparalleled collection of biblical antiquities; their creation of a closely controlled group of scholars to study and promote their collection; their efforts to place a Bible curriculum in public schools; and their construction of a $500 million Museum of the Bible near the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Bible Nation reveals how these seemingly disparate initiatives promote a very particular set of beliefs about the Bible--and raise serious ethical questions about the trade in biblical antiquities, the integrity of academic research, and more.
Bible Nation is an important and timely account of how a vast private fortune is being used to promote personal faith in the public sphere--and why it should matter to everyone.
Author Bio
My work primarily focuses on ideas about martyrdom, death, suffering, and afterlife in the New Testament and literature of Early Christianity. I have additional interests in disability theory and theology, religion and public life, the Bible and education, and cultural heritage.
I read theology as an undergraduate at Oxford, before moving to the United States to pursue post-graduate work in Biblical Studies at, first Yale Divinity School and, later, Yale Graduate School. In 2008, I moved to the University of Notre Dame to teach classes in the departments of Theology, Classics, and History before coming to Birmingham in 2017.
While my academic work is primarily historical, I work in the public sphere as s Papal news commentator for CBS news, a cultural commentator and columnist for The Daily Beast, and a religion news commentator and writer for CNN, BBC, National Geographic, Smithsonian, Discovery Channel, History Channel, and others. A great deal of my recent work has focused on the intersection of religion and politics and the influence of certain religious ideas on international relations, policy making, and education.
Research Interests
I am currently completing a book, based on the 2017 Cadbury Lectures, on Resurrection on the New Testament, Ancient Medicine, Disability, and Constructions of the Bodies.
Other ongoing projects include the Hermeneia Commentary on Second Century Martyrdom Accounts and a Bestiary of the Bible
Source: University of Birmingham
Videos
Community reviews
Write a ReviewNo Community reviews