A consuming fire

"The fall of the Confederacy proved traumatic for a people who fought with the belief that God was on their side. Yet, as Eugene D. Genovese demonstrates in A Consuming Fire, Southern Christians continued to trust in the Lord's will. The churches had long defended "Southern rights" and insisted that slavery had divine sanction, but they also warned that God was testing His people, who must bring slavery up to biblical standards or face His wrath.". "For proslavery spokesmen, "Christian slavery" offered the South, indeed the world, the best hope for the vital work of preparation for the…