I recently read Matthew Bowman’s The Urban Pulpit: New York City and the Fate of Liberal Evangelicalism (Oxford, 2014). The book recalls the original established churches of New York, which were Dutch Reformed and Anglican. Then the evangelical awakening, spearheaded by George Whitefield and others in the late 1730s and '40s, emphasized the importance of a conversion experience through hearing the gospel proclaimed.
Though the older churches rejected Whitefield and the need for conversion, the new Presbyterian congregations were open to him. Over the course of the 18th century, led by the ministers John Gano of First Baptist and John Rodgers of First Presbyterian, these two denominations embraced evangelical ministry and grew and flourished more than others. First Presbyterian planted Brick, Cedar Street (later Fifth Ave), and Rutgers Presbyterian. First Baptist also saw many new Baptist churches started around the city. By the first half of the 1800s, evangelical Christianity was the “cultural consensus” and had come to “cultural dominance” in the New York. The Fulton Street revival of 1857-1859 may have been its high tide.
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