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Abstract
Using multiple sources—readers' letters, survey data, fictional narrative, and taped interviews (with readers and authors)—this dissertation explores how conservative Protestant women read evangelical romance novels. As I talked with readers, they recounted how the genre served a variety of spiritual functions. It helped them claim personal time, cultivate supportive relationships, perform evangelical practices, and construct a theology of romance. These women's stories reveal the complicated ways they combine piety and pleasure, evangelicalism and entertainment, as well as religion and romance. Through their readings of the novels, I argue, these women narrate a vision of God's love that places them and their concerns—marriage and family—at the center of evangelicalism. They are the beloved of a romancing God. This study, then, provides insight into the lived religion of these evangelical women, the ways they live out their faith in everyday situations. Shifting focus from the Sunday sermon to the Christian romance illumines how hard these women work to sustain their evangelical identity. For my consultants, attending church or Bible study is not enough. They need other spiritual resources—evangelical romance reading—to help them fortify their evangelical commitments. Amidst the vagaries of daily life, the novels offer validation and support for these Christian daughters, wives, and mothers. By focusing on evangelical romance reading, this study broadens our understanding of evangelical popular culture and recovers a dimension of women's lived religious experience.
