Spiritual Chicago

I couldn't help but be reminded of the Second Great Awakening in reading Gilbert's chapter on "The Third City," as well as the online article about religion in Chicago.    The attention given to Moody was, in my estimation, similar to that of Finney from our studies last semester, with notable differences.  While both were religious men who led revival/religious movements to the masses, I feel that Finney more clearly shows a connection to a widespread movement that ultimately changed American values.  We discussed in our studies of the Second Great Awakening that the movement led to a more individualized conception of religion for people, and that that spiritual individualism spread to other areas of life. For me, I found myself wondering what, really, was the contribution Moody brought to Chicago and American culture?  The book was rather ambiguous on this fact, flip-flopping back and forth over what he meant to America.   The book spends thirty pages detailing his work and use of technology and popular culture in religion, only to say, "Moody was a paradox.  Despite his remarkable experiments in modern communication and advertizing, his social views were only ordinary, even conservative"(199).  Gilbert goes on to, once again, stress his marketing innovations, but also to say that he really didn't understand the implications of the technology he used or scientific theory, or the realities of an urban environment, and also, most of the people he converted reconverted.   But the book concludes the chapter by saying that his importance was in his use of "culture to overcome discontinuities, to affect behavior, and to apply technology and enterprise in the service of evangelical protestantism"(205).  Gilbert describes Moody's importance through the very things he already said Moody didn't effectively do...so I am mostly confused as to what his point was with this whole chapter.   Essentially, I feel that Moody made good use of technology but didn't ultimately change much about culture, except perhaps to influence others to use popular culture in religion more.  I will have to wait and see what others in class say about this to determine if he is a more useful point of departure for our study of American culture.