Some, like Alexander Campbell and Barton Stone, proposed a return to (or “restoration” of) New Testament Christianity, stripped of centuries of additional teachings and practices. Other restorationists built on the foundation laid by the evangelical churches to critique the Protestant mainstream and move beyond the accepted boundaries of contemporary Christian orthodoxy. Many others left mainstream Protestantism altogether, opting instead to form their own churches. Each witnessed several schisms during the 1820s and 1830s as reformers advocated for a return to the practices and policies of an earlier generation. In addition to the divisions between evangelical and nonevangelical denominations wrought by the Second Great Awakening, the revivals and subsequent evangelical growth also revealed strains within the Methodist and Baptist churches. By any measure, the Mormons emerged as the most successful of these. The Second Great Awakening also prompted many religious utopias, like those of the Rappites and Shakers. Their ideas took many forms, from early socialist experiments (such as the Fourierists and the Owenites) to the dreams of the New England intellectual elite (such as Brook Farm). Some reformers, focused more on social ills than the transgressions of the church, engaged in communal experiments designed to create a more stable and equitable society by reimagining social and economic relationships.
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