The televangelists may be the most conspicuous element of the evangelicalsubculture in America, and the bizarre antics of some of the most prominentfigures--Oral Roberts, Jim Bakker, or Jimmy Swaggart--make for amusing filmclips on the evening news. But as Randall Balmer reveals in this vivid andcolorful narrative, these men make up only a small part of a strikingly diversereligious movement; in fact, the Falwells and the Bakkers are marginal figures,of only moderate importance to the many fundamentalist, charismatic, andpentecostal believers in the United States.When it was first published in 1989, it was universally hailed as asensitive, moving, and enlightening account of a religious phenomena littleunderstood and often ridiculed. Now the companion volume to a forthcoming PBStelevision series hosted by Balmer, Mine Eyes Have Seen the Glory criss-crossesthe country--from Oregon to Florida, from Texas to North Dakota--to take readerson a journey into the heart of evangelical America. In an evenhanded,reflective series of New Yorker-style profiles, Balmer gives one the sense ofwhat it is like to sit in on classes in the Dallas Theological Seminary or toaccompany evangelical activists as they mobilize support for Pat Robertson andJack Kemp at the 1988 Iowa caucuses and the New Hampshire primary. We visit anold-fashioned holiness camp meeting in St. Petersburg, Florida, an Indianreservation in the Dakotas, a huge trade show for Christian booksellers, and afundamentalist Bible camp in the Adirondacks. In addition, the expanded editionincludes a profile of the Multnomah School of the Bible, a fundamentalist Bibleinstitute in Portland, Oregon; tells the story of the pentecostal congregationin Valdosta, Georgia that decided to join ranks with the Episcopal Church; andoffers an account of Billy Graham's recent crusade that brought tens ofthousands into New York's Central Park. Throughout, Balmer fills in thetheological and historical background--on the Jesus Movement in California, forinstance, or Protestant missionary work among Native-Americans--creating ineffect a capsule history of evangelicism. And while Balmer acknowledges acertain sympathy with evangelicism, he doesn't gloss over its failings--thecombativeness and exclusivity that permeate much of its teachings, or thepervasive theology of prosperity which Balmer deplores as "the sanctification ofAmerican consumerism."But perhaps what stands out most in this book is the people Balmer meetson his journey, ranging from the evangelical filmmaker Donald Thompson topentecostal faith healers to fervent young evangelists working the beaches ofsouthern California. It is through their eyes that we see into the heart ofAmerican evangelicism, that we understand the genuine appeal of the movement andthereby arrive at a more accurate and balanced portrait of an abiding traditionthat, as the author argues, is both rich in theological insights and mired incontradictions.