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INTRODUCTION
The prosperity gospel is one of the most significant developments in postWorld War II American religion. It has mirrored and shaped American culture across a wide spectrum of race, class, and religious groups, flourishing among Pentecostals and charismatics, in African American and Latino churches, and across a wide range of groups that would not otherwise lump themselves together. It has been key to the rise of megachurches. And yet, until Kate Bowler's book appeared, the origins and development of the movement, stretching back to the beginning of the twentieth century, had not been comprehensively analyzed.1
What follows is a collection of comments originally delivered in January 2015 at a Conference on Faith and History session dedicated to Blessed and held in conjunction with the American Historical Association annual meeting in New York City, with a response from Kate Bowler. Each of the panelists has a unique point of view on the prosperity gospel and Bowler's approach to it. Randall Stephens has written books on holiness and Pentecostalism in the American South and the recent history of evangelicalism. Most of the key prosperity preachers have Pentecostal connections, making Stephens an ideal choice to comment on Bowler's work. John Turner is the author of biographies of Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, and Brigham Young, the Mormon leader who lead the faithful to Utah, and is now working on postwar Mormonism. The...