"Featuring an introduction by Samuel S. Hill, Religion in the Contemporary South brings together fourteen essays by both established and emerging scholars that deal with a spectrum of topics. These topics include religious identities in the South that weaves in and out of the past; new religious expressions in the South and the shifting position of "old" minority traditions; and a microcosmic look at the Episcopal Church. The collection comes at a time of sweeping change in the South, as the 150-year stronghold of evangelical Protestantism - the Baptist-Methodist hegemony - gives way to a more diverse religious tradition - one that includes leadership by women, decreasing marginalization for Roman Catholicism and Judaism, and the growing presence of so-called "alien" religious traditions: Buddhism, Hinduism, and Islam." "As the South changes and its religious life evolves, so must scholarship. Religion in the Contemporary South is a guide to the "new" southern religions - more diverse, sometimes controversial, but as vital to the region as ever."--Jacket.