Faith, Freedom and Democracy: The Baptists in Atlantic Canada

George A. Rawlyk is a history professor at Queen’s University and
author of Champions of the Truth: Fundamentalism, Modernism, and the
Maritime Baptists.

This book, the author stresses, is “intended [not] for historians and
scholars” but “for John Doe, an average member of an average Baptist
Church.” Thus, the book should be judged not as a scholarly work but
rather as an example of popular, somewhat idiosyncratic, antiquarian
religious historical writing. There are many names and dates, and scores
of fine illustrations, in this handsomely produced volume. As one might
expect, there is little historical analysis and little attempt to locate
the study in any kind of historiographical context.

Roland McCormick is particularly interested in the century following
the end of the American Revolution, when the various groups of Maritime
Baptists became the largest Protestant grouping in New Brunswick and
Nova Scotia combined. He is eager to rescue the Free Christian and Free
Will Baptists from the margins of the religious history of the region.
This he does with both skill and a certain degree of passion.

Insufficient attention, however, has been placed on explaining why, in
the 20th century, the Maritime Baptists have declined as much as they
have in numbers and in influence. The 20th-century declension is as much
a part of the Maritime Baptist story as is the remarkable growth of the
Baptists in the 19th century. Though the author is eager to separate
himself from “historians and scholars,” he could have made much more
use of their work in order to produce a far better popular history.