Other Published Works
The Nature of Church Camp: An Environmental History of Outdoor Ministry, 1945-1980 (Lexington Books, 2024)
The Nature of Church Camp explores how mid-century Protestant camps and retreat centers quietly reshaped American ideas about nature, community, and moral responsibility. Drawing on archival research, oral histories, and site visits, historian Christopher W. Anderson reveals how these outdoor ministries became unexpected laboratories for environmental ethics and spiritual renewal.
At the intersection of faith, leisure, and ecology, these institutions moved beyond traditional church programming to embrace small-group camping and immersive natural experiences. Their evolving practices responded cautiously to rising ecological concerns, helping redefine how Americans understood stewardship, democracy, and the good life.
This book offers a rich historical foundation for the ideas explored in Practical Muße, including the cultural and spiritual significance of rest, the politics of land use and leisure, and the search for more humane, sustainable ways of living together.
“Native Americans and the Origin of Abraham Lincoln’s Views on Race,” in the Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association, Volume 37: Issue 1, (Winter 2016), 11-29.
This study of Lincoln’s frontier encounters and racial imagination recovers Abraham Lincoln’s early encounters with Native Americans as formative moments in his racial thinking. By tracing these often overlooked interactions, the piece sheds light on how moral perspectives are shaped at the intersections of contact, conflict, and frontier life, offering a quiet counterpoint to dominant narratives of American leadership.
