The colonial history of the Caribbean created a context in which many
religions, from indigenous to African-based to Christian, intermingled
with one another, creating a rich diversity of religious life.
Caribbean Religious History offers the first comprehensive religious
history of the region.
Ennis B. Edmonds and Michelle A. Gonzalez begin their exploration with
the religious traditions of the Amerindians who flourished prior to
contact with European colonizers, then detail the transplantation of
Catholic and Protestant Christianity and their centuries of struggles to
become integral to the Caribbean's religious ethos, and trace the
twentieth century penetration of American Evangelical Christianity,
particularly in its Pentecostal and Holiness iterations. Caribbean
Religious History also illuminates the influence of Africans and their
descendants on the shaping of such religious traditions as Vodou,
Santeria, Revival Zion, Spiritual Baptists, and Rastafari, and the
success of Indian indentured laborers and their descendants in
reconstituting Hindu and Islamic practices in their new environment.
Paying careful attention to the region's social and political history,
Edmonds and Gonzalez present a one-volume panoramic introduction to this
religiously vibrant part of the world.
